the mist ends up being an integral part of the setting once more. although he gets increasingly comfortable with each instance of the mist being a prominent feature of the battlefield, he is still very much aware of what happens in its midst.

the gym leader might have been one of the things he could expect, but these pokemon weren't on his list. surprise meets the hope in these pokemon's eyes, and empathy overcomes caution as he approaches them.

"wait, i know you guys."

his head whips around as his hands find their way to kyle's pouch containing his potions. the terrakion on his side watches over the horizon, ever so vigilant to any sudden appearances of paradox pokemon.

"where's navy?"

"good to hear, good to hear."

without a pokemon on hand, the scizor knocks the wind out of the champion. the sygna suit, albeit inactive, provides enough cushioning to keep his bones intact. it still registers as a life-threatening injury, however.



the mists combusts into flames as lightning from the sky cage them to the earth. there's a single cough before a pokemon manages to break free.

his solgaleo comes out, heat crash pushing the scizor away towards the sacred fire that now surrounds the two.

"and who are you after?" he asks as he approaches her with a hand by his stomach. "come on, tell me! i'm bored. a little chat won't be that bad."

kyle is a cautious individual. he only slips up when the consequence from the risk isn't too dangerous. the only other time is when something he isn't familiar about enters the equation without his knowledge.

dream mist would be fine for kyle. he lived a normal enough childhood to not worry about psychological episodes getting triggered by past events. paradox pokemon were no problem for a trainer like him as well. introduction of a mist that hides with what he was prepared for is what causes his folly.

his head hurts for a moment, and then he sees red. natural inclination for destruction wells up all of a sudden and he finds himself looking for a target.

"oh." he chuckles as he finds another person. "it's the florist."

blessed be those that stood in front and stacked enough protection for him to be able to perform this.

he has the front row seats for the book's restoration. his phone's camera had been ready the moment roar of time went off, recording the contents of the book as he had planned before the pages disintegrate back to ashes.

his heart races as the gambit worked, much like the solgaleo that rushes out of its ball to take a swing at the walking wake.

a sunsteel strike lets the pokemon experience one bit of the action as kyle watches in surprise. It looms over the corpse, seemingly curious about the false legendary's identity in this world.

kyle waits until it disappears before he gets the clarity to recall the solgaleo, who surprisingly was more concerned about it than entei. he beckons his entei to him before taking a breather.

"you don't look dead," he tells Michael Navidson as he approaches the book. "good job."

looking around, there doesn't seem to be any other major injury sustained by the party.

"i'll send you the copy wirelessly right now if you want," he offers Eva Morales since internet probably can't reach them underground.

it would probably easier to wait until they're outside though.


tl;dr

• solgaleo pops out for the last hit with sunsteel strike
• watches the dead walking wake like a curious cat
• kyle records the contents of the book with his phone
• offers to pass the notes around

"yup, the kindlers are what i have in mind." they were involved in the moltres avatarship before after all. "i'm assuming they're investigating moltres' whereabouts if they have this. if they're going to the peak with this, then let's see if something happens when we bring the feather up top."

better to keep it around than leave the feather for less reliable people. besides, kyle won't miss the secret ending by reaching the final boss with the secret item.

the kommo-o and its stash becomes the focal point of everyone's eyes. at first glance, El Sunderland's observation seemed the best solution, but kyle knows that they're stacked enough to handle this faster than they can handle a rescue mission for those that fell into the hole.

"if they're tera crystals, then we risk having another incident like this." wild pokemon going berserk with power wasn't unheard of. "we'll just knock it out, try to limit terastalization around these parts by taking its hoard and get the balance in the ecosystem back. easy."

he whistles for his dachsbun to run in. the heat makes its well-baked body firm enough to run in fearlessly and play rough with the kommo-o.

introducing a new element in nature was going to disrupt it. kyle doesn't pity the rangers that would have to deal with the new influx of terastalization on these wild pokemon. this is a band-aid solution at best, but it's the one of the things they can do to assure an easier path up should the other half of the party try to catch up.

tl;dr

• dachsbun uses play rough on kommo-o

"it depends on your patron," he answers Vanilla Kingsley. "mine just loves me so they spoil me a lot with no strings attached."

as the rest of the group get startled by emmett brookes's discovery, kyle notices the third one specifically dressed differently than the other two. hardened by a profession in crime scene investigation, he doesn't mind looking for identification as the others worry about Vanilla Kingsley.

a moltres feather answers some questions kyle has, remembering how the previous moltres avatar, as well as the person who appeared during that one dating sim game, were all connected to it. he wonders if this has any connection with the problems they're currently experiencing right now.

"do you guys know the farhan guy? maybe they're with them." the guessing stops as he notices that it got lost with other's dread of seeing a corpse. it was then that kyle is reminded once again that he is an outlier for getting used to them.

he takes the feather, bringing it with him to the top in case that was the goal of these people.

"vanilla's right. let's head to the top," he answers Yuina Higashi as he drags the third corpse with the two, and then draping the robe over their faces. "if you guys have repel, or anything that can keep wild pokemon from going near them, then we can come back for them later."

he hopes this eases the mind of El Sunderland, who seemed uneasy over the idea of leaving them behind. had kyle been religious, he would have offered a prayer or two as well.

instead, he has his dachsbun make a wish for him. may the party never befall the same tragedy as what these cult members experienced.



tl;dr

• frisks the fancier third corpse and finds a moltres feather
• takes the moltres feather with them on their journey to the top
• asks others if they have means to keep wild pokemon away from the corpses
• dachsbun uses wish before they move on

he boosted water-type moves against the fire-type. he also prohibited the paradox pokemon from abusing the zone with its signature move. he figures that's good enough for people to get off his case in case they tell him that he's being lazy again.

with his contribution in the fight done, his eyes dart from one hand to another. pages and scraps were the best he could see, until the biggest chunk of the book remaining in Eva Morales's hands comes into view.

