Story Guide

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Returning to their home in Rift City, Jay and Nuri with their guilds the Roaring Icebergs and Ardent Cinders are sent to Helmstok's farm to deal with a band of Bunnelby led by a Diggersby, stealing the local crops. In the end, the Roaring Icebergs net a win with better speed and damage control.


Story Update * Job 1 Journal

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The Roaring Icebergs are dispatched to the Ivory Forest to find Helmstok's lost aide Aria. Though the woods drain their energy with every step and the Ivory Bloodsapper threatens to devour them, Jay, Tiva and the group eventually manage to track down Aria, as well as a very mysterious "gate" nestled away in the woods, one with stones impossible to break and surrounded by symbols nobody can read...

Meanwhile, Nuri, Wren and the Ardent Cinders stay behind on the farm to repair the damage caused by the captured Diggersby and his cohorts (and the guilds themselves in the process). Replanting lost crops and re-plowing the fields takes a bit of effort, and delivering food harvests to the market and Zug the Diggersby to the Correctional Facility in Rift City takes a long while, but the work is done all the same.


Story Update Prologue * Mission 1 Journal * Story Update Epilogue

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With Mayor Izel notified about the gate, she chooses to focus on reopening trade with Neve Town in the north. The roads have been disastrously ripped apart with fallen trees and overgrowth everywhere, and the added coverage has allowed bandits and wild Pokémon to settle in and cause trouble for travelers. When the guilds manage to clear the paths, the Ardent Cinders have already reached the aerial tramways before the Roaring Icebergs and helped the tram operator to fix cars for them.

Story Update * Job 2 Journal

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The Ardent Cinders reach Neve Town by tram where Mayor Berwyn and Taiga Fist Guild Leaders Barrik and Gloria tell them that Konjac, a talented scholar in town, has been kidnapped by a sneaky group that are skilled at using handmade traps as well as their own abilities to cause distractions for the Taiga Fists that their smaller numbers can't otherwise handle. Despite not knowing why exactly Konjac was taken, the Cinders manage to track down the kidnappers and reclaim Konjac, returning him home.

At the same time the Icebergs decide to travel up the mountain on foot, knowing that it will take longer to wait for the repaired cars to come back down and pick them up. They catch wind from locals at the base of the mountain about some bandits on the loose and corner the culprits easily, but one of the pair sets off a bomb which causes the guilds to fall into a dusty abandoned building filled with broken-down Porygons. They have to find a path out, but the bandits are inside with them, and they're good at sneaking around. Jay and company manage to escape, even chasing off the bandits in the process, and they also find two Pokémon with buzzy voices that are still awake - a Porygon-Z that Jay calls "Twitch" and a strange, tall bug that he names "Glitch".

Story Update Prologue * Mission 2 Journal * Story Update Epilogue

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After learning that Konjac may be able to translate the runes on the gate in the Ivory Forest, Nuri and Jay try to convince the Neve leaders to let him return to Rift City with them. They agree, on one condition - Konjac wants to translate a message he found in the tunnels below town first, but that pathway is taboo thanks to the violent criminals living inside, led by an old and evil empress from the time before the Taiga Fist Brigade started up named Verana. Without protection, Konjac would never be trusted to go down there.

Even with two guilds at his back, Verana is a force to be reckoned with and her sheer outrage at having her home invaded is barely held back long enough for Konjac to get his notes done. Leaving the tunnel at a full running pace, the Ardent Cinders use a trap laid ahead of time to seal the entrance and lock in Verana and her flunkies.


Story Update Prologue * Job 3 Journal * Story Update Epilogue

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After all the excitement of fighting kidnappers and ruthless empresses, Barrik decides it would do his young friends some good to take time to relax. With Tiva's help, the guilds schedule some party activities - ice sculpting, scholar interviews and tests, and even a Battle Royale against the Taiga Fist Brigade! Meanwhile, as Konjac works on decoding the runes he copied in the tunnels, any remaining guild members try to help clean the rust and muck from Glitch and Twitch's armored bodies.


Story Update Epilogue * Nights at Never Journal

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The guilds return to Rift City to an unfortunate disaster - once again, sinkholes have opened up below the buildings they call home, causing buildings to tip over, crumble, and trap helpless Pokémon in rubble. Izel dispatches the two groups immediately, sending the Icebergs to handle search and rescue for injured and trapped citizens as well as keeping damage under control, stopping the buildings from collapsing any further. The Ardent Cinders are sent to recapture escapees from the Correctional Facility nearby - freed thanks to the sinkholes. With the help of Zug, the Diggersby from Helmstok's farm, they must return anyone captured to Pine, the leader of the Facility.


