Silver Resistance

…Until the last ember fades.

Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Silver Resistance is a Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Fanfic written by ScytheRider, something of a subtle Deconstruction of the titular Roguelike games.

It chronicles the story of Char--a human who awakens to find himself having been transformed into a Charmander, stripped of all memories of his past life, and left stranded in Ambera, a world where Pokémon can talk and have built a thriving civilization. All is not well in Ambera however, as it is being ruled by a tyrannical entity only known as "The Master". If that's not bad enough, Ambera is also plagued by "the Watchers", a mysterious group of ghost Pokémon that only appear at night and relentlessly attack any being unfortunate enough to encounter them.

Crossing paths with a fugitive Bulbasaur, Char is quickly drawn into the resistance movement against the enigmatic Master. After their recruitment, the two are taken under the wings of an elderly Scyther who happens to be one of the all-star players of the resistance movement. But things don't stay simple for very long: Char soon learns he was lured into the resistance because he possesses a rare latent ability called the Call that randomly turns him into a psychic atomic bomb and mind-controls every Pokémon who hears his telepathic call. When he learns that the resistance wants to use his power to summon legendary Pokémon and win the war, Char finds himself in over his head in ways he never thought possible.

The story itself can be found here, and, despite multiple long hiatuses, it is once again updating. It boasts two SpinOffs as of this writing: Silver Resistance: Mystery of the Heart by Diego Zeyon (which itself has a prequel), and Forgetting by Gorsecloud. Silver Resistance also has a prequel set several decades in the past, Emerald Chronicles: A Frozen Flame, featuring numerous fan-created characters.

Silver Resistance now has a character page.

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Tropes featured in Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Silver Resistance:

