Curse of the Unown King

This happened to me last Christmas:

It would be around 11 o'clock at night on Christmas Eve. My parents were not at home, and would not be back until the next day, as they were partying at my grandparents' house. Under normal circumstances I would have gone, but I was sick.

So there I was, alone in my house, with a fever of 37 and a half, watching TV, when suddenly my doorbell rang. I went to see who it was, I wasn't expecting any visitors and I knew it couldn't be my parents, since my grandparents' town is an hour and a half away from where we live and they had called me to let me know that they had arrived only a quarter of an hour ago. I looked through the peephole to see who it was but no one was there.

I assumed it was a drunken joker, you know, on Christmas Eve night.... I opened the door to make him leave, but when I did, I found a package on the landing. Wow! It seemed that Santa Claus had come early this year, I don't know who would have bitten, but at the time he seemed like a pretty generous person, however, to my misfortune, my disappointment was not long in coming. I took the package home and opened it. Inside was an envelope on which was written:

"Keep it, I don't want it anymore; along with a copy of Pokémon Silver Edition, the original." I thought that was great at the time, as I had fond memories of that game, and mine had run out of battery power, making it impossible to save the game. I grabbed my old Game Boy Advance SP and began my viciada. However, first I opened the envelope to see what was inside and found a note with instructions to follow.

Still to this day, I keep it along with the game and it says: "Hello, if you are reading this, it is because you have my game and since I have given it to you, I ask you to please continue it up to the point I tell you in this letter, then you can play freely."

Well, since you gave it to me, I thought, "What less can I do for you?"

I read on:

1st Don't start a new game, continue mine already saved. I have captured the three legendary dogs, and I've given the GS Ball to Cesar, so as soon as you go talk to him you can capture Celebi. I have captured 248 Pokémon, besides Celebi I'm missing Lugia and Ho-Oh. Please capture them and complete the Pokédex.

Damn, what luck! He had practically handed it all to me on a golden platter. I was really looking forward to completing the Pokédex, so I got on with it. I continued the game that had already been started by its former owner and started checking its data. The trainer's name was SUSEJ, a bit odd for a trainer's name, but I'll tell what it means later, if you haven't figured it out for yourselves.

My team consisted of a Houndoom, a Lapras and a Slowbro, at levels 66, 32 and 63 respectively and a Sandshrew, an Abra and a Pidgey at very low levels, which I probably had them to use the MOs. I had all 16 medals and the money limit.

Playing time 662:50 or thereabouts (that made me think the previous owner was a vitiate) and the Pokégear read about 11:50 PM on Saturday, the same time and day of the week as the one I was playing on. At the time that just seemed like coincidence to me. Once I knew my data, I started playing.

First I captured Celebi, since I was in Azalea Village right at the start and it was the closest one to me. I did the whole process, I went to talk to César, I received the GS Ball, then I went to Encinar, I deposited it in the monument to the guardian of the forest and the battle with Celebi began. I was very excited to capture him, since without a special event you can't get him. I caught him after a while, when I got tired of throwing normal PokéBalls at him and threw him a MasterBall (out of 3 I had) and I got a message saying that he had been transferred to Bill's PC, to Pandora's Box.

Pandora's Box? I figured it was a joke. For those who don't know, Pandora's box is a myth, I think Greek, which says that if it is opened, demons will come out of it, things like that, and the human race will be doomed. Without giving it too much importance, since the name of the boxes could be changed, I continued and captured the other two legendaries I had left. It was easy, as I said before, I had the necessary Master Balls. Once I had captured all the legendaries, and thus completed the pokédex, I continued reading the instructions given to me by the former owner:

2º Now that you have captured all the legendaries, create the following team: Mew, Celebi, Ho-Oh, Lugia, Suicune and Moltres. Wait for the Pokégear to mark 3:00 AM to perform the next step.

So it was 01:00 AM in the game and since it marked the same time it actually was, I had to stay awake until three as well. I didn't mind, I was having a good time playing that game. I went to talk to Professor Oak, to see what he would tell me about the Pokédex, went to Azulona City to get the diploma certifying that I had completed the Pokédex, defeated Red and took a look at the other boxes. The guy had even caught the 4 MissingNo's! I kept fooling around like that until I realized that it was already 02:45 AM. I read the next step:

3rd When it's 03:00 AM go to the Alpha Ruins, enter the main chamber and go to the last statue following the corridor down. In front of it put the Unown radio signal, and talk to it.

So I did, I went pulling towards the Alpha Ruins, I took the Magnettrain, because I was in Kanto and from Trigal City to my destination I walked. I had plenty of time.

When I finally arrived it was 02:58, so I waited for 2 minutes in front of the statue, with the Unown radio signal on. That noise was making me quite nervous. When the Pokégear finally read 03:00 AM, I spoke to the statue. It emitted the cry of a Pokémon.... but it didn't sound like one I knew. And text boxes started popping up, "Mew is gone." And Mew's cry. "Celebi is no more." And her scream and so on until they named all the Pokémon on my team. At the end, another text box came up:

"Your team's sacrifice has allowed the release of The Unown King."