"heyo!" he calls her, waving his hand with his phone. "get ready!"

with his word, infinity energy springs forth from his suit and is channeled over to the smeargle. there's something jolly with the tone conveyed by the champion to a point of misplaced playfulness in the midst of rage, panic and apathy.

roar of time.

mirages of the past were supposed to burst out, but from a smeargle, the scope was limited. that was all kyle needed, temporary or not, since the event happened just a few moments ago.

he just needs a copy of the book before it turned into crisps. turning an item to its state a few moments before should be manageable by the pokemon.

if it holds, great. if it doesn't, kyle still has his phone to take a recording of the book's contents. they could always just take screenshots if they need a specific information from a specific page.

tl;dr

• kyle spots dreva with the chunk of the book
• smeargle uses roar of time
• attempts to reverse the time for the book
• kyle gets ready to record the contents of the book with his phone in case it becomes unstable and breaks apart again

musing about the other suicune was cut short by the gym leader. he supposed he got too lax from everything being taken care of without much influence from him.

"my job here isn't to-"

he speaks too slow for Michael Navidson to hear the rest of his response. excitement spreads like wildfire as action is taken by everyone in the cavern, crowding the paradox pokemon with their big moves.

it's enough to give kyle the confidence to move on to things down the priority list.

"entei!" the sharp call gets the pokemon to back away, situating the pokemon right by dahlia goode as kyle calls out another pokemon instead.

the smeargle is comes back to the field, carried by its trainer as he runs straight to the mix with all the defenses stacked against the pokemon's moves. it's the perfect scenario where kyle doesn't need to do anything and is free to do what he wants to contribute. it was elation.



"imprison!"

the unique water-type move that it knows probably was its strongest move. kyle banks on the sygna suit's inherent boosts for forces to overcome the limitations set by a mere smeargle against a copy of a suicune.

without its best water-type move in play, kyle supposed it was safe to use functionalities of his suit to the group's advantage. playing with the trends, he picks the type used most by the pokemon around him.





tl;dr

• entei stays with dahlia
• kyle runs to where book club is with his smeargle
• smeargle imprisons hydro steam
• uses sygna suit to create a water zone
• sygna suit active

kyle reads the short exchange as he follows his mightyena around the house. letters were innocent, but it's the underlying facts that answered his questions indirectly.

why is she keeping these? is she obsessed? maybe she's the one who actually likes him instead of the other way around? they're such a bad pairing but he knows that isn't going to stop matias.

he lingers by the counter, as did his pokemon. he paints the scene in his head, eyes lingering on the door, only to be surprised when his pokemon reacts to it.

"oh?"

the dread is watered down for him with his sygna suit. it's unnoticeable, but not entirely.

the poipole swarm finally notices their activity. nagi's pokemon manages to set up defenses that his chosen smeargle usually cannot do under these circumstances. it buys them enough time to afford reacting late.

"mist ball."

the attack collides with the group of ultra beasts, dissipating into a smokescreen that leaves the air murky like ink in liquid.

"time to dip." kyle calls for it despite not having stayed for long yet. "we got unlucky with our spot."

it wasn't like they couldn't handle it, but rather, it was a lot of wasted effort to try to balance between mining and defending compared to taking a reset and looking for another spot without intruders.

"y-yeah..."

kyle's response is quiet and almost absent as he finds himself enamored by a drawing on a wall. it was easy to dismiss it as just any other children's drawing since this was a remnant of a past civilization, but the familiarity draws him closer than it should have been.

he doesn't have the memories of an alternate universe, like matias does, but he attributes any familiarity he doesn't remember to the galar they have been through. there was no other explanation about how he recalls these drawings.

"you remember more about galar, right?" he asks matias, motioning for him to get closer. "do you recognize these?"

kyle does. it also brings him a sense of dread as he connects the sights they've seen to the prophecy.

matias is a good source of primal energy, which has been proven to be connected to how their avatar powers are powered up. he supposed if they're adverse from using it due to potential side-effects, then he can see their point.

"nah, razz is right. getting him involved is dangerous," he tells thomas. "we can try calcifet first."

he had more control over his patron, and that kyle just doesn't know much about zekrom as opposed to groudon, who was one of the legends prominent on stories shared to the children of hoenn.

besides just blindly asking people with fire-type legends, another point of interest from the ranger appears, bringing kyle's curiosity further out.

"oho?" there's interest that built up with razz's mention of him. "do you mind giving me a rundown of your plans? you can't just dismiss me after teasing me with that."

he arrives with terrakion, who had led him all the way to sootopolis.

"urgh, why here?"

the question directed to the legend lingers in the air as the pokemon cannot respond with words. the mystery of the purpose of their trip remains, but it's certain that it was urgent. terrakion doesn't normally ask from him after all.

a pair of footsteps follow closely behind him. he turns and sees the other sword of justice, and with the location of choice in consideration, the puzzle pieces fit themselves seamlessly.

"virizion too?" he asks matias. kyle steps away from the door and presents the wreckage of an entrance to the elite four. "do you want the honor?"

-of stepping inside a building that presents itself as a red flag.