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Note: Please do not harass the original author or anyone who makes content related to this pasta. This review was simply made for entertainment purposes only. This is all based on MY OPINION as well.

DISCLAIMER: Please read the source of the following story by sparklingdemon for more context. I will not explicitly provide every single image or detail of the story throughout this review to encourage my audience to read the original source material. I’ll provide some screenshots when needed and tell which page I’m on and provide a link for respective page number for the review, but I still highly encourage everyone to read the story itself and check out all of sparklingdemon’s other work. I'll still provide summaries and breakdowns of the story since some people struggled to read the original source material, but ALL CREDIT goes to sparklingdemon . (Link will be provided next to the "Pasta Name".)

WELCOME BACK TO SAUCEZ REVIEWZ: POKEPASTAS SERIES!!! No, really... It's been way too long!

Pasta Name: PMD: Explorers of Death (Rewritten) by sparklingdemon
Publish Date: January 31, 2021

Synopsis: The protagonist forces her starter to be a Vulpix instead of a Squirtle and named her Myra, which leads to a conflict between Myra and the Squirtle insisting which one of them is the “real hero” of the journey with their Shinx partner, Shadow roped into the conflict as well.

Fun Fact: In the vanilla game, Vulpix has a relaxed nature, Shinx has a hasty nature, and Squirtle has a bold nature.

Highlight: Obviously the visuals and comic-formatted storytelling.

Quote: “Kill her and make this right...” -Shadow... and others (It was hard to choose which quote to use.)

Story - Page 1:
So it starts off with the protag saying they're not big on Pokémon spin-off games and they didn't get far in PMD: Rescue Team DX, but the feelings towards the game flooded back to them. You answered a series of questions to determine what Pokémon you'd be. But if you didn't like the fate, you had to reset and redo the quiz until you got the one you wanted. Everyone had to suffer during this process. Explorers of Sky came out in 2009. It was exciting for any PMD fans for a newly updated version of Time/Darkness. The protag was amazed about having to play as a Pokémon for the PMD games.

Their dad was running errands and they went to GameStop for kicks and got a copy of Explorers of Explorers of Sky as it was cheaper than usual. The protagonist was amazed at the diverse environments and the sprite work done for the PMD games and the ability to move diagonally.

So the prologue is almost the same as the original versions but shorter and more brief. I don't mind as it's straight to the point. However, I guess we should pay attention to the fact the game is cheaper than expected as it can raise suspicion, especially for a newly released game at the time (since in the story, these events happened over a decade ago). Also, the pasta is in some kind of comic strip format and let me tell you, the visuals and sprite work for the pasta are really well-made and can make the pasta very convincing.

They were presented with a promising world with a Vulpix walking on a dirt road and they were excited about having the option to play as a Vulpix as they had a high interest in Vulpix, like lighting a fire in their soul type of interest. Their hopes and dreams were confirmed reaching the New Game option with Vulpix trailing behind Shinx, which inspired the Vulpix-Shinx team. They selected "New Game" as they were thinking they were living the dream.

The protag had to answer some questions before entering their paradise. They were considered as a bold type after the quiz. Taking in the text, believing they were getting a Vulpix, only to be given a Squirtle instead. The protag scoffed in absolute betrayal. Not wanting to play as Squirtle, so they reset their DS. They skipped the intro and title screen this time, thinking the personality quiz results were a mistake as they had to be Vulpix. They got Squirtle again. The process repeated, only with randomly selected answers this time: Squirtle again. Another reset occurred, this time, the protag tried to answer the questions differently than before, and that Squirtle icon appeared again in the results. They jumped onto the computer to search for answers on the personality quiz just to get Vulpix. They inserted the answers for Vulpix, but they got the textbox, "You seem to be... the bold type!" again, which is what they've been getting to receive Squirtle beforehand. The protag groaned, not wanting to see Squirtle's dumb face again. Right before the results came in, the game seemingly froze, but before hitting the power switch, static erupted and Vulpix's icon appeared. The outcome was a success.

Now to choose their partner, which would be Shinx. The Shinx icon gave a cute smile and they named him Shadow after their Luxray from Diamond Version. Their journey was about to begin without anything spoiled for them. The screen faded to black and it stayed like that for a while with the protag assuming the game had bad loading times and suspected the game froze again, until a textbox appeared that said "... She's here..." The protag wondered who was speaking and if it was directed towards them.

Page 2
Pics 1-5 (Pic 1) The screen faded to a dark starless sky hanging above a monochrome ocean with the sounds of ocean waves heard but the background depicts them not moving. It was like this for one minute until static abruptly appeared for a second and Vulpix was seen to be laying on the beach in a growing poll of blood, which caught the protag off-guard in shock, but they gradually got excited, thinking "Pokémon was finally taking things to the next level." A Shinx slowly crept onto the screen, presumably Shadow. The protag assumed partners get a special color and blindly accepted it, seeing what he would do next when he stepped forward and spoke.
(Pic 2) "Shadow: I swear I heard it around here somewhere..."
(Pic 3) "Shadow: No, no, it was just nothing..."Shadow then noticed the Vulpix.
(Pic 4) "Shadow: ...!" (Pic 5) "Shadow: ..." Shadow stared at Vulpix sadly and eventually had electricity spark around him.
Before I go on, I want you all to take a look at these visuals as I go by. I'm not planning on posting every single one of them because: I don't want to seem like I'm stealing content from sparklingdemon, deviantart has a KB limit for descriptions and adding pictures uses a lot of KB, and it would be too much work to post all of them.

Pics 6-9 (Pic 6) Shadow: "Kill her and make us right..." Shadow repeated that phrase to himself as the spark grew bigger. "Blood and Pokémon killing each other? Awesome!" The protag thought. Your character's about to get killed, but I guess I would be in awe seeing those themes in a Pokémon game too. (Pic 7) "Shadow: ..." Shadow stopped his attack and shook his head. (Pic 8) "Shadow: ...No, there has to be another way." (Pic 9) Shadow dragged Myra off-screen, leaving a trail of blood behind as the screen then fades away.

Page 3 Pics 10-14
The next shot shows Vulpix in some colorless cave sleeping by a campfire and a trail of blood which were the only things in color. Vulpix yawned and got up on her feet at first, only to wince in pain and fall back to the ground immediately. Shadow jumps in and is surprised to see Vulpix is awake.
(Pic 11) "Shadow: Y-you're... awake..." "Stay down. Keep quiet." The protag thought, "Not even going to say hello first, Shadow?" Vulpix was forbidden to move an inch as Shadow dropped a berry in front of the Vulpix. Shadow: "Eat this. Softly and slowly." "Please don't make me regret this." Vulpix crawled forward and ate the berry to regain strength to stand up again, which seemingly angered Shadow. "Shadow: I said stay down!!" Shadow was aggressive despite saving Vulpix's life. Vulpix laid back down and glared at him. (Pic 12) "Shadow: I-I'm sorry. Just don't move... Please... Your name... Tell me your name. Quietly whisper it to me now."

So the original had Shadow give Myra the berry, he doesn't have the berry in V2, and he gives her the berry again in this rewrite. Not important, just something I'd thought to point out for comparisons. I personally prefer Shadow with the berry because I think it really shows his passive-aggressive interest in wanting to help Myra.

(Pic 13) Shadow was showing signs of desperation in hopes she wasn't a certain somebody. The name screen popped up and entered "Myra". There was a burst of static after the name was entered. Shadow was clearly shocked and upset by this reveal, commenting how he shouldn't have gotten his hopes up with tears in his eyes. It confused the protag. "Shadow: Listen to me... If you want to live, then listen..."

(Pic 14) Shadow turned away and then gained a fearful expression. "Shadow: She heard."

I like the face Shadow gives off here for some reason (Pic 14).

Also, this has kind of been the same story so far with some minor changes here and there with the exception of the prologue being shortened and mostly different plot-wise. The biggest upgrade in this version is obviously the visuals which has been adding a lot to the pasta and the fact that it's in the vanilla game's art style makes it even better. It's already a huge improvement from the previous two versions I've covered. I assure you it's not the exact same story but it takes the concept and the characters and sails them in a more unique and interesting direction.

Shadow sighed in relief as he realized the coast was clear. "Shadow: She doesn't know I brought you here, but she's suspicious. You need to get out of here." "I'll go talk to her. Go run away to anywhere else." "Don't worry about me. Just forget you ever met me. If you even think about following, I... I won't hesitate to kill you..." Shadow exited the cave. "A likely story, Shadow." The protag thought, commenting about how indecisive he was on Myra's life or death. Protag was finally able to move Myra as she stood up.

>Original: Shadow chases after Myra flees away
>V2: Shadow didn't realize Myra ran away until bumping into her
>Remake: Shadow encourages Myra to run away because he feels like she is going to need it.

