#ingomen au

[answrs]

the problem I'm having is there's like 4 (okay, 3.5, the last one is definitely not on the table for this au's canon but just a general PMD idea) settings i could take the ing(o)men au into and they all pretty much clash with each other, and since i can't decide which to focus on, *none* of them have had any progress done on the plot basically since the damn inception of this au :|

this post is honestly just me brainstorming since maybe if I write my thoughts out with the pros/cons it'll help me narrow things down? (edit: lmao it actually worked and I've narrowed it down to just 2 possibilities, leaning towards 1, so woo! massive progress!)

1) Ingo falls to Hisui as an absol

pro: have a very specific scene for this one (a panicked thrashing as he nearly gets strangled to death by his own tie because the only garment remotely loose enough around his form is his coat, the rest of his outfit becoming scattered in the wind as he fights for air). also because of him never being a human to the people there, his fighting to help when his senses warn him of danger. and then there's a clash of the guardian angel image the clans with no prior expectation of absol eventually see him as vs a devil harbinger the Galaxy Clan thinks him based on their various homelands' folklores where absol are native makes a compelling wedge, especially once the MC falls and grows close to him

con: can only really have a full connection to Sneasler and still leaves the warden spot needing filled, since he can't communicate and (since he's a pokemon and an unknown one at that) is held much further than arm's length from any of the humans, even the clans that appreciate him. might be an angle to learn about Irida and Adaman through connecting with their eevees? but then basically have to do 50 OCs for each of the respective partner mons in place of their humans.

2) Ingo is changed from human to absol in Hisui - possibly during the Red Sky? (possibly mortally wounded by Beni/Kamado defending MC?)

pro: human connections! immediate angst! drama! the clans mourning him only for the biting winter snow and Lady Sneasler's frantic cry to reveal him staggering towards the settlement on a wounded leg, coat billowing in the wind, looking for help

con: very far into the Hisui storyline, don't get anywhere close to as much traction from the omen aspect of his existence. probably muddles the importance if you throw all the Lord Sinnoh and Banishment and Everything Else in sy the same time as his change. but if it's not during Red Sky and is just like. him tripping off a cliff one day and coming back as a pokemon is the exact opposite problem of it being so stupid and anticlimactic and no reason for a blessing from Sinnoh to give a reason for him to come back.

3) Hisui is the same but the reverse-deebying turns him into an absol

pro: classic Arceus Fucked Up Whoops, can throw in Hisuian Zorua MC shenanigans trying to get home while being amnesiac and also a wild pokemon are always a classic

con: no point on him being an absol vs Literally Any Other Pokemon (and honestly even less plot relevance than other people's Hisuian Sneasel aus). i love the trope but really doesn't fit the concepts i wanna explore with it.

4) pokemon mystery dungeon it

this is a joke. maybe as a different au where imagine Emmet just gets yoinked and Arceus just. forgets to make him a pokemon. didn't It already change this guy? (no Arceus that was Ingo). so Emmet's just wandering around as a human and sees this absol wearing his lost brother's outfit yelling about safety checks to a pair of rambunctious zorua pups (Akari and Rei) playing on a cliff lmao