islandshore | 52 - video/action for travelmates;

[Here we have Riku. Or more specifically, we have Riku and a book. When he looks at the camera, it's with a soft chuckle. Then he starts reading off the page.]

A young man, callow and foolish in innocence came to own a sword. With it, he smote Pokémon, which gave sustenance, with carefree abandon. Those not taken as food, he discarded with no afterthought. The following year, no Pokémon appeared. Larders grew bare.

Just let that sink in for a second. A sword. Killing and eating Pokémon. Still with me?

[Then he'll continue.]

The young man, seeking the missing Pokémon, journeyed afar. Long did he search, and far and wide, too, until one did he find.

Asked he, "Why do you hide?" To which the Pokémon replied...

"If you bear your sword to bring harm upon us, with claws and fangs, we will exact a toll. From your kind, we will take our toll, for it must be done. Done it must be, and for it, I apologize."

To the skies, the young man shouted his dismay. "In having found the sword I have lost so much. Gorged with power, I grew blind to Pokémon being alive. I will never fall savage again. This sword I denounce and forsake. I plead for forgiveness, for I was but a fool."

So saying, the young man hurled the sword to the ground, snapping it. Seeing this, the Pokémon disappeared to a place beyond seeing.

[Riku snaps the book shut, placing it down. Afterwards, he shifts into a more comfortable position, arms folded over his chest.]

So, ignoring the obvious anti weapons message here, this story's pretty interesting. It's an old legend from the Sinnoh region, and if it holds any truth, it means that the people in this world used to use real weapons and actually hunted Pokémon. Plus, when you look at stuff like Skarmory's Pokédex entry, you see bits about forging swords from their feathers. You gotta wonder why they stopped and why they're so paranoid about people defending themselves.

You think it's because people abused that power?

[Either way, he's glad he swung by the library. Sometimes they actually do have interesting reads.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

People should never kill anything that they can't eat or use, but getting rid of anything that can kill is just stupid. You still need to eat something, and people can't eat without killing other living things. You need to be able to defend yourself, too.

What I'm wondering though is why humans can't eat Pokémon, but other Pokémon can. The story says that humans could before, but if you try now it's like biting a rock. How did something like that change, and how can it only be that way for humans?

Maybe that legend holds the key to understanding it. Or maybe it's just a silly story.

But, for all we know, the world could've changed due to some higher power. There's a lot we still don't understand about legendary Pokémon. Some of the stories I've seen treat them as gods instead of your standard animals.

It's hard to believe that anyone could be strong enough to do something like that. Entei was strong enough to stop a storm around himself when I met him, but to be able to keep humans from eating Pokémon would need someone a lot stronger than that.

But even if humans can't eat Pokémon here, the meat in the stores has to come from somewhere. Have you seen any other animals around? I haven't.

What about something like Mew? Supposedly it's one of the most powerful Pokémon out there, and it's a Psychic type.

No idea about the meat, though. Everyone's so tight-lipped about it.

I haven't heard of that one before.

I know. I like to know where my food comes from and how it's lived. Some other people have told me about the animals that these kinds of meat would come from in their worlds, but it's not the same. I want to be able to see them and talk to them before I eat them.

Wouldn't talking to them make it a bit... I don't know, creepy? Because then you get to know them. The way I see it, that'd make it harder to look at them as food.

When you eat you're ending a life. If you don't know anything about how your food lived, then you won't be able to live on in its place.

Live in its place? Okay, that's a new one.

You've killed and eaten someone. They've become part of you. Their life has been ended to continue your life. The only way that they can live on is for you to live for them, so you can't just forget about them. Without them, you would be dead.

That's an awfully... spiritual way of looking at it. Can't say I've ever met anyone who takes it that seriously; most people see a fish, cook the fish, eat the fish, and that's the end of it.

Grandpa always told me, "Be it grass, fruit, or beasts, whatever you eat, you have to live its part. Don't waste a thing." I do my best to follow that. It doesn't seem like many other humans ever think about where their food comes from, let alone try to live its part.

But wait, how would you live for something like grass and fruit? I could understand animals, but plants don't really... do much.

They're alive and they can feel, just not the same way that humans or other animals do. They do a lot of things, but they do it so slowly that you have to watch for a while to see it.

So you're telling me that plants can actually think and feel. They don't just... move to face the sun or anything.

[Man, that's a bit odd even for his standards.]

Yeah. Young plants don't think or feel much, but older plants like trees usually have good stories to tell.

So they're like wise, old men with branches glued on? Kind of hard to imagine, but I guess if they actually saw and felt what happened around them, all those years would stack up pretty fast.

I don't think that time passes for trees any faster than it does for anyone else.

[...Is that supposed to be a joke? Or is Apollo taking Riku too literally?

The world may never know.]

[Riku's just gonna assume he means it literally and promptly shake his head.]

Maybe not, but when you're old and stuck in the same place all your life, your surroundings tend to stick out. Anything different becomes unforgettable.

[He speaks from experience.]

52 - video/action for travelmates;

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