Page 4 Pics 15-22
(Pic 15) Fiddling around with the menu, Myra was in a Sharpedo Bluff. They were the "NULL" rank and silhouette of the team's badge, assuming it was an error, "Did anyone bother to beta test this game or what?" The protag thought. I'm going to say that from now on.

(Pic 16) Looking through Myra's items, she had chains and the option to toss them away was unavailable. "You found these chains wrapped tightly around your neck. You don't remember how you got them, but you can't take them off." There didn't seem to be any functional purpose with the chains. There was nothing else of interest on the menu, so they took Shadow's idea and left despite not knowing who to go.

Looking around the cave, Myra came across what was like a substitute doll pinned onto a flag post as it was a decoy with the following written: "Myra" (Pic 17). This creeped the protag out and regret naming their Vulpix after their name. Whoever did this, wasn't very welcoming of Myra's presence, but it only made the protag more excited to explore rather than scared. Everything in this "ruined world" was still a dark grey. Myra was coming across a town with Pokémon-shaped buildings that were seemingly empty of residency. (Pic 18) One building had the following written: "Please take what you need. We have all our needs inside the Dungeon. - The Kecleon Brothers" The protag couldn't make Myra grab anything despite what the note said. There was nothing of interest at the Xatu or Kangaskhan buildings, disappointingly. Taking in the environment, they noticed everything was motionless, including the waterfalls and windmills. The developers were probably lazy, but everything still felt lifeless. They noticed the Marowak building had blood trailing at the entrance. The protag was eager to go in for some action, but they were halted with a note. "Marowak Dojo has collapsed. I'm trapped inside. We're all trapped inside. -Marowak Dojo's Sensei"

I don't think it's intentionally referencing the dead Marowak from Pokémon Tower. More of a mere coincidence. I wouldn't consider that a creepypasta since it's something that happens in the actual games.

Myra couldn't enter the dojo but the protag thought it was for the best since they thought dead Pokémon would be bad for their stomach. You better get those bags ready then because you're in for a treat. Stepping away, fearing a zombie-like Pokémon would burst out of the door. The Duskull building had another note: "We are neither alive or dead. We will never rest in peace." The protag felt vindicated about their "getting attacked by zombies" prediction.

Page 5 Pics 23-26
Going up north, Myra found a Wigglytuff hut with two bonfires on each side. There was a blank signpost inside. Going down the ladder, thinking it was a red flag to go down. The goal was to find a sign of life. There were bulletin boards and another empty signpost. "There are several calls for help here. No one has answered them."
"There is only one request here." The job request said "find her" from an anonymous client. The protag couldn't accept it but they could read its summary. "Find her. Find her before it's too late! I believe in you, Shadow. Only you can do this." Shadow was asked to kill Myra which is why he hesitated to kill her. Presumably, the same Pokémon he mentioned promising that killing Myra will make things right. Myra didn't do this to hurt anyone, but she seemed like a scapegoat now. Myra proceeded to move to a deeper level.

Pics 27-37 It got darker on each floor. There was a cauldron of blood and access was limited. (Pic 27) A Vulpix Tail was found inside of the cauldron. The summary of the tail said "Not one of yours... Right?" I theorize that the tail belongs to another Vulpix and they thought it was Myra, killed the Vulpix, and turned out it wasn't Myra. To not disappoint 'the one that sent out that request", they hid the tail in the cauldron to bury the evidence.

The protagonist is thrilled and excited about the dark themes but is going to go straight to the store if Myra gets killed. Some may say this is overreacting, but it's the idea of feeling close to an in-game character, may be hurtful to the heart. Blood Whistle may have had a protag that overreacted to Mario getting killed, but he took it way too far and was more frequent about their upset remarks compared to here.
(Pic 28, 29) Eventually, Myra encountered bloody footprints and ran up to a grey Bidoof who noticed Myra. (Pic 30) "Bidoof: Is it you? Are you the one?" (Pic 31) "Please... Make us right... Please, m-make us..." (Pic 32) During this process, Bidoof was shaking in pain at every step, bleeding from the neck until their head was cracked unnaturally. Myra charged up and shot her Ember attack at Bidoof who was now shivering in agony. The Bidoof burnt to death and vanished away with yellow light particles flying over their dead body now fading away.

The Bidoof with all of the blood leaking out of them and their neck cracking unnaturally is very unsettling honestly.

(Pic 33) Myra saw words written in blood that spelled out “Run Away and Pay”. Textboxes would pop up that were counting up to the number three it seems. There was a closed three with “Don’t Enter” in blood. And when Myra tried to go inside the building.

(Pic 35) A legless Wigglytuff came up with the textbox saying “THREE...” as they were crawling towards Myra and leaving a trail of blood behind in the process. (Pic 36) Myra climbs up the ladder to escape the Wigglytuff and burns the Wigglytuff hut. Myra would only go south afterward. (Pic 37) She eventually encountered a blood trail leading to a dungeon with a warning that said “She’s in here.”

The whole build up with Wigglytuff counting to three and crawling towards Myra, leaving a trail of blood would be disturbing to see in animation form. But the screencaps still work because even if it's not like a WMV like Ben Drowned is, the screencaps can be used to give you an idea on how the protagonist went through all of these events from their "haunted cartridge".

Page 6 (I'll have you read the full conversation from the story itself)

Entering the cave, a black screen appeared and dialogue between two people popped up as they were discussing finding Myra. Talking about living normally after killing her they were both surprised by her current whereabouts within the dungeon. It turned out one of them was Shadow and the other made demands for Shadow to ensure she didn’t find “her”.

“Kill her and make us right... Please...” Shadow promises and refers to “whoever” as his “partner”.

I don't really have much to say about this conversation. It builds up to how hesitant Shadow is in killing Myra. And to add more to how Shadow is attempting to fulfill a request for someone who remains anonymous for now, which I think is effective for the story.

Page 7 Pics 38-41

Hi! Future me speaking since I do make a couple of theories about the zombie Pokémon throughout this review: I found out about Myra's motive in killing everyone other than in self-defense from the QnA lore page after nearly finishing all of this review. Myra is actually saving everyone by ending a certain Pokémon's dying world because Myra is intended to be the "hero" according the protagonist and she's metaphorically bringing them to her world rather of a certain Pokémon's dying world since they will be brought back to life in Myra's world.

Back to Myra, she was on “B1F”, Myra was in the dungeon as it was pretty maze-like for being some sort of cave. Along the way, she encountered zombie-like Koffing and Zubat. Myra got poisoned by the Koffing, as she was slowly losing HP and there were no healing items or tutorials provided for her. She defeated them both though as they took calamitous damage from Myra’s attacks (Pic 38). Myra then encountered a Spoink without its pearl and it was completely motionless. Myra lunged at the Spoink instead of interacting with them and defeated the Spoink. No bouncing means no life for the Spoink. I'm not sure if that reference was intentional.

Myra then encountered colorless Pidgey and Seedot on the third floor. Everyone took Calamitous damage from Myra. Some repetitive textboxes appeared with “Seedot can’t take it anymore!” (Pic 39) Yeah, that is some pretty spooky dialogue right there. I'm not sure if it's supposed to mean that Seedot gives up and knows it's hopeless to stop Myra or not. Future me speaking: Or maybe Seedot can't take it anymore of the dying world and wants to be saved by Myra.

On the fourth floor, Myra fought a Vigoroth that was seemingly a bigger threat to her compared to the rest of the zombie Pokémon she fought beforehand as more than half of her HP depleted from Vigoroth’s scratch alone. Luckily, Myra was able to take down the Vigoroth with a critical hit of using Ember. (Pic 40)

It didn’t take long for other zombies to approach Myra. A Teddiursa used Fake Tears to get Myra crying and was cornered by him and the Ursaring. But, like before, Myra got lucky with landing critical hits with Ember, defeating the two. (Pic 41) Something tells me that these zombie Pokémon are meant to stop Myra to prevent her from experiencing something all of these zombie Pokémon experienced in the past and they're killing her so she has a fast death rather than a slow painful one.

Page 8 Pics 42-45

(Pic 42) The fifth floor had a panel with a red “X”. Being concerned about it being a trap, the protagonist made Myra step on it anyway just to kill the curiosity. The staircases Myra came from were now closed off. In other words, there was no way back. The protagonist assumed their objective was to hunt down every zombie Pokémon on the floor to proceed.

(Pic 43) Myra encountered an Azurill who wasn’t being hostile and said, “Wake me up from this nightmare...” The protagonist tried to get Myra to help the Azurill, but he just repeated the same thing. Due to blocking the way to proceed and her exit back being sealed off, Myra had to use Faint Attack to defeat the poor Azurill. A zombie Drowzee came behind Myra and said “You’re your own nightmare” only to be defeated by Myra.

