Badge #5, Pt 3: The Wasteland

Welcome to the Byxbysion Wasteland! This is another very wide open area that's annoying to navigate. Allegedly, you're here to stop a PULSE Pokémon... but it's an optional battle so we'll come back to that. Instead, you need to navigate across the map to get to the fifth gym: the Poison Gym.

Follow the red arrow to the right into the building (and then follow the red arrow out of it again) to a computer... blocked off by Ace! Who has returned after betraying you a few hours ago! The computer (in the middle of the wasteland) controls a door that you need to unlock to proceed, so I guess you should talk to them (and then fight them).

PULSE Garbador puzzle summary

As you walk through the wasteland, you'll see five "reactor tubes"; similar to the ones found in Corey's old gym. If you turn them all to red, this door will open up.

Inside, you'll find TM175 Toxic Spikes, and a set of stairs. Follow the stairs to find a cave; the path from here is relatively linear until you reach a room with two more tubes. Turn them both to red to open a door at the back into another room, which has three paths available. The middle door contains TM66 Payback. Follow the right-most door to encounter PULSE Garbodor.

After beating it, you can pick up TM09 Venoshock.

After beating them, you can go into the newly-unlocked second building, and then follow the only path up to the gym. Heal your Pokémon and save your game before going into the side room for the gym; you'll get another cutscene and a battle with Fern.

After beating him down, you can finally take your place and battle Ayaya. This is a hard as hell battle, and arguably even more of a difficulty spike than Shelly. Some tips:

• High Horsepower is not nerfed by the Wasteland field. Phanpy learns it as an egg move; you can find it inside the Citrine Mountain area accessible from Beryl Ward. This completely eviscerates her team. Same with Earth Power, or Scorching Sands (learned by Nidoqueen as an egg move.).
• Revavroom can hit really hard with a shift-gear boosted Iron Head, is immune to all of her strong Poison moves, and is completely immune to hazard effects on the field. Switch in a weaker one alongside it to bait her, then sweep with +2 Atk moves.
• Fake Out support is essential here, as it lets you gang up on a problematic Pokémon whilst the other one does ineffective attacks. I'm going to keep singing the praises of Purugly, which gets both Fake Out and U-Turn.
• Offensive Toxapex is a sight to behold, with Toxic Spikes on the wasteland getting 1/8th chip damage and a guaranteed poison on you. Kill it as soon as possible.
• This fight does rely a little bit on good luck; if you get Blizzard frozen turn 1 it's game over. Just F12 and try again. Likewise, if she switches in the wrong order you'll need to adjust your game plan.

Before doing anything, we need to actually go and get the HMX for Strength. Trudge your way back through the wasteland... to find Cain edgeguarding the door. You have to beat him to get through, so...

Leave the wasteland to find Cal, who will reveal he sabotaged the PULSE all along; and will then give you the TMX for Strength! We're not going to go and rescue the kids yet; instead, we're going back into the Wasteland for something.

You might have noticed this suspicious hole in the wall whilst exploring the wasteland. If not, you can get to it by jumping down off the ledge to the north left of the building that takes you higher up after you slide down (that's a mouthful). It's the left hole, not the right hole; the left hole becomes useful once you shove the Strength boulder down the massive gap in the floor. Jump down behind it to find a small grotto.

Within this grotto is the Mismagiusite, and a grave. Interact with it.. it's Kiki's grave? What could this mean? It means that you need to fight a level 65 Medicham. This isn't that hard of a fight, it's merely 15 levels above you, so you can beat it legitimately if you so desire. (Or you can Murkrow cheese it.) Either way, after beating it, the fake Kiki reveals herself to be a Misdreavus.

Finally, there's an Squirtle you can catch if you set the weather to rainy. If you go back to the grotto described in the PULSE section above, there's a hidden door behind the left reactor tube; keep going to the right (ignore the strength rock) until you're outside again. There's some non-euclidean geometry here; first, slide down the path and enter the cave. Climb the laddeer once, then go back down the ladder to enter a different chamber. Push the strength rock downwards, jump off the ledge, and push the second strength rock to the left to open up the path to the north.

You'll find the Squirtle relaxing in a wastewater pool, and TM12 Taunt directly below. With that, you've seen everything there is to see in the Wasteland for... most of the game.

If you didn't already, catch a Chimecho (via Chingling) from the Obsidia Stairs; then, head to Azurine Island once again. Make your way to the former Meteor building and show the guy hanging out there your Chimecho. If you go into the back room, you will find a Chikorita! This is the second of our three trips here, but the last for a while. Goodbye, Azurine Island!

Next stop is Pyrous Mountain, at Apophyll Beach. Don't go down to floor B1F (you might remember a boulder there), but instead go straight up to floor 3F to find a different Strength boulder.

You need to push the boulder into the hole. It's pretty easy to screw yourself here, so save beforehand and then follow the red arrow to push it. Jump down into the hole yourself to find... a Tepig? If you talk to it, it skedaddles down to B1F again; now you should go and find that Strength boulder you remembered. If you push it out of the way, you'll find the Tepig again, as well as TM101 Fire Spin and TM37 Sandstorm. It flees once again; this time to the top of the mountain. If you interact with it again.. it'll battle you! I warn you, though, it's only level 15 so its a bastard to catch. Make sure you have a good supply of Pokéballs.

Finally, if you travel to North Obsidia alleyway - provided you've done all of the Gang Quests so far - you will find a Houndour, which will fight you if you have a Pokésnax.