Story Update Prologue * Mission 3 Journal * Story Update Epilogue

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Mayor Izel has started having psychic visions in her sleep, only making her more concerned about the mystery of the gate in the Ivory Forest. The latest vision has given her a sign that it has to be opened with special keystones before a terrible disaster occurs, and that two are in "the drowned depths" and "the pool of the moon". Nuri and Jay suspect that one may be in Attwell, the village nestled next to a deep lake. Although there is some concern about having both guilds leave the city when a disaster had just happened, Izel is convinced that not only does she have the help needed in the city already, but this Gate matter is more urgent. However, she can't communicate with them without some extra help, so Esther joins them as a close friend who can communicate with Izel in her dreams.

The Cinders and Icebergs find the Spiked Cannons' boat out on the water by Attwell Village easily, and meet with Fjord's second-in-command now having taken his place, Nami, and Mayor Lunette and her kids. Nami is sure that digging around in the sunken mines under the village is a bad move, feeling that the risk of drowning or getting caved in is a serious threat, but the Rift City leaders feel that the key is worth tracking down and so they move in. The Roaring Icebergs take a lead and collect the next keystone.

Glitch has his own vision, caused by a strange spirit while all the guilds are asleep. This sight seems to be some kind of memory or hallucination, a gate similar to the one the guilds found in the Ivory Forest which is sealed and without keystones. A voice can be heard crying out to be let back in and that "they are in there".


Story Update Prologue *  LOG 00000 * Job 4 Journal * Story Update Epilogue

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The guilds have plans to visit Asteria City next, and as it turns out Attwell Village has a shipment to make there - and their somewhat scatterbrained delivery Gyarados, Riptide, could use some extra assistance to make sure she doesn't spill or "donate" the goods during the trip, which Nami points out happens frequently. Because the boat can only hold one guild at a time, the Ardent Cinders agree to join her and make sure that each and every crate arrives safely. Though, as it turns out, some familiar bandits that were met on Iclyn Mountain are eager to interfere.

After Jay heads back to Rift City to test if the keystone they found really will fit into the Gate, the remaining Roaring Icebergs face their own dilemma when the entire village is given a blackmail ultimatum - they are warned by a Ribombee and the same kidnappers and bandits from Iclyn Mountain that they have to give up their keystones, or the whole village will be fried with a series of electricity-based traps, and if they try to disarm them they have to face punishment from two powerful Raichu sisters and risk the lives of Mayor Lunette and her kids. Tiva hurries to get her teams out to rescue the Mayor and disarm the traps, and the bandits are driven off safely.


Story Update Prologue * Mission 4 Journal * Story Update Epilogue

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With the deliveries complete and Attwell Village saved, Rift City's guilds find that Asteria City has its own problems to work out. There are troublemaking kids going around painting graffiti all over houses while youngsters climb on Riptide despite not knowing how to swim, and the kitchens are understaffed to prepare food for themselves on top of two more guilds besides their own. All guilds are split up to help with these tasks while waiting to have a word with the Pale Rose guild leader.


Story Update Prologue * Welcome to Asteria Journal

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Pandora of the Pale Roses agrees to let the guild enter the place they call "The Moon Pool", a place sealed away in an abandoned building outside of the city thanks to the ghosts that have been constantly coming out of it ever since the dark times when the city was first established. Ebony guides them to the sealed door and leaves them to their work after Glitch blasts the door open with his cannon. Esther shows that they don't feel safe going inside, and wait in a tree instead. Inside the guilds see a building a lot like the one where Glitch and Twitch were found, and a gate just like the one in the Ivory Forest - but open and glowing from the magical "water" inside. After passing through, the guilds find themselves in a forest that somehow folds around itself as if it's grown inside of a tube, with gravity all over the place. The keystone turns out to be placed at the front of a ghostly train which is hard to catch and even more tricky to ride as it can turn intangible apparently at random. Yet another keystone is collected by the Roaring Icebergs, and although the ghosts are in hot pursuit they stop as soon as the guilds make it through the gate and back into the Moon Pool Facility.

Meanwhile, as the guilds go through the gate to find the key Glitch has a panic attack, refusing to go through with them. Twitch and Konjac stay behind to comfort him, and they and any guild members staying behind decide to follow up on the advice Wren and Tiva have given them: the Icebergs are to hunt around the facility and try to find any more information from the Ancients that could be helpful in getting the Gate open. Meanwhile Wren, having some suspicions of Pandora, has the Cinders try to learn more about her and how she helps to lead Asteria.