Another theory I have is this could be a metaphor for feeling stuck. I’m almost thinking Myra becoming more of the antagonist here now because she is killing off all of these Pokémon. Sure, it’s in self-defense in her perspective, but that’s just it, it’s all in her perspective. It could be in reality, she’s murdering all of these bystanders and some of them have been trying to fight back. The Azurill is a metaphor for people trying to help the murderer and give them a second chance to redeem themselves, but it is too late for Myra because the staircase in going back has been sealed off as a metaphor that she isn’t as hesitant in killing others much anymore. And Drowzee scolds Myra for what she has down. I’m not saying this theory of mine is correct, in fact, I’m probably far off if anything, but we’ll have to see what happens next.

(Pic 44) Next, Marill asked Myra if she had seen her brother. Playing dumb, they responded with no. The next shot was Marill responding with “LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! LIAR!” Marill had empty eye sockets with black fluids leaking out of them. Marill used tackle and its ability boosted its Attack! Myra took 16 damage. The Marill was a bit of a challenge as it took three hits from Myra’s Faint Attack to be taken down. It was stressful considering Myra had the type disadvantage.
As simple and slightly cheesy as it is, I do think the empty eye sockets of the Marill are a bit effective in the creepy factor department, especially with the dialogue tone calling Myra a liar. Another thing is it’s convincing sprite work too. It’s not cheesy and obviously edited as that one shot from the Blood Whistle. Also, Marill is by far the creepiest part of this gosh darn story!

(Pic 45) The sixth floor had a couple of Magnemites and a Magnezone who were completely motionless and didn’t put up a fight. It was that simple, but there was some worry about what the seventh floor would be like. Myra was attacked by three rabid Poochyena with blood covering their muzzles. Myra was able to take down all of the Poochyenas. The protagonist expressed frustration with all of these close calls of Myra nearly being defeated.
The bloody muzzles are a nice touch of sprite work. And Myra must be wearing the Close Call badge.

Page 9 Pics 46-55
Forgetting to pace around and heal, Myra went straight to floor 8. Real quick: something I didn’t mention was that Myra’s poison was cured out of the blue once she got to the second floor and the protag could see Myra was slowly regenerating HP instead the more she walked around. I had to read back at this point because I was wondering how is Myra taking all of this damage without having any healing items to replenish her HP back.

(Pic 46) Anyway, Myra encountered Shadow who was shocked to see her presence and ran away without saying a single word when Myra attempted to talk to him.

(Pic 47) “Shadow got away. The staircase was sealed!” The protagonist felt a little betrayed by this action. Assumptions were made that Shadow didn’t have it in him to kill Myra himself, but he wasn’t any better to abandon her at the mercy of the zombies either. Another reason why it took me so long to make this review was because I feel like some of the things I would’ve said or theorized on are already being said.

(Pic 48) Myra approached a Swellow hyper-focusing on a Wurmple as if he was going to eat them. Swellow flew and used “Swallow” on the Wurmple, consuming them as a whole. Swellow was hoping to make Myra his next meal as he faced her. But Myra used Ember to burn the Swellow. That’s an interesting way of using “Swallow”.

(Pic 49) Myra immediately spawned next to a bunch of familiar Pokémon. It was the owner of the houses in the empty town earlier. This is probably where all of the townsfolk had gone. That would make sense and it makes me wonder if this townsfolks were past Pokémon who were trying to stop "Shadow's friend", but failed to. You'll see what I mean later on.

(Pic 50) A blood-covered Duskull appeared with the following message: “We aren’t dead yet. We never will be.” Of course, Myra takes them out too. The protagonist expressed unsatisfactory emotions with how fighting for Myra’s life against these zombies is merely becoming a routine at this rate. Yeah, the fighting is starting to become a little repetitive.

(Pic 51) A textbox popped up saying how Myra was getting hungry. The Belly stat had 19 out of 100 units left. If you haven’t played PMD, yes, there is a hunger mechanic and it’s called “Belly”. The stat depletes for every movement you make inside of a dungeon. And you slowly lose HP once it hits 0. Also, good job utilizing this mechanic for the pasta, sparklingdemon. I think this is a way of building up tension in Myra’s life-risking scenario. I feel like it’s a mechanic people forget about for the PMD games.

Myra made it to the 10th floor and was starting to get dizzy from hunger. Her stamina was depleting too fast for the protag’s tastes. Going south of the dungeon, Myra stumbled across something that hadn’t been shown throughout the dungeon. Items. Beautiful, precious items were on display, and they were oddly in color too, compared to the rest of the settings, indicating that they were important. They were placed on a rug and guarded by two Kecleons. The protag questioned if they were the Kecleon brothers that left the note back at the town. Are they as friendly as the note implied? I would talk about how oddly convenient this is but Dovey and I are currently writing a story arc that has its share of odd convenience.

(Pic 52) Myra stepped on the rug and picked up the first item. One of the Kecleons screamed, “pay the price” repeatedly. The protagonist assumed they were actually for free.

(Pic 53) Myra turned to face the Kecleon on the left who was chanting, “A life for a life” repeatedly. Admittedly, I find these chants a little unsettling.

Myra picked up and ate the Blast Seed. Not reading the description, the Vulpix blew a powerful explosion of flames at the Kecleon in front of her. The Kecleon was engulfed by the blast of fire. The other Kecleon used Thief which dealt much damage to Myra. The protag knew Myra had to get out of there. She picked up the Warp Seed and used it towards the Kecleon after they attempted to use Thief on her again. The Kecleon tried to use Thief to get Myra’s chains, but they won’t come off as the textbox implied.

(Pic 54) Myra threw the Warp Seed and it landed on the Kecleon as they teleported out of there. There were no longer any Kecleons to guard the rest of the items. The protag wasn’t hesitant to make Myra scoop up all of the items and food to fill up Myra’s Belly. There was a Max Elixir, a Violent Seed, and four pieces of Grimy Food. Consuming the Violent Seed made Myra’s Attack and Special Attack rise sharply.

I feel like this part with the violent seed consumption should've happened earlier to make all of the calamitous damage Myra is dealing towards the zombie Pokémon a little clear on why Myra is dealing a lot of damage towards each Pokémon rather than it just being instantly. Like, have the shop back at the town have two seeds provided: the joy seed and the violent seed. Myra's belly stat is almost empty of units, so she has to eat despite not being inside of a dungeon which throws the protagonist off-guard. There's a note that says "Choose your route: the path of joy or survival?" The protagonist tries to get Myra to get the joy seed, but a zombie Pokémon snatches it and says, "There will never be any JOY in your life!" and the light particles appear around them and makes them vanish. The protagonist has to make Myra eat the violent seed, despite being concerned about how low of belly units the seed replenishes, but a textbox appears saying "You chose the path of violence. It's the only way for survival." But I guess that would lean towards Myra being more of an antagonist, and I assume Myra is supposed to be categorized as the good protagonist for this story since she's the "hero". Future me speaking: if Myra is technically saving the zombie Pokémon to bring them to LIFE in her new world, I think the usage of the Life Seed could be used for metaphorical purposes. If Swallow was used to literally swallow another Pokémon, which isn't how it's used in the actual games, then I think there can be a metaphorical usage for an in-game item.

I have another reason for this concept that I won't share until I give my "further thoughts" for spoiler purposes.

(Pic 55) It wasn’t much before the Kecleon approached Myra again as if the Warp Seed was only there to buy Myra time to pick up the other items. Myra was cornered by the Kecleon and her HP isn’t fully restored yet. The Kecleon dealt half an HP bar number of damage to Myra with the Thief attacks. Kecleon was charging with double its speed this time. To slow down the Kecleon, Myra threw a piece of the Grimy Food at them. Unexpectedly, the food actually made the Kecleon become paralyzed instead. The protagonist wasn’t hesitant to make Myra launch an Ember towards the Kecleon. They were defeated and the stairs to the next floor were unlocked. After a sigh of relief, Myra ate the rest of the Grimy food to replenish their Belly stats before proceeding upstairs.

Just the feeling of being cornered is enough to make you feel for Myra in this scenario. It makes you want to ensure her safety and well-being.

Page 10 Pics 56-60
So, we’re now on page 10 and not much really happens except more fights against zombie Pokémon. Even the story itself has each floor in some kind of montage pace. Not saying it’s a bad thing. I’ll have you guys give it a read.

(Pic 56) Some of the next floors had some pretty simple battles that Myra was able to breeze through. Floor 11 had a Spinda, Wynaut, and Wobbuffet. Floor 12 had a Pachirisu, a Zigzagoon, and an Octillery. Floor 13 had a Tangela, Heracross, and Mr. Mime. Floor 14 had some organized duos with Murkrow & Shuppet and Slakoth & Slowpoke (who were bleeding from their tail being cut off). But it wasn’t until Floor 15 seemed to have given Myra some trouble and in danger again with a larger group of Pokémon attacking Myra at once. The protag had a strategy to have Myra flee into the hallway to take out each one individually to prevent her from getting swarmed. It worked to take out all six of them. The staircase still hasn’t opened up yet as if there was one more opponent remaining for the gauntlet battle. It turns out there was a motionless Sunflora in the corner. Myra had to finish them off in order to proceed.

