Nightmare Fuel / Pokémon Ghost Stories

Moments subpages are Spoilers Off. You Have Been Warned!

Note: remember that she's talking to a eleven-year-old child.

Every game has them to some extent, whether they're in-universe (canon) or based on the games.

• The Desert Resort in Black and White has Yamask inside: those are Pokémon based off of Egyptian souls combined with death masks. The White Dex Entry states "These Pokémon arose from the spirits of people interred in graves in past ages. Each retains memories of its former life." A Pokémon from the spirits of the dead, in a wrecked tower. Alternatively, the Black dex entry states "They look at their mask and cry". Apparently, the mask is an exact replica of that person's face when they were human.
• The concept behind Galarian Yamask may be one of the most haunting since Paras and Parasect, hitting some of the same notes. Galarian Yamask carries an ancient stone instead of a mask, and it's stated that the stone is inhabited by an evil spirit that is sapping Yamask's energy. The only other design changes are its eye color (easily explained by the spirit) and the fact that it has more "teardrops" on its eyes. This implies that a Galarian Yamask is no more than a Unovan Yamask that picked up a cursed rock one day and became possessed, and it's now tormented by its existence. Things get worse when you evolve it: to do so, you need Yamask to take at least 49 HP in damage without fainting and then you bring it to a specific stone arch in the Wild Area. When it evolves under those conditions, the implications are that Yamask became too weak to hold the evil spirit at bay, and the spirit emerged to build itself a body with the stones. The Pokédex also states that Yamask has been consumed by the time it becomes Runerigus. You're only looking at the evil spirit by that point, and the two Pokémon tell the story of a monster players recognize being slowly devoured by evil, with the complete obliteration of Yamask being your own fault. Enjoy your new Runerigus!
• Phantump, which is like Yamask but far worse. Specifically, the part where they come from the souls of children who died in the forest. Its evolution Trevenant is no less creepy — think of the evil tree from Poltergeist, only with spider legs and a big single eye. And you can encounter hordes of them. A tree stump haunted by a dead child, becoming someone's servant or pet. What Do You Mean, It's for Kids? At least Trevenant is rather friendly, letting Pokemon live inside of it. However, if you harm the forest, it will trap you in and never let you leave. Its Secret Art, Forest's Curse, which is a Grass-type version of Soak may be referring to this. The animation◊ does not help◊.
• In Black and White, there is a bridge that lies in between Route 16 and 15 called Marvelous Bridge. At the end, a man and a woman can be seen. When talking to the woman, she will disappear before the player's eyes. The man beside her is just as shocked as players are. In Black 2 and White 2, we find out who this girl is, and what her story is. In one of the new areas, you find an abandoned house, and as you go through the various levels, you find furniture rearranged when you weren't looking. Once you near the end, you catch a glimpse of the girl from the bridge, crying out for her mother, father, and her Pokémon. Then, you enter the final room, and find the Lunar Wing... upon which the girl reveals she's been protecting it. The description says the house was the victim of a strange and sad accident... The Lunar Wing is used to call the Pokémon Cresselia, which is the only Pokémon known to counteract the harmful nightmares of the Pokémon Darkrai. Considering how protective the girl is of the Lunar Wing, as well as her dialogue about being in an "endless dark dream", it's implied that she fell victim to Darkrai and the Lunar Wing wasn't brought to her in time. The B2/W2 guide book confirms that she died in her sleep because of her dark dream. The reason why she was haunting the Marvelous Bridge was so that she could get Cresselia's attention and return the Lunar Wing, because she knew it could no longer help her. But that's not the chilling part. She also states that in the dark dream, she could hear her dad's voice saying "Forget about the Lunar Wing..." Normally, Darkrai's (literal) Nightmare Fuel is a defense mechanism, and most people believe that it is not malevolent. However, the girl's statement seems to suggest that this particular one wanted her to stay trapped in the dark dream, possibly even for sinister reasons. And given how we've seen one like that before, that theory isn't entirely implausible.
• In Black and White, the Litwick/Lampent/Chandelure evolutionary line sucks out people's souls. But that wouldn't be creepy enough, no... they burn their souls when they're finished! According to Black 2 and White 2, the flames are only lit when it is absorbing souls. They're always lit when you see them...
  • There's a school girl in the Celestial Tower with a Litwick. If you talk to her after battling her, she says that whenever she sends her Litwick out, she immediately feels really tired, and she even relocates to the Pokémon center after you defeat her - Implying that this little girl is being slowly killed by her own Pokémon, and she has no idea what's happening to her.
  • Some of the Pokédex entries mention that Chandelure "leaves the body behind." But it doesn't say anything about whether or not they die. Your body can still function without a soul, but Chandelure rips out your soul and just leaves your empty body to wither. That's right; Chandelure is the Pokémon equivalent of a dementor!
• A NPC in Lavender Town in Red/Blue and Yellow Versions provides the following exchange just to screw with players:
  "Do you believe in ghosts?"
  "No."
  "Haha, I guess not. That white hand on your shoulder, it's not real."
  • In the Pokémon Origins special depiction of this scene, there really is a hand on Red's shoulder.◊
• Lavender Town's Pokémon Tower in the original Pokémon games was a creepy tower full of ghosts that your own Pokémon - without exceptions - were afraid to battle. The music was scary as well, and old channellers shout creepy things at players when they engage them in a Pokémon match (because they're possessed by their own Pokémon). There are very good reasons that most Pokémon Creepypasta centers around this place.
  "Give me blood!"
