Arriving at the Ginkgo Guild, Ash pushed open the shop door.
The Ginkgo Guild's shop in Jubilife Village wasn't very big, but the shelves were crammed with all sorts of odds and ends, from various materials to daily necessities. Volo was standing in front of one of the shelves, putting away the goods he had just brought back, one item after another.
Hearing the door open, he turned his head, and when he saw who had come in, a familiar smile immediately appeared on his face.
"Oh?"
"So what brings the two most famous great heroes of the Hisui Region these days all the way to my humble place?"
Ash: "…"
Why that title again?
Pikachu, lying on his shoulder, rolled its eyes.
"Pika."
Already sick of hearing it.
Cynthia walked up to the counter, seemingly not affected by his teasing at all.
"Mr. Volo, your information travels fast."
"If a merchant's information doesn't move a bit faster, how's he supposed to do business?"
Volo, smiling, paused what he was doing.
Cynthia looked at him and suddenly asked, "Then what do you think Team Galactic suddenly making all that information public is for?"
The smile on Volo's face stiffened for a brief moment, then he spread his hands in a very natural gesture.
"That's not a question you can ask me."
"As for whether Captain Kamado has some other ideas in mind, how could a man doing business in Jubilife Village like me dare to comment lightly?"
Cynthia raised an eyebrow slightly.
This really was a textbook merchant's answer.
"All right, enough small talk. We actually are here today to give the Ginkgo Guild some business."
"Now that's what I like to hear."
Volo's eyes immediately lit up quite a bit.
"What are you buying?"
Cynthia first listed the daily necessities they needed to restock, then asked about a few types of materials containing relatively high Ground Attribute energy. After listening, Volo quickly agreed to help them look through the guild's current inventory.
Ash took out a few treasures they had recently dug up and sorted, asking Volo to appraise them and give a price while they were at it.
Once the regular transactions were more or less done, Cynthia didn't head straight to payment. Instead, she reached out and tapped lightly on the counter.
"There's one more thing."
Volo looked up.
"What is it?"
"Information."
When he heard that word, the smile on Volo's face actually grew more obvious.
"That depends on what kind of information you're looking to buy."
"The Ginkgo Guild does know quite a lot of things, but the fewer people know a piece of news, the higher the price."
"Let's see if you recognize this first."
Cynthia opened the bag she carried with her and took out a fiery red Plate, a little larger than her palm.
This was the seventh Plate Arcanine had retrieved for them from the magma of Firespit Island after returning to normal, and the Flame Plate Cynthia had deliberately kept back instead of immediately letting the Arceus Phone absorb it.
Once a Plate was absorbed into the phone, it couldn't be taken back out. Since they were planning to ask the Ginkgo Guild about clues related to the actual object, they naturally needed to keep at least one sample on hand they could show others directly.
The moment the Plate appeared in the shop, an extremely brief change flashed across the smile on Volo's face.
His dark pupils clearly contracted for an instant.
Although in the very next second he resumed his usual smiling expression, Cynthia had been watching his reaction ever since she took out the Plate, and that instant of abnormality naturally didn't escape her notice.
"Mr. Volo, have you seen this thing before?"
Cynthia gently set the Flame Plate on the counter.
Volo lowered his head and looked at the Plate, but didn't answer right away.
After a few seconds, he finally spoke slowly. "Saying I've seen it directly wouldn't be quite accurate, but I have indeed heard some things related to Plates like this."
The look in Cynthia's eyes immediately grew much more serious.
Up to now, with all the Plates they had collected, there were almost no people who could actually sit down and explain the origin of the Plates. The Kings and Mount Pokemon would hand over Plates, but they couldn't possibly explain the history behind them in detail the way humans could.
Volo pulled over a chair from beside him and sat down, but he didn't immediately start talking about what he knew. Supporting himself on the tabletop with one hand, his gaze shifted back to the two of them.
"But before I get into that, I'd also like to ask you a question. Why have you been collecting these Plates?"
There was still a smile on Volo's face.
"Lately I've indeed heard that you receive strange Plates from Kings and certain unusual Pokemon, but I didn't realize until now that what you've been looking for are exactly things like this."
Cynthia didn't answer immediately. Instead, she asked, "Does that question have anything to do with the information you're going to sell us?"
"A little," Volo replied without dodging.
"If it were just ordinary ore or fragments from ruins, I certainly wouldn't pry. But these things are different. Since you're planning to ask me about information related to them, I at least need to know what you're actually planning to do with the Plates."
The atmosphere in the shop turned a bit quieter.
Ash didn't rush to answer, leaving this sort of issue—clearly better handled by someone good at dealing with people—to Cynthia.
Cynthia looked at Volo for a moment and quickly made up her mind.
"We come from overseas. Mr. Volo, you've heard that much."
"Mm."
Volo nodded slightly.
"In some old records from our homeland, there are mentions of objects very similar to these Plates, but the surviving content is extremely fragmentary. All we can tell is that the Plates are connected to certain very ancient legends."
Cynthia went on calmly, "After coming to Hisui, we kept encountering Plates like this from Kings and Mount Pokemon."
"And we just so happened to run into anomalies like the Space-Time Rift and the Kings' rampages, so we wanted to keep searching and see whether the Plates are related to the Venerable Sinnoh and to the recent incidents."