Unless all of these Pokémon are ACTUALLY supposed to be the townsfolks for that one empty town shown in the vanilla game, I appreciate your diverse section of Pokémon, even including the not-so-popular ones, sparklingdemon. Future me speaking: turns out all of them are townsfolks from Treasure Town (which is the empty town Myra was in earlier) or from the guild.

(Pic 57) The Sunflora with withered petals was burning and spoke out to Myra, “The light burns... It’s hurting us... Is it you? Are you the light? Why are you burning us?” The Sunflora’s burn caused calamitous damage each time until she fainted. The protag was left with a really ugly feeling afterward, questioning why they had to kill all of these Pokémon just to proceed. Was it causing real pain and death? Was it really necessary? Not to dwell on the idea for too long, they proceeded forward to the next floor. Floor 16 had a Ledyba, Toegpi, and Politoed. Politoed was worrisome with having Hypnosis and Perish Song, but luckily, the attacks were missed. Floor 17 had Camerupt, Ponyta, and Bellsprout. Floor 18 had a Scyther, Zangoose, and Sandslash.

(Pic 58) Floor 19 had the scariest-looking enemies with Arbok, Weavile, and Drapion. All of them had blood dripping from their claws and/or mouths. Somehow, Myra managed to take them all out. But Weaville’s Pressure drained Myra of all of her PP. The only move they have PP for is Tail Whip which the protag never thought of using throughout the dungeon. Concerned about floor 20, Myra was in serious trouble if it contained stronger foes. They had to proceed downwards. It seemed like a maze at first as Myra got lost for a few solid minutes. It was until a textbox popped up.

(Pic 59) “You went back in time to change the future.” It was a Grovyle who was speaking as Myra continued taking a few steps into the room. “How many times must you go back until you get the future you want?” The Grovyle curiously asked Myra. Stepping close to the Grovyle. “We’ve already failed. You’ve already failed.” They responded. They were finally within attacking range, but the protag was unsure about hurting the Grovyle as they were completely lost, almost dead, and were waiting to have their suffering end, or were willing to kill Myra.

(Pic 60) Attempting to speak to the Grovyle, Myra lunged at him instead. He still didn’t turn around to face Myra. The protagonist wanted answers from him, but it seemed like trying to squeeze them out of him through attacks wasn’t doing anything. He took 5 damage from each attack. After a while, Myra stood still staring at the Grovyle and the same yellow light that surrounded the Bidoof from earlier was rising from the Grovyle as well. The Grovyle was slowly bleeding out of his mouth as he began to laugh. Grovyle gave one last remark, “I’ll see you in your next life... “hero.””

The Grovyle vanished away into the light. The protag was confused about what the Grovyle was talking about. While trying to theorize, they decided to proceed to the next set of stairs. They noticed the screen stayed black longer than usual. The protag questioned if they were finally finished with their gauntlet of battles.

I think I have an idea of what the Grovyle means by going back in time to change the future. It’s referring to the protag constantly resetting the game to get Vulpix as their character.

Page 11 Pics 61-65
(Pic 61) The screen faded into a cutscene of Myra inside a deeper part of the cave. No music was playing, but the sound of roaring, bellowing wind, and a faint noise of a clock ticking. Myra had a stern, fierce look in her eyes as if she knew what was ahead of her direction. It was more trails of blood. The following textboxes appeared, “I know you’re there. I can feel your heartbeat.” Myra was unfazed by the strange voice. The background turned into a rainbow gradient as Myra took some steps forward to reveal a silhouette of a Pokémon right in front of her.

(Pic 62) “Do you still recognize me, Myra?” It spoke out to her. It revealed a shadow figure with chains wrapped around their neck, just like Myra does. The protag was able to figure out who the silhouette was blending in with the rainbow gradient background. They just didn’t want to believe it was them. The shadow figure then revealed who they were.

(Pic 63) “You did this to me.” It was revealed to be the Squirtle. The protagonist’s heart stopped at the sight of the same Squirtle they tried to erase away in favor of the Vulpix. She was severely beaten up and bloodied while exposing muscle tissue and a missing arm. I like how the author took something that would be very cheesy for your typical creepypasta, and made it work.

(Pic 64) The static shot up the screen once again, as the actual background was exposed from the masquerade of the rainbow gradient. “You maimed me beyond repair.”

The sprite work has been mind-blowing thus far, but I have to admit, the blood trail looks off here. It might just be me. It just looks way too detailed and realistic to look like it would be shown in the actual game. I will give credit to the amount of detail placed into the blood, though. In fact, come to think about it, the overly detailed blood kind of adds to the creepiness of the atmosphere.

“But you couldn’t make me disappear.” The same yellow light that engulf the Grovyle rose upon the Squirtle as well. Had this light been burning her skin away?

“You still want to, don’t you?”
“You hate this ugly, disgusting form that your soul took.”
“So, you know what?”
“Kill me. I dare you.”
“I’m not afraid of you anymore.”

Myra moved toward the deformed Squirtle but was cut off by someone else.

(Pic 65) I love the extra detail with the sharp teeth on Squirtle’s icon.

Pics 66-72

(Pic 66) “Stop!” Shadow, who came out of the nowhere, shouted at the two.

(Pic 67) Shadow was right behind Myra who expressed signs of surprise at his presence.

(Pic 68) Shadow intervened between the two girls. “Don’t do this... Don’t hurt her!” Shadow defiantly hopped up and down. But was talking to Myra, or Squirtle? I was asking the same thing too reading that. Another example of this story reading my mind and saying things for me.

(Pic 69) “Shadow! How could you let her get this fair?! Kill her! Kill her now!” Squirtle screamed. “I... I can’t.” Shadow responded.

Squirtle: “You have to! Please, snap out of it, Shadow!”
Shadow: “... No.”
Squirtle: “No?”
Shadow: “You can’t make me kill someone! Only someone horrible would want to do this!”
Squirtle: “How is she any better? She wants to kill me! She’s the one who’s horrible!”
Myra: “.........”
Squirtle: “How can you believe her over me? She wants to destroy us!”
Shadow: “No, she wants things to be right, too! I know it!”
Squirtle: “No, you can’t believe her! She’s corrupted your thoughts!”
Shadow: “You’re the one corrupting me!”
Squirtle: “What?”
Shadow: “You’re the one always telling me to do these things! You tell me not to listen to her, but I don’t want to listen to you!”

So, Myra walks away and comes back with a bucket of popcorn as she continues to watch the chaos unravel between Squirtle and Shadow. I’m just kidding. That doesn’t actually happen. But, seriously, the beef between these two is a mix of being both funny and sad at the same time. It’s funny because of their facial expressions throughout the whole thing. And I’m not saying they’re a bad thing because they really add to the reading experience. However, in the context of the dialogue and I’m sure was the intended purpose of this scene, it’s meant to be sad because Squirtle trusted Shadow to murder Myra so that they can live their lives “normally” again. Shadow is getting fed up with Squirtle giving him commands and committing actions he clearly doesn’t want to do. And it’s even built up on how he doesn’t want to kill Myra because he knows it’s wrong to murder. Shadow feels like Myra is the better choice for him because she’s been a little more patient and understanding with him compared to Squirtle. Squirtle feels betrayed by all of Shadow’s scolding remarks towards her.

(Pic 70) Shadow: “I hate you! You’re a monster!”

The tears in Shadow’s tears really indicate that he feels just as betrayed as Squirtle is with him. Really good attention to detail. Definite points for the emotional impact.

Suddenly, Squirtle shook violently as the light around her grew brighter. The static bursts back onto the screen, making it difficult for the protagonist to view the characters.

(Pic 71) Shadow’s dialogue could only be visible for a bit. “Oh no!” “Quick! Run away before she.” The dialogue wasn’t finished as the static grew stronger with loud cracking noises that sounded like glass breaking, coming from the speakers.

(Pic 72) It faded in a bit to reveal a dialogue box from Squirtle: “You think you can make me fade away... But you can never get rid of me."

(Pic 73) The next shot was a close-up of the mutilated Squirtle holding a sharp knife in the grips of her tail as she gave a sickening, wide grin, showing off her sharp, pointy teeth, and her dark, soulless, red pupils to impact the sight of her eye sockets. That is actually terrifying, not going to lie.

Pics 74-75

(Pic 74) Squirtle had one more remark to make while her close-up was displayed on screen. “I’m the one who’s real, not you.”

Definitely better than “I am God” from Sonic.exe and it’s probably because the close-up looks convincing and actually looks like it’s in the game and the textbox is in font and style of the game and not some random font they found on Microsoft Word.

(Pic 75) Shadow: “Myra! No!” Shadow’s cry indicates that Myra is in deep trouble and shows how much Shadow cares for her.

DUE TO KB LIMITS, THIS WILL BE WHERE THE REVIEW WILL BE SPLIT INTO TWO PARTS. SORRY.