When I closed the text box the screen went black for about 2 seconds and then it popped up on the King Unown's page in the Pokédex, which went something like this:

"This ferocious beast can sleep for centuries and when it wakes it will kill anything for food."

It had no number and its cry was the one that had sounded before. It was dark blue like the Unown, but its form only resembled them in the head where it had 3 spikes, like a crown and it had only one eye. Unlike the Unown, this one had a body, legs and arms ending in spikes stained red, I guess it could be blood. When I closed the Pokédex I appeared back where I had found the Unown King and another message popped up saying "You have released the Beast". When I closed it, the game automatically saved.

I then had exactly 666 hours of gameplay!

I looked at my equipment, but now I had no Pokémon. The game started to get on my nerves. I left the chamber and headed for Mauve City, to pick up some Pokémon from the PC. During the drive to said city, I noticed that there was something strange, plus the music from the Unown radio signal kept playing everywhere I went, but I only noticed it as soon as I entered the Pokémon center.

There were no people!

The NPCs had disappeared!

When I looked inside the PC I found that out of the 20 practically full boxes, there were now only two Pokémon in Pandora's Box. A level 20 Staryu and the Sandshrew from before. I didn't know what was going on so I was wandering all over Johto. There were no NPCs in any town, no route, not even in the houses. I read the next step of the note:

4th Wait for the call.

The call, from whom? I didn't know who was supposed to call me, so I opened the Pokégear and looked at the numbers, only Professor Elm's and Oro's mother (the playable character) were there. I called Professor Elm, but a message popped up saying, "He doesn't seem to be answering...". And when I called Oro's mother I got the usual text. It was already 03:30 AM and still no one had called me back. I had already kicked almost all of Johto and there wasn't a single person, and there were no Pokémon in the grass either. Finally the call came. It was from Oro's mother, it said:

"Son, please come home quickly...!". The cry of the Unown King sounded and the call ended.

Between the fever and the sleepiness I was already starting to feel sick, but I wanted to know what was going on and now I knew where to go. In my house there was no one, however, upstairs there seemed to be a note on the wall, I read it and it said:

5th and last: Go see Professor Oak.

Before I left, I looked at the houses in Spring Town to see if anyone was there, however, as I already feared, there was no one. Not one NPC in all of Johto. Now I knew I had to go to Kanto, and since I couldn't take either the S.S. Anne or the Magneto Train, then I understood why I had just those 2 Pokémon: so I could go surfing all the way to Kanto. However, before going to see Professor Oak I took a walk around Kanto to see if anyone was there. There only seemed to be Mr. Fuji in Lavender Town, I talked to him and he said:

"I've been very busy lately."

That's when I understood what was going on:

The Unown King had killed every person and Pokémon in the game, hence what his Pokédex page said. After talking to possibly the last person in the game, I went to Palette Town. I had no flight, but there were no Pokémon in the grass or water either so it didn't take me long to get there. There was no one there either, neither in Red's house, nor in Blue's house.

I entered Professor Oak's laboratory. As expected there was not even a person NPC. But where Professor Oak normally stands, there was the mini sprite of a Unown. I guessed what I had to do, so I stood in front of it and pressed A. The cry of the Unown King sounded and the battle against it began.

He was level 100 and to top it off, equipped with several restore everything. He finished off my Pokémon in no time, but as soon as the last of my Pokémon was weakened, the battle continued. Gold was at level 10, I already knew I was not going to be able to do anything against that critter. I thought about turning off the console, but then I thought better of it, I told myself that if I didn't see how it ended, I would be intrigued because maybe this wouldn't happen to me again. After all, it was a game, what could happen to me?

Oro only knew Placaje, but he didn't get to use it because the Unown King attacked first. He used Bite and Oro was weakened. A message came up saying "SUSEJ is dead". The screen went black for a few seconds and then a sprite of a man dressed in black appeared, as Professor Oak appears at the beginning of the game. He said the following to me:

"SUSEJ! You just released the Beast and doomed the human race. I couldn't have done it without you.'" Then the screen went black and after a minute, the normal intro of the game started, with Lugia flying in the blue sky.

There was no previous saved game, I could only start a new one. It was already 04:30 AM, so I turned off the console and tried to sleep since, besides being sick, I felt very tired. That night I dreamed that I was King Unown and I was wandering around the world looking for my next victim.

I don't know if this was a morbid joke, or if it really had a supernatural origin, what I do know is that I was a month without stopping to think about it and that every time I remember it my hair stands on end and I even have nightmares about it from time to time. If it was a joke (which I hope it is) I think it was a joke of a satanist or something: 03:00 AM is considered Satan's hour, which just coincided with the 666 hours of gameplay, SUSEJ is Jesus in reverse, not to mention the "release of the Beast". Of one thing I am sure: having played that game has left me scarred for life.