Story Update Prologue * Job 5 Journal * Story Update Epilogue

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When the guilds come through the Moon Pool, they find all their members collapsed on the floor, sleeping. And without warning, everyone coming out falls asleep as well. It turns out, with a message from Esther, there is something inside the facility that has just put both of the guilds into a deep sleep, trapping them in a mashed-up world of dreams, desires and nightmares - which is agreed on by two voices cutting off Esther and insisting that the guilds stay. The guild leaders and new partners joining them are just too deep to realize what's happened by themselves, so it's up to the guild members who are still able to remember that they're asleep to snap themselves and everyone else out of it.

While anyone who can fight from inside the dreamscape is trying to get out, the members that were out in Asteria at the time and managed to not be put under try to use Esther's advice to help. The strange smoke that has spread over the sleeping guilds has to be held back as much as possible, and any movement from something trying to get close to them should be chased off quickly. The guilds manage to free themselves, with a parting message from the two voices warning that the guilds have taken a mission that's over their heads and they should stop now, before they meet the voices again as enemies.

Nuri and Jay break into a fierce argument, reminded of the worst time in their lives by the nightmare they shared. Tiva and Wren explain to the guilds that their adoptive father, Shamus, originally led one guild for Rift City while he raised them, until a sinkhole event took him away from them forever. Jay and Nuri, each insisting that the other was responsible for their troubles, make an announcement that the Icebergs and Cinders are not to interact with one another from here on out.



Story Update Prologue * Dream-State Disaster Journal

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The threat of mysterious entities is doubled with a new shock as Pandora declares an arrest when they get back to the city. Tiva is taken prisoner as a thief, which Jay insists is too petty a crime. The claim falls on deaf ears and Tiva is taken away along with her belongings.

Reiko, the daughter of the guild leader before Pandora, takes pity on the guilds and offers them a stay in her family home while they try to sort out the mess that they now have to deal with. While Nuri mocks Jay for having a partner who steals things, Wren takes over as a leader to get information. Jay explains that the things Tiva took were junk items, almost nothing actually valuable, and that he was making sure Tiva returned what was taken when he found out. On top of the information gathered by the members of the Ardent Cinders who didn't get put to sleep in the Moon Pool Facility - information that Pandora goes missing regularly and seems to gamble often - Wren suspects that Tiva was arrested as part of a ploy to get to something valuable - which at the moment is the keystone they took from the Moon Pool.

Glitch and Twitch interrupt with a beam of light that illuminates a strange ghost attached to Reiko, one that reacts to the pressure to have Reiko take over as the Pale Rose Guild leader (like the plan had been before her mother passed away and she handed the guild over to Pandora instead). The mysterious figure does not speak or react to words or attacks from the guilds, making it hard to find a way to get it removed.

With their suspicions only growing, the guilds disperse with the Icebergs performing a jailbreak - first having to find the secret hidden prison where Tiva is being kept and getting her free. They come face to face with Gus, the leader of the criminals they've been dealing with so far called "The Jawbreakers", and a Spiritomb named Division. The two are so powerful that the Icebergs are unable to defeat them and have to book a hasty retreat along with Tiva's cellmate - the original Mayor of Asteria Ichabod.

The Cinders take to investigative work. Their task is to find any information that proves Pandora as an unworthy guild leader, find a replacement, and potentially free Reiko from the ghost attached to her. They manage to uncover proof that Pandora has been taking deals with criminals and blackmailers, allowing crime to run rampant in Asteria. The most noticeable of the bunch is The Jawbreakers - a group in Asteria at that very moment. The various members of the Jawbreakers try to take the evidence collected by the Cinders, but the guilds win out and expose Pandora to the masses.

Story Update Prologue * Mission 5 journal

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Job 6

Izel's next contact is to inform the guilds that they should return to Neve Town for the next keystone hidden inside of a sealed doorway which they believe Konjac can open with a secret phrase. The guilds learn that Barrik has stepped down as guild leader, placing his partner Gloria in charge. She is not as welcoming to the Cinders and Icebergs as Barrik was, and isn't impressed by their story about keystones and gates, but is ultimately convinced to let them return to Pandora's tunnels - with a warning that if they cause any trouble, she will make sure they are punished.

Konjac successfully opens a strange passage underground, leading to a mystical passage filled with statues of strange Pokémon, including one that holds the keystone. Before they can take it, the statues spring to life and carve escape tunnels, spilling molten lava into the room. Konjac realizes that the flow is strong enough to reach up into Neve Town and destroy his home town if it isn't brought under control quickly. But when Trough, Crest and Gulshan appear and chase after the statues with the runaway keystone, Jay and Nuri go after them - not willing to risk letting Gus get to it first and having to face him again. The guild is split, with half of the leaders staying behind to quell the lava threat, and the other two pursuing the keystone. Only one group can succeed.

Log 00001  * Story Update Prologue * Job 6 journal

To be continued...