Click the following for [PART 2]

Description

Note: Please do not harass the original author or anyone who makes content related to this pasta. This review was simply made for entertainment purposes only. This is all based on MY OPINION as well.

DISCLAIMER: Please read the source of the following story by sparklingdemon for more context. I will not explicitly provide every single image or detail of the story throughout this review to encourage my audience to read the original source material. I’ll provide some screenshots when needed and tell which page I’m on and provide a link for respective page number for the review, but I still highly encourage everyone to read the story itself and check out all of sparklingdemon’s other work. I'll still provide summaries and breakdowns of the story since some people struggled to read the original source material, but ALL CREDIT goes to sparklingdemon . (Link will be provided next to the "Pasta Name".)

WELCOME BACK TO SAUCEZ REVIEWZ: POKEPASTAS SERIES!!! No, really... It's been way too long!

Pasta Name: PMD: Explorers of Death (Rewritten) by sparklingdemon
Publish Date: January 31, 2021

Synopsis: The protagonist forces her starter to be a Vulpix instead of a Squirtle and named her Myra, which leads to a conflict between Myra and the Squirtle insisting which one of them is the “real hero” of the journey with their Shinx partner, Shadow roped into the conflict as well.

Fun Fact: In the vanilla game, Vulpix has a relaxed nature, Shinx has a hasty nature, and Squirtle has a bold nature.

Highlight: Obviously the visuals and comic-formatted storytelling.

Quote: “Kill her and make this right...” -Shadow... and others (It was hard to choose which quote to use.)

Story - Page 1:
So it starts off with the protag saying they're not big on Pokémon spin-off games and they didn't get far in PMD: Rescue Team DX, but the feelings towards the game flooded back to them. You answered a series of questions to determine what Pokémon you'd be. But if you didn't like the fate, you had to reset and redo the quiz until you got the one you wanted. Everyone had to suffer during this process. Explorers of Sky came out in 2009. It was exciting for any PMD fans for a newly updated version of Time/Darkness. The protag was amazed about having to play as a Pokémon for the PMD games.

Their dad was running errands and they went to GameStop for kicks and got a copy of Explorers of Explorers of Sky as it was cheaper than usual. The protagonist was amazed at the diverse environments and the sprite work done for the PMD games and the ability to move diagonally.

So the prologue is almost the same as the original versions but shorter and more brief. I don't mind as it's straight to the point. However, I guess we should pay attention to the fact the game is cheaper than expected as it can raise suspicion, especially for a newly released game at the time (since in the story, these events happened over a decade ago). Also, the pasta is in some kind of comic strip format and let me tell you, the visuals and sprite work for the pasta are really well-made and can make the pasta very convincing.

They were presented with a promising world with a Vulpix walking on a dirt road and they were excited about having the option to play as a Vulpix as they had a high interest in Vulpix, like lighting a fire in their soul type of interest. Their hopes and dreams were confirmed reaching the New Game option with Vulpix trailing behind Shinx, which inspired the Vulpix-Shinx team. They selected "New Game" as they were thinking they were living the dream.

The protag had to answer some questions before entering their paradise. They were considered as a bold type after the quiz. Taking in the text, believing they were getting a Vulpix, only to be given a Squirtle instead. The protag scoffed in absolute betrayal. Not wanting to play as Squirtle, so they reset their DS. They skipped the intro and title screen this time, thinking the personality quiz results were a mistake as they had to be Vulpix. They got Squirtle again. The process repeated, only with randomly selected answers this time: Squirtle again. Another reset occurred, this time, the protag tried to answer the questions differently than before, and that Squirtle icon appeared again in the results. They jumped onto the computer to search for answers on the personality quiz just to get Vulpix. They inserted the answers for Vulpix, but they got the textbox, "You seem to be... the bold type!" again, which is what they've been getting to receive Squirtle beforehand. The protag groaned, not wanting to see Squirtle's dumb face again. Right before the results came in, the game seemingly froze, but before hitting the power switch, static erupted and Vulpix's icon appeared. The outcome was a success.

Now to choose their partner, which would be Shinx. The Shinx icon gave a cute smile and they named him Shadow after their Luxray from Diamond Version. Their journey was about to begin without anything spoiled for them. The screen faded to black and it stayed like that for a while with the protag assuming the game had bad loading times and suspected the game froze again, until a textbox appeared that said "... She's here..." The protag wondered who was speaking and if it was directed towards them.

Page 2
Pics 1-5 (Pic 1) The screen faded to a dark starless sky hanging above a monochrome ocean with the sounds of ocean waves heard but the background depicts them not moving. It was like this for one minute until static abruptly appeared for a second and Vulpix was seen to be laying on the beach in a growing poll of blood, which caught the protag off-guard in shock, but they gradually got excited, thinking "Pokémon was finally taking things to the next level." A Shinx slowly crept onto the screen, presumably Shadow. The protag assumed partners get a special color and blindly accepted it, seeing what he would do next when he stepped forward and spoke.
(Pic 2) "Shadow: I swear I heard it around here somewhere..."
(Pic 3) "Shadow: No, no, it was just nothing..."Shadow then noticed the Vulpix.
(Pic 4) "Shadow: ...!" (Pic 5) "Shadow: ..." Shadow stared at Vulpix sadly and eventually had electricity spark around him.
Before I go on, I want you all to take a look at these visuals as I go by. I'm not planning on posting every single one of them because: I don't want to seem like I'm stealing content from sparklingdemon, deviantart has a KB limit for descriptions and adding pictures uses a lot of KB, and it would be too much work to post all of them.

Pics 6-9 (Pic 6) Shadow: "Kill her and make us right..." Shadow repeated that phrase to himself as the spark grew bigger. "Blood and Pokémon killing each other? Awesome!" The protag thought. Your character's about to get killed, but I guess I would be in awe seeing those themes in a Pokémon game too. (Pic 7) "Shadow: ..." Shadow stopped his attack and shook his head. (Pic 8) "Shadow: ...No, there has to be another way." (Pic 9) Shadow dragged Myra off-screen, leaving a trail of blood behind as the screen then fades away.

Page 3 Pics 10-14
The next shot shows Vulpix in some colorless cave sleeping by a campfire and a trail of blood which were the only things in color. Vulpix yawned and got up on her feet at first, only to wince in pain and fall back to the ground immediately. Shadow jumps in and is surprised to see Vulpix is awake.
(Pic 11) "Shadow: Y-you're... awake..." "Stay down. Keep quiet." The protag thought, "Not even going to say hello first, Shadow?" Vulpix was forbidden to move an inch as Shadow dropped a berry in front of the Vulpix. Shadow: "Eat this. Softly and slowly." "Please don't make me regret this." Vulpix crawled forward and ate the berry to regain strength to stand up again, which seemingly angered Shadow. "Shadow: I said stay down!!" Shadow was aggressive despite saving Vulpix's life. Vulpix laid back down and glared at him. (Pic 12) "Shadow: I-I'm sorry. Just don't move... Please... Your name... Tell me your name. Quietly whisper it to me now."

So the original had Shadow give Myra the berry, he doesn't have the berry in V2, and he gives her the berry again in this rewrite. Not important, just something I'd thought to point out for comparisons. I personally prefer Shadow with the berry because I think it really shows his passive-aggressive interest in wanting to help Myra.

(Pic 13) Shadow was showing signs of desperation in hopes she wasn't a certain somebody. The name screen popped up and entered "Myra". There was a burst of static after the name was entered. Shadow was clearly shocked and upset by this reveal, commenting how he shouldn't have gotten his hopes up with tears in his eyes. It confused the protag. "Shadow: Listen to me... If you want to live, then listen..."

(Pic 14) Shadow turned away and then gained a fearful expression. "Shadow: She heard."

I like the face Shadow gives off here for some reason (Pic 14).

Also, this has kind of been the same story so far with some minor changes here and there with the exception of the prologue being shortened and mostly different plot-wise. The biggest upgrade in this version is obviously the visuals which has been adding a lot to the pasta and the fact that it's in the vanilla game's art style makes it even better. It's already a huge improvement from the previous two versions I've covered. I assure you it's not the exact same story but it takes the concept and the characters and sails them in a more unique and interesting direction.

Shadow sighed in relief as he realized the coast was clear. "Shadow: She doesn't know I brought you here, but she's suspicious. You need to get out of here." "I'll go talk to her. Go run away to anywhere else." "Don't worry about me. Just forget you ever met me. If you even think about following, I... I won't hesitate to kill you..." Shadow exited the cave. "A likely story, Shadow." The protag thought, commenting about how indecisive he was on Myra's life or death. Protag was finally able to move Myra as she stood up.

>Original: Shadow chases after Myra flees away
>V2: Shadow didn't realize Myra ran away until bumping into her
>Remake: Shadow encourages Myra to run away because he feels like she is going to need it.