• An Arm and a Leg: Char in the Temporal Tower arc; it's temporary, though.
• Arc Words: The author recently admitted to "four places at once" and "come crashing down" being these, though their meaning is yet unclear.
• The Atoner: Scythe, for serving under the Master.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: Played completely straight by Scythe and Adiel. Both (relatively) tower over their subordinates in martial prowess, wisdom, and experience.
• Asskicking Equals Authority: The Adrellos Scyther clan, complete with the "duel for leadership" tradition.
• Ascended Extra: Lily, dead front and center. Originally submitted by Gorsecloud as a potential character for the prequel, Emerald Chronicles. From there, she gets the role of the Pokémon with The Call. THEN, she appeared with a cameo role in the main fic, only she quickly progressed to becoming a major character during the journey to Temporal Tower. She is also a bit of an inside joke, connecting Silver Resistance to Spanning Time, where a character named Lily is the main character Chlora's niece.
• Backstory: Sycthe has several chapters dedicated to this.
• Badass Creed: In addition to the example cited above, the Adrellos creed may be the personification of this.
• Baleful Polymorph: In keeping with the tradition of Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, this occurs to Char at the very beginning of the story.
• Big Bad: The Master.
• Big Brother Mentor: Arguably, Scythe. Later, this is deconstructed.
• Blessed with Suck: So, you have been gifted with a phenomenally powerful form of telepathy that has the ability to subconsciously influence the minds of your friends (see entry under The Empath below), summon Pokémon and Watchers from miles away when you're experiencing an 'episode', compel legendary Pokémon, and whose nature you can barely comprehend, much less control? The Call could be considered the epitome of this trope.
  • Also played painfully straight with Lily, Char, Saura, and Lucario; the last of whom was born without the ability to use Aura.
• Blood Knight: Adiel.
• Broken Pedestal: The reason Ray's brother disappeared before Ray joined the resistance was because he became a traitor, and Scythe ordered him to be killed.
• Cain and Abel: Invoked with Scythe and Adiel.
• Call to Adventure: The author claims that Char's power was not named after this trope, but it seems to evoke this effect on the characters around him.
• Catapult Nightmare: Char's "sentry duty" dream. Also becomes a chronic problem with Saura later.
• Character Development: Lots of it.
• The Chessmaster: Scythe, and to a lesser extent Prince.
• Crowning Moment of Heartwarming: Invoked almost too many times to count, usually between Char, Saura, Ray, and eventually Scythe as well.
• Crowning Moment of Awesome: Again, almost too many instances to count, but almost anything involving Scythe in the early chapters would qualify.
  • Also, Char's Pyrrhic Victory over a Steelix in Chapter 24.
• Darker and Edgier
• Doomed Hometown: Saura's village certainly qualifies, as does Zona's in the Spin-Off and Frozen Spring in Frozen Flame.
  • Everybody's Dead, Dave in the latter two examples.
• The Empath: Inverted by Anyone with the Call. They're essentially impressing their emotions and perceptions on the Pokémon around them without realizing it. In some cases it's good (Lily and Prince), but others not so much (See the Nice Job Breaking It, Hero entry below)
• The Empire: The Master's reign over Ambera has many trappings of this, though it seems to be a surprisingly benign and laissez-faire version, at first... (See Offstage Villainy below.)
• Elaborate Underground Base: The Gold Division base, explained to be a former Pokémon academy.
• Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: An inversion, of sorts: Char is surprised to discover that being a Fire-type does not grant him immunity to fire, and that it's not a very good idea to sleep in a burning brazier. Otherwise played mostly straight; this is Pokémon, after all.
• Ensemble Darkhorse: Adiel, the villainous Scizor, is a fan favorite despite how rarely he appears or speaks.
• Evil Tower of Ominousness: The Master's fortress is obliquely described thus.
• Genre Savvy: The entirety of Team Ember, when approached by Team X as part of an extremely obvious attempt to infiltrate the Gold Division in Chapter 23.
• Ghost Town: The Watchers and the Master's other servants have made more than one settlement in Ambera into one of these.
  • Also, there is at least one example of a literal ghost town (i.e. a town populated by ghosts): Blackriver City.
• Gotta Catch Em All: Domo is a Ditto with the power to transform into any Pokémon he's seen in his life. His life's mission is to see every Pokémon.
• Heel Face Turn: Present in Scythe's backstory.
• It Got Worse: The fate of Emerald Division in general and Prince's Silver Division in particular. Both suffered catastrophic losses in a battle with the Master's forces that took place between the events of Frozen Flame and Silver Resistance.
• Jerkass: Lucario. Though not without reason.
• La Résistance
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Again, Char.
  • Subverted with Saura.
• Loads and Loads of Characters
• Magi Babble: The author goes into great detail to explain how a lot of taken-for-granted game mechanics and Pokémon attacks actually work.
• Mind Probe: Performed by Eva to sense Char's call ability.
• Mind Rape: The byproduct of coming into contact with the Watchers and not dying will usually result in this, to a tragic degree.
• Minion with an F In Evil: Both the members of Team X and their apparent leader, Dusknoir, seem to be the embodiment of this trope. This may be a clever lampshade by the author, considering what type of character the other Dusknoir was in Pokémon Mystery Dungeon 2.
• More Expendable Than You: Char's selfless spirit does not go along well with the fact that We Cannot Go on Without You is in full effect.
• Naive Newcomer: Char suffers from this for many of the early chapters, for obvious reasons.
  • Also Lily in Emerald Chronicles, having just come to Ambera from another region.
• Names to Run Away From Really Fast: If "The Master" wasn't bad, try the Watchers.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: In a recent chapter, Char realizes that he, Saura, and Lily have been subconsciously broadcasting their doubts to Scythe--who is especially sensitive to the Call--for the past several weeks. Essentially, more they doubted Scythe, the more unstable he became, and it fed a vicious cycle of erratic behavior on his part. (Confused? See The Empath entry above.)
• Nocturnal Mooks: The Watchers are a particularly unsettling example of this.
• The Obi-Wan: Domo the Ditto, and later Prince the Infernape are the only characters who seem to be able to relate directly to Char and teach him more about his fire power.
• Offstage Villainy: The Master, to ridiculous lengths. We never see most of the awful things he's done, only hear about them.
• Olympus Mons: Many legendary Pokémon feature prominently in the story arc, either as a part of the basic mythology or appearing in actual cameos.
  • Though, in a slight subversion (and since this is a Mystery Dungeon Fanfic), no one is concerned with capturing said gods.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: Saura (not really) and Ray, by Char.
• Playing with Fire: Char, being a Charmander and all.
• Plucky Comic Relief: Ray provides most of this.
• Proud Warrior Race Guy: Clan Adrellos may be an example of this trope, though some could argue they're a subtle subversion.
• Rage Against the Mentor: Char gradually treats Scythe more personally throughout the story, and eventually starts trying to call him out on things he disagrees with.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: The Evergreen Guild in Emerald Chronicles
  • You've got the leader with split personality, Yuu the overly-excitable second-in-command, Seismic, a child in an adult's body, several more who are mentioned, and Lily, who has The Call. This is actually Lampshaded by the fact that upon seeing all their quirks, Lily runs away from the Guild after she first came to join.
  • Also, the entire Evergreen Guild is a Shout-Out to the Wigglytuff Guild in Pokémon Mystery Dungeon 2.
• The Remnant: A rare non-villainous example, but the Emerald Division in its present form may qualify after the sack of Rayquaza's Clutch.
• The Revolution Will Not Be Vilified: Played somewhat straight in the case of Ambera's resistance divisions.
• Sempai-Kohai: Scythe, again, to both his own resistance team and Team Ember. Though, just as above, this is later deconstructed.
• Shout-Out: The author has used the fic to make numerous of these to its inspiration, the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon games, as well as roguelikes in general
  • There are also several Shout Outs to others fanworks, such as Char Cole.
  • He even shouts out to his own fics, including, of all things, his badfic: "RAYQUAZA DOES NOT PLAY WITH BLOCKS."
• Song Fic: Subverted. The story contains lots of poetry inserts, but they're all actually original lyrics to melodies from Pokémon Mystery Dungeon.
• We Are Team Cannon Fodder: Ray and Saura but not actually Saura are this to Char, neither having the world-shaping Call.
• World of Cardboard Speech: Chapter 42 has six of them at once. That's got to be some kind of record.
• Xanatos Gambit: Scythe instructs the heroes about creating these at one point, explaining that sometimes you can cause your enemies to help you by trying to stop you. Both he and Adiel pit this trope against each other.
• Xanatos Speed Chess: Eventually revealed to have been invoked on multiple occasions by Scythe, largely as a result of the protagonists' actions and (arguably) existence, which derailed many of his carefully laid plans. Unfortunately, this doesn't last long, for Adiel is also an extremely capable Chessmaster.