  • The ghosts themselves without the Silph Scope: in the remakes, they look misty, but the originals are quite creepy, as well as one of MissingNo's forms. The music (and the music in Lavender Town itself) was also was VERY creepy, being in a stark contrast to all the upbeat and happy music of the rest of the game.
  • In Yellow, talking to Pikachu while inside Pokémon Tower causes him to appear scared, shivering in fear. This was also carried over into the Let's Go games, where selecting "Play With Pikachu/Eevee" while inside the tower achieves the same effect. They don't want to be here just as much as you do.
    Pikachu/Eevee looks frightened by the spooky atmosphere.
• The Preexisting Encounter with Marowak at the top of Lavender Tower.
  "Be gone, intruders..." (cue Fight Woosh)
• Lavender Town Bonus: In Heart Gold and Soul Silver with the Pokémon Tower incident long past, Lavender Town underwent a makeover, replacing the Pokémon Tower with the radio tower and creating the House Of Memories, giving the dead Pokémon a quieter place to rest. However, if you stay in the House Of Memories for too long, your Pokémon becomes scared and gets more and more agitated before finally getting angry with you. Even though Lavender isn't a dreary ghost town anymore, it still has that little something that can still get at your Pokémon.
• The Old Chateau in Diamond/Pearl has real ghosts. Not just Ghost-type Pokémon — human ghosts. Worse, you can't use the Escape Rope here. Lost explorers can only get out by themselves. In Platinum, it's heavily implied that Charon lived there as a small child.
• In Diamond/Pearl/Platinum, when heading up Route 217 to Snowpoint City, there's an old woman sitting alone in her cabin with all the lights off, telling trainers about the lack of visitors. After giving trainers the Spell Tag - a Ghost-type enhancing item - she's not there anymore when the house is accessed again. A trainer that's near the cabin actually mentions legends of hauntings in the area.
• Although it's not a straight haunting, at the Ruins of Alph in HG/SS, if the player talks to their party members, they'll remark the place is freaking them out. The same thing happens when you're inside Mt. Silver: the player's Pokémon suddenly freak out and howl, and occasionally "sense something" and nervously call out. Also, most of the mountain, the route leading up to it, and the Pokémon Center at its base are totally devoid of trainers. ^*Except for Optional Boss Red, whose Heroic Mime status and training-alone thing just makes things worse.
• Giratina's place in Diamond, Pearl and Platinum. Unlike the equally scary Distortion World from Platinum, in D/P things are a little closer to reality: Giratina lies in a hidden cave, called Turnback Cave, where supposedly the reality boundaries are distorted, and "dead Pokémon can come back to this world". It's literally the door to afterlife. The cave is hidden in a quiet forest, the "Sendoff Spring"; the creepy "Old Chateau" theme starts playing, giving the feeling that it's not a good idea to stay in the spring; and for good measure, the Japanese name for that place is "Funeral Spring Path", further implying that's where people's ashes are thrown. In Platinum, you and Cynthia appear in front of there when you leave the Distortion World. So now we have two equally creepy locations connected to the same Pokémon, both accessible in Platinum, which makes you wonder if Turnback Cave is just an extension of the Distortion World. It gets even more creepy when you consider that, upon arriving in the Turnback Cave via the Distortion World, Cynthia ponders how Turnback Cave is said to be the entrance to the afterlife. Which would imply that that creepy, Eldrich Location you just left is...
  Inscription in Giratina's chamber: This is... That where life sparkles... That where life has faded... A place where two worlds overlap...
  • Turnback Cave's sense of foreboding is not lessened one bit by the cryptic and faded inscription you see on the wall of the first room: "...Past three pillars...to the sleeping... ...before 30 is surpassed..." When you explore the place, it's a fog-filled maze with countless nearly-identical, featureless rooms where the door you just came from often leads to a different room entirely if you try to double back. Oh, and Escape Ropes and Dig do not work, so the only way out is through the entrance. The most reliable way to get back out is to reach the end of the maze, which automatically warps you back to the entrance once you leave the room, so if you get lost, heaven help you. Mercifully, Turnback Cave will kick you out if you take too long, but unless you figure that out from the initial wall writing, there's no way you'll know that at the time.
• Giratina itself is quite creepy. Despite its sinister nature, it's more aggressive than downright evil. However, it becomes more terrifying when you realize that Giratina is essentially an Eldritch Abomination akin to that of Yog-Sothoth^note Both are inter-dimensional god-like beings that can barely (if at all) be comprehended by humans. It rules a world consisting of anti-matter (something we as humans have very limited understanding of as it is), can shift between two forms (one a six-legged dragon and the other a serpentine-looking...thing), is able to attack by hiding in the shadows and emerging from them, and has an obsession with maintaining balance to the point where it will gladly drag anyone (Cyrus found out the hard way) down into an alternate world where our understanding of physics and reality as we know it are thrown out the window. Giratina isn't just scary, it's something that would fit right in an H. P. Lovecraft horror novel.
• In the north side of Lumiose City there's a building with three floors with children playing around on the first floor and the dojo leader from Kanto starting up a gym on the third. The second floor? As soon as your step out of the elevator the lights go nuts, you're unable to move and a ghostly woman just slowly moves around you before stating that "You're not the one." and leaves. Who is the one, and what would have happened if it were you? She's back again in Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire. On Mount Pyre, the cemetery. Also, it's unclear if she's a ghost in her ORAS appearance, and those games take place several years before X and Y. She says "You're not the one" in both appearances, so did she die looking for "the one"?
• There's more creepy and unexplained intricacies in Lumiose City than the mysterious ghost girl. If you enter Lumiose Station and read the timetable at the far back from behind, you'll find an unnerving message.