Page 4 Pics 15-22
(Pic 15) Fiddling around with the menu, Myra was in a Sharpedo Bluff. They were the "NULL" rank and silhouette of the team's badge, assuming it was an error, "Did anyone bother to beta test this game or what?" The protag thought. I'm going to say that from now on.

(Pic 16) Looking through Myra's items, she had chains and the option to toss them away was unavailable. "You found these chains wrapped tightly around your neck. You don't remember how you got them, but you can't take them off." There didn't seem to be any functional purpose with the chains. There was nothing else of interest on the menu, so they took Shadow's idea and left despite not knowing who to go.

Looking around the cave, Myra came across what was like a substitute doll pinned onto a flag post as it was a decoy with the following written: "Myra" (Pic 17). This creeped the protag out and regret naming their Vulpix after their name. Whoever did this, wasn't very welcoming of Myra's presence, but it only made the protag more excited to explore rather than scared. Everything in this "ruined world" was still a dark grey. Myra was coming across a town with Pokémon-shaped buildings that were seemingly empty of residency. (Pic 18) One building had the following written: "Please take what you need. We have all our needs inside the Dungeon. - The Kecleon Brothers" The protag couldn't make Myra grab anything despite what the note said. There was nothing of interest at the Xatu or Kangaskhan buildings, disappointingly. Taking in the environment, they noticed everything was motionless, including the waterfalls and windmills. The developers were probably lazy, but everything still felt lifeless. They noticed the Marowak building had blood trailing at the entrance. The protag was eager to go in for some action, but they were halted with a note. "Marowak Dojo has collapsed. I'm trapped inside. We're all trapped inside. -Marowak Dojo's Sensei"

I don't think it's intentionally referencing the dead Marowak from Pokémon Tower. More of a mere coincidence. I wouldn't consider that a creepypasta since it's something that happens in the actual games.

Myra couldn't enter the dojo but the protag thought it was for the best since they thought dead Pokémon would be bad for their stomach. You better get those bags ready then because you're in for a treat. Stepping away, fearing a zombie-like Pokémon would burst out of the door. The Duskull building had another note: "We are neither alive or dead. We will never rest in peace." The protag felt vindicated about their "getting attacked by zombies" prediction.

Page 5 Pics 23-26
Going up north, Myra found a Wigglytuff hut with two bonfires on each side. There was a blank signpost inside. Going down the ladder, thinking it was a red flag to go down. The goal was to find a sign of life. There were bulletin boards and another empty signpost. "There are several calls for help here. No one has answered them."
"There is only one request here." The job request said "find her" from an anonymous client. The protag couldn't accept it but they could read its summary. "Find her. Find her before it's too late! I believe in you, Shadow. Only you can do this." Shadow was asked to kill Myra which is why he hesitated to kill her. Presumably, the same Pokémon he mentioned promising that killing Myra will make things right. Myra didn't do this to hurt anyone, but she seemed like a scapegoat now. Myra proceeded to move to a deeper level.

Pics 27-37 It got darker on each floor. There was a cauldron of blood and access was limited. (Pic 27) A Vulpix Tail was found inside of the cauldron. The summary of the tail said "Not one of yours... Right?" I theorize that the tail belongs to another Vulpix and they thought it was Myra, killed the Vulpix, and turned out it wasn't Myra. To not disappoint 'the one that sent out that request", they hid the tail in the cauldron to bury the evidence.

The protagonist is thrilled and excited about the dark themes but is going to go straight to the store if Myra gets killed. Some may say this is overreacting, but it's the idea of feeling close to an in-game character, may be hurtful to the heart. Blood Whistle may have had a protag that overreacted to Mario getting killed, but he took it way too far and was more frequent about their upset remarks compared to here.
(Pic 28, 29) Eventually, Myra encountered bloody footprints and ran up to a grey Bidoof who noticed Myra. (Pic 30) "Bidoof: Is it you? Are you the one?" (Pic 31) "Please... Make us right... Please, m-make us..." (Pic 32) During this process, Bidoof was shaking in pain at every step, bleeding from the neck until their head was cracked unnaturally. Myra charged up and shot her Ember attack at Bidoof who was now shivering in agony. The Bidoof burnt to death and vanished away with yellow light particles flying over their dead body now fading away.

The Bidoof with all of the blood leaking out of them and their neck cracking unnaturally is very unsettling honestly.

(Pic 33) Myra saw words written in blood that spelled out “Run Away and Pay”. Textboxes would pop up that were counting up to the number three it seems. There was a closed three with “Don’t Enter” in blood. And when Myra tried to go inside the building.

(Pic 35) A legless Wigglytuff came up with the textbox saying “THREE...” as they were crawling towards Myra and leaving a trail of blood behind in the process. (Pic 36) Myra climbs up the ladder to escape the Wigglytuff and burns the Wigglytuff hut. Myra would only go south afterward. (Pic 37) She eventually encountered a blood trail leading to a dungeon with a warning that said “She’s in here.”

The whole build up with Wigglytuff counting to three and crawling towards Myra, leaving a trail of blood would be disturbing to see in animation form. But the screencaps still work because even if it's not like a WMV like Ben Drowned is, the screencaps can be used to give you an idea on how the protagonist went through all of these events from their "haunted cartridge".

Page 6 (I'll have you read the full conversation from the story itself)

Entering the cave, a black screen appeared and dialogue between two people popped up as they were discussing finding Myra. Talking about living normally after killing her they were both surprised by her current whereabouts within the dungeon. It turned out one of them was Shadow and the other made demands for Shadow to ensure she didn’t find “her”.

“Kill her and make us right... Please...” Shadow promises and refers to “whoever” as his “partner”.

I don't really have much to say about this conversation. It builds up to how hesitant Shadow is in killing Myra. And to add more to how Shadow is attempting to fulfill a request for someone who remains anonymous for now, which I think is effective for the story.

Page 7 Pics 38-41

Hi! Future me speaking since I do make a couple of theories about the zombie Pokémon throughout this review: I found out about Myra's motive in killing everyone other than in self-defense from the QnA lore page after nearly finishing all of this review. Myra is actually saving everyone by ending a certain Pokémon's dying world because Myra is intended to be the "hero" according the protagonist and she's metaphorically bringing them to her world rather of a certain Pokémon's dying world since they will be brought back to life in Myra's world.

Back to Myra, she was on “B1F”, Myra was in the dungeon as it was pretty maze-like for being some sort of cave. Along the way, she encountered zombie-like Koffing and Zubat. Myra got poisoned by the Koffing, as she was slowly losing HP and there were no healing items or tutorials provided for her. She defeated them both though as they took calamitous damage from Myra’s attacks (Pic 38). Myra then encountered a Spoink without its pearl and it was completely motionless. Myra lunged at the Spoink instead of interacting with them and defeated the Spoink. No bouncing means no life for the Spoink. I'm not sure if that reference was intentional.

Myra then encountered colorless Pidgey and Seedot on the third floor. Everyone took Calamitous damage from Myra. Some repetitive textboxes appeared with “Seedot can’t take it anymore!” (Pic 39) Yeah, that is some pretty spooky dialogue right there. I'm not sure if it's supposed to mean that Seedot gives up and knows it's hopeless to stop Myra or not. Future me speaking: Or maybe Seedot can't take it anymore of the dying world and wants to be saved by Myra.

On the fourth floor, Myra fought a Vigoroth that was seemingly a bigger threat to her compared to the rest of the zombie Pokémon she fought beforehand as more than half of her HP depleted from Vigoroth’s scratch alone. Luckily, Myra was able to take down the Vigoroth with a critical hit of using Ember. (Pic 40)

It didn’t take long for other zombies to approach Myra. A Teddiursa used Fake Tears to get Myra crying and was cornered by him and the Ursaring. But, like before, Myra got lucky with landing critical hits with Ember, defeating the two. (Pic 41) Something tells me that these zombie Pokémon are meant to stop Myra to prevent her from experiencing something all of these zombie Pokémon experienced in the past and they're killing her so she has a fast death rather than a slow painful one.

Page 8 Pics 42-45

(Pic 42) The fifth floor had a panel with a red “X”. Being concerned about it being a trap, the protagonist made Myra step on it anyway just to kill the curiosity. The staircases Myra came from were now closed off. In other words, there was no way back. The protagonist assumed their objective was to hunt down every zombie Pokémon on the floor to proceed.

(Pic 43) Myra encountered an Azurill who wasn’t being hostile and said, “Wake me up from this nightmare...” The protagonist tried to get Myra to help the Azurill, but he just repeated the same thing. Due to blocking the way to proceed and her exit back being sealed off, Myra had to use Faint Attack to defeat the poor Azurill. A zombie Drowzee came behind Myra and said “You’re your own nightmare” only to be defeated by Myra.

