Fanfic / Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Pathways of Aspiration

Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Pathways of Aspiration is a Pokémon Mystery Dungeon fan fic written by Pbugle. A young man from the human world gets sent to the Pokémon world and turned into a Bagon and is now in a tropical region called Faire with a Raichu at his side. Will he use his second chance at life wisely?

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Tropes:

• Aerith and Bob: Wendy is probably the most normally-named character. Binair, Eoin, and Catalina would be next, and Chimera and Argon are the most outlandish.
• Amazing Technicolor Wildlife: Inverted with Pallids, which are all monochrome.
• Apologetic Attacker: Argon doesn't want to be too hard on a Chimera during their practice battle. He becomes increasingly annoyed with her refusal to give it her all so he knows what to expect from future opponents.
  Argon: Chimera, do you want to sto—
  Chimera: HIT ME! I CAN TAKE IT.
• Batman Gambit: Chimera gets Eoin to call off their duel by deliberately missing; attacking Chimera after that would lend credibility to the idea that Eoin isn't as civilized as he claims.
• Blind Mistake: Chimera's Blinker Seed-induced blindness results in him plummeting off a cliff. Fortunately, he's unharmed and even gets an adrenaline rush from it.
• Bluff the Impostor: Argon thinks that her "mother" isn't who she claims to be, so puts her to the test by asking why she was given the name Argon. Sure enough, the story [[spoiler:Uxie gives (that she was named after the chemical element that powered the lights in her father's guild) does not align with what Argon knows (that the name was given to her on the interest of being easy to pronounce, as well as making sure she would be called first when Pokémon were called in alphabetical order).
• Both Sides Have a Point: Chimera and Eoin's argument in A Matter of Honor amounts to this. Eoin needed Chimera's badge to escape the mystery dungeon and would otherwise have ceased to exist, but Chimera is angry that he came close to dying because of his badge's absence, and argues that Eoin doesn't know with 100% certainty that Uxie wouldn't have harmed him. Eoin attacked Chimera first but didn't intend to kill him and wasn't at the same level of sapience that he is now, but Chimera says that almost using lethal force against Eoin was justified since as far as he's concerned, Eoin could have killed him or someone he cares about.
• Downer Beginning: The story opens with Chimera (or as his name is as this point in time, Drover) overlooking a harbor on a cold night while contemplating suicide. At the same time, Argon has recently turned down the position of guildmaster and is bitter at the Pokémon who offered her the position without wondering if she would say no due to her father, a guildmaster himself, going missing during a dangerous expedition.
• Driven to Suicide: Triple subverted. To kick the story off, Chimera intends to commit suicide by jumping into freezing water. He decides not to do it, but then the ice beneath him cracks so he falls in anyway. However, he doesn't die, but ends up as a Bagon in the Pokémon world.
• Electroconvulsive Therapy Is Torture: Averted. Argon uses this on Chimera in Crimson Snow to wake him up. It works and doesn't leave Chimera particularly worse off.
• Eye Scream: Chimera shoots a Pallid Rampardos in the eye in Crimson Snow.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: In a sense. In The Party, Argon mentions Pokémon who dye their fur/scales to appear to be of their species' Shiny variant. Almost immediately thereafter, she meets a Charmander wearing thick and opaque goggles with a metal cone covering the flame on his tail. He also appears to be a different shade of orange from the usual Charmander. Though it isn't revealed immediately, this turns out to be Eoin in disguise.
• Foreshadowing:
  • When he throws his cellphone and DS into the sea in the prologue, Chimera chides himself on his "useless aim". His transformation into a Bagon doesn't improve it at all, what with the tiny arms.
  • Catalina and the Wigglytuff running the factory in Pith Town refer to the founder and president of the WFG as "two-faced". Two chapters later, this turns out to be Binair the Girafarig, whose species has a second face on its tail.
• Given Name Reveal:
  • Chimera turns out to have been called Droverson in the human world.
  • Inverted for Argon; her mother used to call her Mausi as a pet name.
• Hammerspace: When "Evelyn" shows Chimera his missing person's poster, he notes that it seemed to be "not on her person" before. Justified in that this is actually Uxie performing illusions.
• Heat Wave: The story's setting of the Faire region is this. The military band's flutist even passes out from the heat.
• Hold Your Hippogriffs:
  • "White Donphan".
  • "Straw that broke the Camerupt's back".
• Lame Pun Reaction: Subverted. While Chimera, Argon, and Eoin are trekking up the snowy Shayne Mountain, Chimera remarks that he wouldn't want Eoin to be "put on thin ice". Eoin groans... but it's actually from a sudden migraine.
• Non-Indicative Name: The Seedy Pecha, a tavern which is too classy to have "seedy" in its name.
• Oh, Crap!: Chimera seeing a Pallid Rampardos about to attack him and Argon.
  Well... shit.
• One-Word Title:
  • Arsenal.
  • Reconciliation.
  • Rally
• Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure: Argon can only assume Chimera's reference to The Lion King is "some sort of in-joke jest" seeing as that movie doesn't exist in the Pokémon world.
• Pun-Based Title: Fall From Grace in which Chimera plunges off a cliff only to discover not only that he's still alive, but that he enjoys it.
• Shout-Out:
  • Prompted by the presence of a Heal Seed, Chimera recounts the Adam and Eve story to Argon.
  • Chimera makes a nod to The Lion King while touring Pith Town for the first time.
  Chimera: [S]eems like everything the light touches is part of Faire's giant kingdom, but what's that shadowy island over there?
  • The snowy, treacherous Shayne Mountain is a nod to Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Guiding Light starring an Ice-type Vulpix/Ninetales called Shane. There's even an Ice-type Vulpix roaming near the landing site.
• Shown Their Work: The unique choice of Bagon for the human protagonist to turn into didn't go to waste; Chimera gets a kick out of jumping off cliffs.
• Synchronous Episodes: Phantom Reunion and An Old Flame Quenched. In both of these chapters, Uxie is impersonating someone Argon and Chimera know; for the former, Argon's mother, and for the latter, Chimera's old coworker Evelyn in the form of a Togetic. To add to the parallel, both chapters reveal something about the characters' names; Mausi was a pet name Argon's mother used to address her by, and Chimera's human name was Droverson. When Uxie is found out, both chapters end with:
  Uxie: Pokémon such as I make plans, and Arceus laughs... I suppose I should have expected this.
• Temporary Blindness: A Blinker Seed does this to Chimera near the beginning. A Heal Seed cures him the next day.
• Toilet Humor: While flying them around, Catalina warns Chimera and Argon to wait until they reach the ground if they need to use the bathroom because "the Pokémon below are her customers too".
• Villainy-Free Villain: Chimera doesn't think too highly of his superiors at his workplace back in his old life, testifying that they would yell at their employees and "breathe down their necks" and "threaten to give marching orders". They weren't really doing anything wrong by expecting their employees to do their jobs, but any reader who has suffered under strict employers will instantly relate to Chimera and hold similar disdain.