Pokémon: Who let him leave Pallet Town?

Chapter 126 Underground Temple
Meanwhile, Natsume had already arrived deep in the forest.

"What exactly is that little groundhog trying to do?"

Natsume found it strange.

Gophers have a habit of planting tree fruits and using their own droppings to fatten them up.

Natsume was very clear about this.

But along the way, every tree fruit planted by the little groundhog had a big bite taken out of it.

Some seeds were bitten in half.

The fruit of this tree cannot sprout.

No wonder the gopher colony says this little gopher is strange by nature.

Deep in the forest, the further you go, the fewer muddy paths there are.

In the end, even dense pebbles appeared under Natsume's feet.

Torches were hung at intervals on the large trees on both sides.

Natsume, intrigued, quickened his pace.

At the end of the road stood a stone temple covered in green vines.

Outside the stone temple, there are two statues.

The statue is quite old, and many parts have weathered away, making it appear somewhat abstract.

Natsume arrived in front of the fairly well-formed statue.

The stone is cracked like scales, and its tail curls into a question mark in the ripples of wind erosion, while only the spine stubbornly retains the arc of mythology.

Natsume examined it closely and could vaguely recognize it from its shape and long tail as a dreamlike statue.

Is this the ancestral home of the Lara Americans?

Natsume remembered that last night, after the old chieftain finished his oath, a group of Lalamo tribesmen went to the forest with sacrificial items.

"If that's the case, then the so-called god of abundance and hunting..."

Natsume shifted his gaze and looked at another statue with great interest.

Unfortunately, this statue seems to be older than the Dream Statue.

Most of it has weathered away and disappeared, covered with moss.

The only distinguishing feature is the stinger at the tail of the statue, which resembles the stinger of a large bee.

Natsume searched his memory but couldn't think of any mythical beast with a needle as thick and long as Beedrill.

"Never mind, let's find the little groundhog first," Natsume muttered.

The gods worshipped by many ethnic minorities are not necessarily mythical beasts.

Some ethnic minorities also worship things like the wind-speed dog and the fire moth.

Maybe this is a giant bee statue.

Natsume pulled out a flashlight and with a clang, the shrine was illuminated as bright as day.

The telekinetic energy was simultaneously released, and both the physical eyes and the mind scanned everything inside.

Inside the temple, wrinkled orange seeds lay beneath a stone niche, and a half-burnt incense stick sat in a bronze censer.

The blue bricks are covered with messy footprints, and faded gold coins are embedded in the dents of the offering table.

Apart from that, Natsume found nothing.

"Strange"

Natsume muttered to himself, "The little groundhog's droppings disappeared right here."

Suddenly, Natsume's gaze darkened.

In its perception, there was a considerable space beneath the temple.

"This is?"

Natsume used his telekinesis to investigate, but could not get close; it seemed to be blocked by something.

The researcher's curiosity was piqued, and Natsume stepped out of the temple, using his telekinesis to explore his surroundings.

There should be an entrance to an underground space somewhere.

After searching for a long time, until a faint stinging pain came from his brain, Natsume still couldn't find the so-called entrance.

He even tried teleportation, but couldn't pinpoint the landing point at all.

"We can't just dig a big hole in someone's family's land, can we?"

Natsume pulled out an iron shovel.

So he decided to dig a small hole.

As soon as the shovel hit the ground, Natsume seemed to remember something, and looked up at the dreamlike statue at the entrance as if possessed.

He approached the statue, and under his telekinetic investigation, the Dream Statue seemed perfectly normal. "How could its tail still be there?" Natsume squinted, looking at the Dream Statue's slender tail.

Logically speaking, this part should be the weakest and the first to break due to weathering.

But now, the tail of the dream statue is actually the most intact.

This defies common sense.

Even the bee statue next door, now just a butt, would cry if it saw it.

Natsume reached out and touched the tail of the dream statue, trying to bend it.

"Kacha!"

The tail made a crisp sound, and Natsume's feet slipped, causing him to fall.

"null--"

The tail returned to its place, and the small cobblestone path bounced back.

The surroundings were quiet, as if nothing had happened.

"Stab~"

A faint blue light flickered in Natsume's eyes.

Despite the rapid fall, Natsume quickly regained his balance.

"Clang-"

When the high-powered flashlight was turned on, the originally dark space was instantly illuminated as if it were daytime.

Natsume was in a small path, surrounded by basalt.

As you pass through the winding basalt tunnel, the air suddenly condenses into a scorching, dry heat.

"It's so dry in here," Natsume muttered to himself.

Suddenly, the space in front of him opened up, and the beam of the flashlight instantly filled the entire area.

Before Natsume stood an even larger temple!

The 20-meter-high main hall dome is supported by eight honeycomb-shaped rock pillars, each of which is etched with an ancient relief depicting a swarm of large needle bees surrounding a pink halo.

"Is it really a Beedrill?"

Natsume was taken aback, guessing that this might have been left by the Lara Americans from a very ancient time.

As Natsume approached, he discovered that the things embedded in the tips of the bee stings had all been gouged out, leaving only honeycomb-shaped, pitch-black holes, like hollowed-out eye sockets.

“Sometimes, it’s even older than the temple above.”

Natsume glanced at the honeycomb-like structure inside the hole, and with a gentle touch on the stone pillar beside him, he was able to tear off a large piece, which contained the same honeycomb structure.

On the central altar, a dreamlike serpentine stone sculpture hangs from the dome, its tail coiled into a spiral shape.

The broken left claw of the statue reveals a honeycomb-like internal cavity structure.

Natsume found some suspicious alloy fragments here.

Twelve bronze lamp pillars are arranged around the perimeter, with a small cigarette butt inside the nearest lamp.

Natsume picked up the cigarette butt, but it turned to dust with just a gentle touch, perhaps because the area was too dry.

Looking up, half a piece of Snorlax energy bar packaging paper was still stuck to the charred lamp wall.

All the discoveries tell Natsume that Sakaki had already sent people to remove all the valuable items from this place.

However, the temple itself has considerable historical value.

"Tsk, what a pity that it was hidden underground."

Natsume shook his head, no longer in a hurry to find the little ground squirrel, and instead wandered around the actual shrine.

What if you can find a bargain?
Natsume ignored the enormous dream statue and walked straight toward the statue of the giant bee swarm.

Giovanni will definitely take everything related to fantasy, leaving no stone unturned.

But this bee is different; it might leave something behind.

Standing before the largest Beedrill statue, the researcher's sensitivity made Natsume stop in his tracks.

This bee statue has a crown-like shape carved into its head for some reason.

Most importantly, there is a stone-carved pedestal in front of the statue.

On the shelf, there was a semi-circular recess; the items inside had already been removed.

Natsume looked at the dent and pondered for a moment.

After a while, he took out a red and white ball and placed it in the indentation.

Perfect fit.

(End of this chapter)