Another theory I have is this could be a metaphor for feeling stuck. I’m almost thinking Myra becoming more of the antagonist here now because she is killing off all of these Pokémon. Sure, it’s in self-defense in her perspective, but that’s just it, it’s all in her perspective. It could be in reality, she’s murdering all of these bystanders and some of them have been trying to fight back. The Azurill is a metaphor for people trying to help the murderer and give them a second chance to redeem themselves, but it is too late for Myra because the staircase in going back has been sealed off as a metaphor that she isn’t as hesitant in killing others much anymore. And Drowzee scolds Myra for what she has down. I’m not saying this theory of mine is correct, in fact, I’m probably far off if anything, but we’ll have to see what happens next.

(Pic 44) Next, Marill asked Myra if she had seen her brother. Playing dumb, they responded with no. The next shot was Marill responding with “LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! LIAR!” Marill had empty eye sockets with black fluids leaking out of them. Marill used tackle and its ability boosted its Attack! Myra took 16 damage. The Marill was a bit of a challenge as it took three hits from Myra’s Faint Attack to be taken down. It was stressful considering Myra had the type disadvantage.
As simple and slightly cheesy as it is, I do think the empty eye sockets of the Marill are a bit effective in the creepy factor department, especially with the dialogue tone calling Myra a liar. Another thing is it’s convincing sprite work too. It’s not cheesy and obviously edited as that one shot from the Blood Whistle. Also, Marill is by far the creepiest part of this gosh darn story!

(Pic 45) The sixth floor had a couple of Magnemites and a Magnezone who were completely motionless and didn’t put up a fight. It was that simple, but there was some worry about what the seventh floor would be like. Myra was attacked by three rabid Poochyena with blood covering their muzzles. Myra was able to take down all of the Poochyenas. The protagonist expressed frustration with all of these close calls of Myra nearly being defeated.
The bloody muzzles are a nice touch of sprite work. And Myra must be wearing the Close Call badge.

Page 9 Pics 46-55
Forgetting to pace around and heal, Myra went straight to floor 8. Real quick: something I didn’t mention was that Myra’s poison was cured out of the blue once she got to the second floor and the protag could see Myra was slowly regenerating HP instead the more she walked around. I had to read back at this point because I was wondering how is Myra taking all of this damage without having any healing items to replenish her HP back.

(Pic 46) Anyway, Myra encountered Shadow who was shocked to see her presence and ran away without saying a single word when Myra attempted to talk to him.

(Pic 47) “Shadow got away. The staircase was sealed!” The protagonist felt a little betrayed by this action. Assumptions were made that Shadow didn’t have it in him to kill Myra himself, but he wasn’t any better to abandon her at the mercy of the zombies either. Another reason why it took me so long to make this review was because I feel like some of the things I would’ve said or theorized on are already being said.

(Pic 48) Myra approached a Swellow hyper-focusing on a Wurmple as if he was going to eat them. Swellow flew and used “Swallow” on the Wurmple, consuming them as a whole. Swellow was hoping to make Myra his next meal as he faced her. But Myra used Ember to burn the Swellow. That’s an interesting way of using “Swallow”.

(Pic 49) Myra immediately spawned next to a bunch of familiar Pokémon. It was the owner of the houses in the empty town earlier. This is probably where all of the townsfolk had gone. That would make sense and it makes me wonder if this townsfolks were past Pokémon who were trying to stop "Shadow's friend", but failed to. You'll see what I mean later on.

(Pic 50) A blood-covered Duskull appeared with the following message: “We aren’t dead yet. We never will be.” Of course, Myra takes them out too. The protagonist expressed unsatisfactory emotions with how fighting for Myra’s life against these zombies is merely becoming a routine at this rate. Yeah, the fighting is starting to become a little repetitive.

(Pic 51) A textbox popped up saying how Myra was getting hungry. The Belly stat had 19 out of 100 units left. If you haven’t played PMD, yes, there is a hunger mechanic and it’s called “Belly”. The stat depletes for every movement you make inside of a dungeon. And you slowly lose HP once it hits 0. Also, good job utilizing this mechanic for the pasta, sparklingdemon. I think this is a way of building up tension in Myra’s life-risking scenario. I feel like it’s a mechanic people forget about for the PMD games.

Myra made it to the 10th floor and was starting to get dizzy from hunger. Her stamina was depleting too fast for the protag’s tastes. Going south of the dungeon, Myra stumbled across something that hadn’t been shown throughout the dungeon. Items. Beautiful, precious items were on display, and they were oddly in color too, compared to the rest of the settings, indicating that they were important. They were placed on a rug and guarded by two Kecleons. The protag questioned if they were the Kecleon brothers that left the note back at the town. Are they as friendly as the note implied? I would talk about how oddly convenient this is but Dovey and I are currently writing a story arc that has its share of odd convenience.

(Pic 52) Myra stepped on the rug and picked up the first item. One of the Kecleons screamed, “pay the price” repeatedly. The protagonist assumed they were actually for free.

(Pic 53) Myra turned to face the Kecleon on the left who was chanting, “A life for a life” repeatedly. Admittedly, I find these chants a little unsettling.

Myra picked up and ate the Blast Seed. Not reading the description, the Vulpix blew a powerful explosion of flames at the Kecleon in front of her. The Kecleon was engulfed by the blast of fire. The other Kecleon used Thief which dealt much damage to Myra. The protag knew Myra had to get out of there. She picked up the Warp Seed and used it towards the Kecleon after they attempted to use Thief on her again. The Kecleon tried to use Thief to get Myra’s chains, but they won’t come off as the textbox implied.

(Pic 54) Myra threw the Warp Seed and it landed on the Kecleon as they teleported out of there. There were no longer any Kecleons to guard the rest of the items. The protag wasn’t hesitant to make Myra scoop up all of the items and food to fill up Myra’s Belly. There was a Max Elixir, a Violent Seed, and four pieces of Grimy Food. Consuming the Violent Seed made Myra’s Attack and Special Attack rise sharply.

I feel like this part with the violent seed consumption should've happened earlier to make all of the calamitous damage Myra is dealing towards the zombie Pokémon a little clear on why Myra is dealing a lot of damage towards each Pokémon rather than it just being instantly. Like, have the shop back at the town have two seeds provided: the joy seed and the violent seed. Myra's belly stat is almost empty of units, so she has to eat despite not being inside of a dungeon which throws the protagonist off-guard. There's a note that says "Choose your route: the path of joy or survival?" The protagonist tries to get Myra to get the joy seed, but a zombie Pokémon snatches it and says, "There will never be any JOY in your life!" and the light particles appear around them and makes them vanish. The protagonist has to make Myra eat the violent seed, despite being concerned about how low of belly units the seed replenishes, but a textbox appears saying "You chose the path of violence. It's the only way for survival." But I guess that would lean towards Myra being more of an antagonist, and I assume Myra is supposed to be categorized as the good protagonist for this story since she's the "hero". Future me speaking: if Myra is technically saving the zombie Pokémon to bring them to LIFE in her new world, I think the usage of the Life Seed could be used for metaphorical purposes. If Swallow was used to literally swallow another Pokémon, which isn't how it's used in the actual games, then I think there can be a metaphorical usage for an in-game item.

I have another reason for this concept that I won't share until I give my "further thoughts" for spoiler purposes.

(Pic 55) It wasn’t much before the Kecleon approached Myra again as if the Warp Seed was only there to buy Myra time to pick up the other items. Myra was cornered by the Kecleon and her HP isn’t fully restored yet. The Kecleon dealt half an HP bar number of damage to Myra with the Thief attacks. Kecleon was charging with double its speed this time. To slow down the Kecleon, Myra threw a piece of the Grimy Food at them. Unexpectedly, the food actually made the Kecleon become paralyzed instead. The protagonist wasn’t hesitant to make Myra launch an Ember towards the Kecleon. They were defeated and the stairs to the next floor were unlocked. After a sigh of relief, Myra ate the rest of the Grimy food to replenish their Belly stats before proceeding upstairs.

Just the feeling of being cornered is enough to make you feel for Myra in this scenario. It makes you want to ensure her safety and well-being.

Page 10 Pics 56-60
So, we’re now on page 10 and not much really happens except more fights against zombie Pokémon. Even the story itself has each floor in some kind of montage pace. Not saying it’s a bad thing. I’ll have you guys give it a read.

(Pic 56) Some of the next floors had some pretty simple battles that Myra was able to breeze through. Floor 11 had a Spinda, Wynaut, and Wobbuffet. Floor 12 had a Pachirisu, a Zigzagoon, and an Octillery. Floor 13 had a Tangela, Heracross, and Mr. Mime. Floor 14 had some organized duos with Murkrow & Shuppet and Slakoth & Slowpoke (who were bleeding from their tail being cut off). But it wasn’t until Floor 15 seemed to have given Myra some trouble and in danger again with a larger group of Pokémon attacking Myra at once. The protag had a strategy to have Myra flee into the hallway to take out each one individually to prevent her from getting swarmed. It worked to take out all six of them. The staircase still hasn’t opened up yet as if there was one more opponent remaining for the gauntlet battle. It turns out there was a motionless Sunflora in the corner. Myra had to finish them off in order to proceed.