  Something is written on the back of the timetable.

  :"I'm going to go for help. Wait in the usual place."

  • On the fourth floor of Hotel Richissime, speak to the girl in the room to the right of the elevator (who shares the same model as aforementioned ghost girl):
    Girl: "... ... ... ..."
    Girl: "...Don't talk to me..."
    Girl: "...If you do, I won't... ...hear the elevator..."
• In the Scary House in Route 14 an old man will tell his story in the house. When he entered it in a dark night, he encountered a man sitting in the fireplace and when he approached the man, he tells him to go away. The narrator tries to calm him, but the man wasn't refering to him, but the "horde of faceless men!" What did he mean by that, a horde of Slendermen?
• The Electric Tale of Pikachu gives us the Black Fog◊, a gigantic and ancient Haunter that was once worshipped as a god. Nowadays, it's taken to indiscriminately killing both people and Pokémon by devouring their souls. In the end, rather than being caught by Ash while severely weakened, it graphically committed suicide with Selfdestruct.
• After the Delta Episode in ORAS, when you get to Room 4 in Sea Mauville, you will hear of a presence like you're being watched. If you check the top left bookcase, you will learn that the Odd Keystone was lost on Sea Mauville, and then get another note about being watched. Then, if you select a menu option such as Items, Pokédex etc., and then exit, the Odd Keystone will be behind you and Spiritomb will attack. Made even worse if you save directly after getting that second note about being watched. If you quit then come back later, the game will start up on you being attacked by Spiritomb.
• When you battle Phoebe for the first time, there are two instances of a ghost girl watching you that you might not have noticed.
• Later on, after you defeat the Elite Four, you see Phoebe at Mt. Pyre talking to a gravestone. She tells you that she was visiting her grandmother. When you climb to the summit again, the only person you see is an old man, and the old woman who was next to him before isn't there...
• In Mauville Hills, Apt. 16 has a different sign from all the other vacant apartments, giving a "great deal on the lease". Usually talking to the intercom of an empty room lets you know nobody answered. This one says "...". The game didn't say there was no reply. Just complete and utter silence. Then you wonder why this vacant room in particular is cheap to rent...
• Even the Pokémon Sun and Moon demo has a very unsettling event. At the ferry terminal, you can see a woman who has to sail away on a ship. There is a Machamp walking around the same room. She states that she's nervous, and she hopes that you can see her off on her journey. If you respond "Of course!", she states that she's scared, but that she has the courage to do it now that you're here, and then gives you a Comet Shard. After talking to you a bit more, the screen shifts to a first-person point of view as she walks towards the ferry door as the Machamp passes in front of her, obscuring her from you view. As the Machamp moves out of your viewpoint, she's completely disappeared. What's more, the attendants at the terminal stop you from trying to follow her, explaining that there's no ferry present to pick anyone up yet.
• Pokémon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon has the Seven School Mysteries sidequest at the Trainer's School in Hau'oli City, Melemele Island. A lead from one of the students gets you to investigate the school at night, where a young girl who speaks the local language poorly begs you to investigate the Seven Mysteries. You will find a variety of creepy happenings resulting, from an endless staircase to an illusionary class. The Seventh Mystery itself? The girl herself, as she is the ghost of one of the students.

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