I beat Bugsy last night easily, considering I have a Quilava and a Hoothoot. Anyways, after that, I battled my rival and won, and then entered Ilex Forest.
In my first post, I mentioned how stupid I was as a little girl, and this is a story to further prove it. You see, I couldn’t get past Ilex Forest. I didn’t know what to do about the Farfetch’d, and was just stuck at that point. I remember making new games on a regular basis, and kept catching Pokémon in the grass by Azalea Town. At one point I somehow had my box full of Pokémon and an Ekans had to be sent to the next box, even though I only caught the same Pokémon. I even trained a Spearow until it evolved into Fearow—all my training was done in the grass by Azalea Town, mind you; I was a very persistent little girl—and then tried to train it until it learned Fly so I could just skip Ilex Forest. Seriously. Looking back, it’s amazing I ever beat the game.
Anyways, that whole story is actually relevant to this for a reason. You see, during one of the times I was stuck there, I remember deciding to call Hex out of boredom. After beating Bugsy, I tried calling her again. The answers have been changed a bit. The previous one about the gym was replaced by this:
“Ah, good evening. I heard you defeated the gym in Azalea. Thank you very much for showing those mindless bugs how weak they truly are.”
Okay, cool. After beating my rival, I also got this:
“Hello, Gold. I saw the red-haired boy you’ve been looking for near Ilex Forest. Judging from the look on his face, I suppose you must have defeated him. Well done.”
Then I spammed calling her, getting the same answers over and over again, until, finally, I got this useful message:
“Gold, I’m in Goldenrod City. I’m surprised you aren’t here yet. Are you stuck in Azalea Town? Hmm… When I went to Ilex Forest earlier, I saw a Farfetch’d wandering around. It probably belongs to the cutting master of Azalea Town. You should try sneaking up on it. It will run away, and you can use that to your advantage to chase it to the entrance of the forest. I’m sure the cutting master in Azalea will be very grateful and give you a reward that should help.”
By now, I think you’ve figured out why the story about my childhood idiocy is relevant. The sole reason I got through Ilex Forest was because of this message from Hex. I’d have figured it out eventually, sure, but “eventually” could easily have been years. The coincidence of it is also amazing. I could have easily gotten a “normal” Silver version game, without Hex, or I could have not been so stumped by the maze. Think about it: how many people would have trouble with it? I was the one idiot girl in a thousand who got stuck there. And yet, Hex was prepared to offer me the solution. What are the chances of that?
Thinking about it that way, I can suddenly relate to why my cousin thought she was scary. It’s not because of the phone call where she mentioned the whole ghost line, but it’s the mere probability of it. This was all running through my mind while playing the game, and considering it was like 12 AM at night and pretty dark, it pretty much added to the eeriness of it. I think too much, I guess.
As soon as I got out of Ilex Forest, I saved the game and stopped playing for the night. Before that, though, I decided to give Hex one last call in Ilex Forest, and got this:
“Do you know the story of Ilex Forest? It’s protected by a guardian that can travel through time. The people are respectful of it and built a shrine, but it makes me think… What does it do with its powers? Can it try to change the future and past? Can it do that? Could it possibly save… … …Ah, I’m sorry. I’m just thinking out loud here. Sometimes I just feel like a puppet, like everything that happens in my life was set from the day I was born. Even if you could travel through time, I can’t help but think you still wouldn’t be able to change fates. Thinking about it, time travel must be a pretty grim power. You’d know what would happen, but would be helpless to stop it. Isn’t that sad? …Ah, I went off-topic again. I’m sorry. I should hang up now. Talk to you later.”
Pretty deep for a video game character, I think. And a bit depressing.