Unless all of these Pokémon are ACTUALLY supposed to be the townsfolks for that one empty town shown in the vanilla game, I appreciate your diverse section of Pokémon, even including the not-so-popular ones, sparklingdemon. Future me speaking: turns out all of them are townsfolks from Treasure Town (which is the empty town Myra was in earlier) or from the guild.

(Pic 57) The Sunflora with withered petals was burning and spoke out to Myra, “The light burns... It’s hurting us... Is it you? Are you the light? Why are you burning us?” The Sunflora’s burn caused calamitous damage each time until she fainted. The protag was left with a really ugly feeling afterward, questioning why they had to kill all of these Pokémon just to proceed. Was it causing real pain and death? Was it really necessary? Not to dwell on the idea for too long, they proceeded forward to the next floor. Floor 16 had a Ledyba, Toegpi, and Politoed. Politoed was worrisome with having Hypnosis and Perish Song, but luckily, the attacks were missed. Floor 17 had Camerupt, Ponyta, and Bellsprout. Floor 18 had a Scyther, Zangoose, and Sandslash.

(Pic 58) Floor 19 had the scariest-looking enemies with Arbok, Weavile, and Drapion. All of them had blood dripping from their claws and/or mouths. Somehow, Myra managed to take them all out. But Weaville’s Pressure drained Myra of all of her PP. The only move they have PP for is Tail Whip which the protag never thought of using throughout the dungeon. Concerned about floor 20, Myra was in serious trouble if it contained stronger foes. They had to proceed downwards. It seemed like a maze at first as Myra got lost for a few solid minutes. It was until a textbox popped up.

(Pic 59) “You went back in time to change the future.” It was a Grovyle who was speaking as Myra continued taking a few steps into the room. “How many times must you go back until you get the future you want?” The Grovyle curiously asked Myra. Stepping close to the Grovyle. “We’ve already failed. You’ve already failed.” They responded. They were finally within attacking range, but the protag was unsure about hurting the Grovyle as they were completely lost, almost dead, and were waiting to have their suffering end, or were willing to kill Myra.

(Pic 60) Attempting to speak to the Grovyle, Myra lunged at him instead. He still didn’t turn around to face Myra. The protagonist wanted answers from him, but it seemed like trying to squeeze them out of him through attacks wasn’t doing anything. He took 5 damage from each attack. After a while, Myra stood still staring at the Grovyle and the same yellow light that surrounded the Bidoof from earlier was rising from the Grovyle as well. The Grovyle was slowly bleeding out of his mouth as he began to laugh. Grovyle gave one last remark, “I’ll see you in your next life... “hero.””

The Grovyle vanished away into the light. The protag was confused about what the Grovyle was talking about. While trying to theorize, they decided to proceed to the next set of stairs. They noticed the screen stayed black longer than usual. The protag questioned if they were finally finished with their gauntlet of battles.

I think I have an idea of what the Grovyle means by going back in time to change the future. It’s referring to the protag constantly resetting the game to get Vulpix as their character.

Page 11 Pics 61-65
(Pic 61) The screen faded into a cutscene of Myra inside a deeper part of the cave. No music was playing, but the sound of roaring, bellowing wind, and a faint noise of a clock ticking. Myra had a stern, fierce look in her eyes as if she knew what was ahead of her direction. It was more trails of blood. The following textboxes appeared, “I know you’re there. I can feel your heartbeat.” Myra was unfazed by the strange voice. The background turned into a rainbow gradient as Myra took some steps forward to reveal a silhouette of a Pokémon right in front of her.

(Pic 62) “Do you still recognize me, Myra?” It spoke out to her. It revealed a shadow figure with chains wrapped around their neck, just like Myra does. The protag was able to figure out who the silhouette was blending in with the rainbow gradient background. They just didn’t want to believe it was them. The shadow figure then revealed who they were.

(Pic 63) “You did this to me.” It was revealed to be the Squirtle. The protagonist’s heart stopped at the sight of the same Squirtle they tried to erase away in favor of the Vulpix. She was severely beaten up and bloodied while exposing muscle tissue and a missing arm. I like how the author took something that would be very cheesy for your typical creepypasta, and made it work.

(Pic 64) The static shot up the screen once again, as the actual background was exposed from the masquerade of the rainbow gradient. “You maimed me beyond repair.”

The sprite work has been mind-blowing thus far, but I have to admit, the blood trail looks off here. It might just be me. It just looks way too detailed and realistic to look like it would be shown in the actual game. I will give credit to the amount of detail placed into the blood, though. In fact, come to think about it, the overly detailed blood kind of adds to the creepiness of the atmosphere.

“But you couldn’t make me disappear.” The same yellow light that engulf the Grovyle rose upon the Squirtle as well. Had this light been burning her skin away?

“You still want to, don’t you?”
“You hate this ugly, disgusting form that your soul took.”
“So, you know what?”
“Kill me. I dare you.”
“I’m not afraid of you anymore.”

Myra moved toward the deformed Squirtle but was cut off by someone else.

(Pic 65) I love the extra detail with the sharp teeth on Squirtle’s icon.

Pics 66-72

(Pic 66) “Stop!” Shadow, who came out of the nowhere, shouted at the two.

(Pic 67) Shadow was right behind Myra who expressed signs of surprise at his presence.

(Pic 68) Shadow intervened between the two girls. “Don’t do this... Don’t hurt her!” Shadow defiantly hopped up and down. But was talking to Myra, or Squirtle? I was asking the same thing too reading that. Another example of this story reading my mind and saying things for me.

(Pic 69) “Shadow! How could you let her get this fair?! Kill her! Kill her now!” Squirtle screamed. “I... I can’t.” Shadow responded.

Squirtle: “You have to! Please, snap out of it, Shadow!”
Shadow: “... No.”
Squirtle: “No?”
Shadow: “You can’t make me kill someone! Only someone horrible would want to do this!”
Squirtle: “How is she any better? She wants to kill me! She’s the one who’s horrible!”
Myra: “.........”
Squirtle: “How can you believe her over me? She wants to destroy us!”
Shadow: “No, she wants things to be right, too! I know it!”
Squirtle: “No, you can’t believe her! She’s corrupted your thoughts!”
Shadow: “You’re the one corrupting me!”
Squirtle: “What?”
Shadow: “You’re the one always telling me to do these things! You tell me not to listen to her, but I don’t want to listen to you!”

So, Myra walks away and comes back with a bucket of popcorn as she continues to watch the chaos unravel between Squirtle and Shadow. I’m just kidding. That doesn’t actually happen. But, seriously, the beef between these two is a mix of being both funny and sad at the same time. It’s funny because of their facial expressions throughout the whole thing. And I’m not saying they’re a bad thing because they really add to the reading experience. However, in the context of the dialogue and I’m sure was the intended purpose of this scene, it’s meant to be sad because Squirtle trusted Shadow to murder Myra so that they can live their lives “normally” again. Shadow is getting fed up with Squirtle giving him commands and committing actions he clearly doesn’t want to do. And it’s even built up on how he doesn’t want to kill Myra because he knows it’s wrong to murder. Shadow feels like Myra is the better choice for him because she’s been a little more patient and understanding with him compared to Squirtle. Squirtle feels betrayed by all of Shadow’s scolding remarks towards her.

(Pic 70) Shadow: “I hate you! You’re a monster!”

The tears in Shadow’s tears really indicate that he feels just as betrayed as Squirtle is with him. Really good attention to detail. Definite points for the emotional impact.

Suddenly, Squirtle shook violently as the light around her grew brighter. The static bursts back onto the screen, making it difficult for the protagonist to view the characters.

(Pic 71) Shadow’s dialogue could only be visible for a bit. “Oh no!” “Quick! Run away before she.” The dialogue wasn’t finished as the static grew stronger with loud cracking noises that sounded like glass breaking, coming from the speakers.

(Pic 72) It faded in a bit to reveal a dialogue box from Squirtle: “You think you can make me fade away... But you can never get rid of me."

(Pic 73) The next shot was a close-up of the mutilated Squirtle holding a sharp knife in the grips of her tail as she gave a sickening, wide grin, showing off her sharp, pointy teeth, and her dark, soulless, red pupils to impact the sight of her eye sockets. That is actually terrifying, not going to lie.

Pics 74-75

(Pic 74) Squirtle had one more remark to make while her close-up was displayed on screen. “I’m the one who’s real, not you.”

Definitely better than “I am God” from Sonic.exe and it’s probably because the close-up looks convincing and actually looks like it’s in the game and the textbox is in font and style of the game and not some random font they found on Microsoft Word.

(Pic 75) Shadow: “Myra! No!” Shadow’s cry indicates that Myra is in deep trouble and shows how much Shadow cares for her.

DUE TO KB LIMITS, THIS WILL BE WHERE THE REVIEW WILL BE SPLIT INTO TWO PARTS. SORRY.

Click the following for [PART 2]