[ti]location[/ti] GIANT SHRINE (gone)

Sarah dismounted her Duraludon and stared up, trying to find the point where the spire ended and the sky began. It was an impossible task from this close to the base of the tower, and she was more likely to fall over backwards than find that invisible seam.

She lost the staring contest with the sky and looked away, eyes watering.

Lightning snapped through the sky like neon rubber, slapping against the tower and making Freedom groaned like a stressed girder.

Sarah laid a hand on him and he calmed, grinding his massive steel feet into the topsoil. He closed his eyes, settling down for a long wait. This wasn't the first time they'd come to the shrine to 'think'.

Sarah turned her gaze back to the sky. One day she would win the staring contest, and the heavens would buckle under the weight of her will. One day.

Jinx still felt a little odd, visiting the shrines, going to what was canonically some sort of spiritual center dedicated to legendary Pokemon just to get her health back. Why couldn't this be like the other games and have you just speak to a nurse at the, uh... what were they called... Pokemon Houses? At least then there would be a clear conversation partner, a goal that made sense in-game as well as out of it.

Or was the shrine being a place of healing meant to make sense in this game's lore as well? Was she actually getting healed by the legendary Pokemon themselves every time?

It was a big thought for a small girl to have, and so Jinx just stared up at the immense stature of the Giant Shrine and considered for a moment what, exactly, she would be drawing her newfound power from.

Even with that other player jumping in there to help her with the Duraludon, Jinx wasn't sure she'd survive its attack without a shrine visit in between, and when the other player had run to the shrine, well... Jinx had followed. The wild Duraludon would be there when she got back, that much she knew. Better to heal up now, somewhere with even more towering metal than she'd found in that wild encounter in the Steppes, and then come back recharged and raring to go.

Mismatched eyes gaze up towards the highest point of the enormous monument, quite the difference from the dark precipice into which they stare so often. A shrine to the sky and a shrine to the deep. The choice between them is obvious to her.

Still, dragon hunting is not an easy profession to take, and its toll makes itself clear on both Tuesday and her companions. It's time to rest and heal, and for that, a stop by the giant shrine is necessary.

Does she pray? No.

She does offer gratitude, though.

"Thank you." The words are whispered when a gloved hand touches still, feeling the charge of electricity.

Unfortunately for Duraludon, the battle took place at the Giant Shrine.

"Don't worry, Crony," Bergamot said calmly, standing on the crest of the hill. Her hair whipped behind her as the storm crackled overhead. There was a flash, and a single fork of lightning stabbed down, drawn immediately to the Giant Shrine's imposing spire. Static crackled in the air, sweet as ozone.

"We're invincible."

Duraludon's beam attack hit at the same time the Giant Shrine 's power activated. Bergamot's Salandit was engulfed by two sources of light and power- one healing, one destructive. Two poles, positive and negative. But which would win out?

The Giant Shrine, of course.

It was immense. It was incomparable. To Duraludon, the Giant Shrine was a skyscraper, and the dragon-type Pokemon was just a tin can tossed in the dirt.