July 27th: Eon Genesis

Time to do the Eon Ticket event. According to Bulbapedia, my ticket will only take me to the destination once and then I won't be able to return because I'm playing Sapphire instead of Emerald. More great decision making on the part of whoever decided I should only be able to visit this place exactly once on this save. Okay, I can probably edit my save as needed to go back, but that shouldn't be necessary.

Before I get too far into complaining, I should really load the game and actually try playing the event. I believe I need to go to whatever boat would take me to the Battle Tower and find somebody there that will take my Eon Ticket instead.

- The last place I left off was Petalburg. I think this is close to where I need to be. I remember something about Mr. Briney being the one to captain the ship.
- Popped into Wally's house. His dad is still none the wiser about Wally's whereabouts.
- Mr. Briney is not in his cottage. I probably need to look somewhere along the East coast. I'll try Slateport next.
- Flew to Slateport and went to the Pokemon Center to drop off Jirachi since I still forgot to do that.
- Finally looked at the summary page for the Deoxys I got from Aar.
- It's actually a level 50 shiny Deoxys named "The Virus" with the OT being "BRC2025" and the Trainer ID being 42069.
- It also has maxed out PP for all of its moves, which are Psycho Boost, Calm Mind, Recover, and Thunder.
- Admittedly, I thought this would be a near-replica of the Deoxys from GameStop's 2008 distribution event and didn't bother to check that until now. Instead, this thing was purpose-built to be an awesome killing machine.
- Got Gary out of the box so I could continue my adventure.
- I picked the right spot this time. The S.S. Tidal awaited me in the Slateport Harbor.
- The woman standing next to the boat checked my ticket and gave me the options to sail to Lilycove or to the Battle Tower. Looks like I do need to talk to someone else here.
- It occurred to me in this moment that I didn't check my bag and there were problems during the event that might have resulted in me not actually getting the ticket.
- The Eon Ticket did not appear in either my Items or Key Items within my bag.
- Went back to the Pokemon Center and saved.
- Edited my save to have an Eon Ticket and the event flag for having received it.
- Checked my bag to make sure I had the Eon Ticket. "The ticket for a ferry to a distant southern island." Sounds right to me.
- The woman at the ship still wasn't giving an Eon-related option, but I think there was someone else I had to talk to instead.
- Wait, Bulbapedia says I have to talk to Norman first.
- Flew to Petalburg City and talked to him. Nothing.
- I'm stupid. The page clearly says "Lilycove Harbor" and I've only been trying at Slateport. Not that it made any difference prior to my having the Eon Ticket.
- As I talked to the guide at Lilycove, she stopped herself and mentioned the pass.
- She boarded the ship and a sailor stepped out instead. Sounds like I'm doing the event.
- He talked about the Southern Island being a tiny place a long distance away before we set sail.
- After reaching the island, there was a short hike up some stairs and through some trees before entering a forest.
- Within the forest was a small, shallow pond with a patch of land in the center. There was something there that looked like an egg or a meteorite.
- Continuing North revealed nowhere else to go. Time to see what this mystery thing does.
- Interacting with it summoned a legendary-looking Pokemon. It was Latios! A battle started shortly afterwards.
- Latios one-shot Sredsa with Psychic. Switched in Finger.
- Latios did a Dragon Dance and I did an Iron Defense. This was going to be a long battle.
- Latios has Recover. I might need to switch in Annie. Alternatively, Billy could try to use Sing.
- Luster Purge was not very effective against Finger, but it took about one third of his health anyways.
- A pattern of Recovers and Metal Claws began.
- Got Latios to a yellow HP range. Metal Claw has been dealing good damage and I'm worried that a third could take it out. I'll try throwing an Ultra Ball. It probably won't work.
- Also, I only brought nine of them. I pretended like I didn't read the part of the Bulbapedia page where it said this would happen because I didn't want to ruin the rest of the experience but I think this is actually the whole point of this event and the Southern Island.
- Two Ultra Balls in and neither have done anything.
- Switched in Billy so he could use Sing.
- Fly seems to do pretty good damage.
- Billy hit the first Sing attempt. Dragon Breath is super effective against Latios, but it doesn't do a ton of damage. Used that to chip away some health.
- Health still in the yellow but it's asleep. I'll try another Ultra Ball.
- Still nothing. Another Dragon Breath nearly killed Latios.
- The Ultra Balls aren't doing shit no matter how much I take it down.
- Latios used Recover twice and Psychic once, bringing itself back to full health and knocking out Billy.
- Switched in Annie. I'm putting an end to this attempt even if the Latios doesn't like it.
- Oh, right, Psychic. Annie has Fighting typing.
- Finger took out Latios with two Iron Tails. Easy peasy.
- The weird thing has text if observed again. "All dreams are but another reality. Never forget..."
- I'm pretty sure knocking out Latios here screws me out of trying again, so I'm just going to reset and maybe come back to this later.

For some reason, I thought the event associated with the Eon Ticket was going to be more involved than this. I like the design of the Southern Island, but I wish there was more to do there and that I could return to it without needing to be on Emerald or modifying my save. Seeing as I'm not super entranced by most legendary or mythical Pokemon, Latios alone wasn't enough to make this impactful for me.