CHAPTER 10 — A Will Forged in Fire

  Bugs.

  Age was irrelevant. They were the so-called creepy crawlies for children and adults alike—unwanted, feared, and loathed. Something about them stirred the primal instincts humans carried deep inside. Whether through sight, touch, or even hearing, Bugs elicited truly visceral reactions from all those who beheld their forms.

  Large and unblinking compound eyes—sometimes bright and sometimes dark—forced people to avert their gazes from unknown depths. The subtle brush of skin against bodies—hairy, scaly, or thumping, squishy flesh—made people scrub their hands raw, but a phantom sensation always remained. And the cries, oh the cries. Little clicks in your ears, buzzes and screeches that began as low hums but which became a cacophony of sound echoing madly without end… They were sounds so far removed from anything people knew, so alien, so terrifying that their skin crawled and itched and sent shudders running unbidden down spines.

  An innate aversion and yet—

  Why were people so afraid of them? Why did they see a weak, unassuming Bug crawling along the ground and feel the desire to trample it?

  It was because people naturally feared that which they did not understand. There was something so indescribably unfamiliar about Bugs that it rattled their very beings.

  That something was a monstrous desire to live.

  Every creature wanted to stay alive, humans included, but their will to live would forever pale in comparison to that of a Bug’s.

  Bugs started off weaker than anyone else. To compensate for their pitiful place behind life’s starting line, they could grow faster than anyone else. They could even become more powerful than anyone else, but if they did not grow sufficiently strong fast enough, then—

  They were likely to die sooner than anyone else, too.

  That was why Bugs never stopped fighting. They never stopped struggling. No matter what the world thought, no matter how people looked at them, Bugs never faltered or strayed. They did whatever it took to survive.

  Bugs, above all others, possessed the most overwhelming tenacity.

  My surroundings simultaneously faded away and turned crystal clear all at once. The morning sun became a rising dot on the horizon. Golden rays peeked through gaps in buildings and cast their dappled glow on the beaten, rundown field we stood upon. Wind whistling below the underpass became murmurs in my ears. So did introductory remarks from Burgh, the man who was here more as a witness than a referee.

  I didn’t pay attention to any of it. Gold eyes stared analytically out across the field to where a lone woman stood with a hard expression.

  Everyone I fought before in the past always said the same thing about me.

  True to my reputation as a Bug Specialist, I unnerved them. In what was surely ironic, the way I looked during fights was as if I was picking my opponent apart piece by piece—like they were a Bug.

  Sierra Brooks.

  She was prideful. She was a woman who couldn’t accept defeat and tried to take back what was hers, but she had returned home long ago in failure, not triumph. I was strong. I could confidently claim so. That did not mean I underestimated my opponent. Someone like her, someone like Sierra Brooks whose passions had once burned brightly for the Unova she believed in—no, she would not have idled her years away. She would not have let the Fire within her and her team become complete cinders.

  Becoming the Castelia Gym Leader was nigh impossible for Sierra now. She knew that, and yet she was still unwilling to go down without a fight. There was a difference between pride and arrogance.

  The flames she wielded were now pointed at me.

  We would probably never understand or come to terms with each other, but that didn’t matter. This was Unova. Every person fought for their beliefs and tried to make them a reality.

  One and only one word left my mouth in a murmur, and it was meant for the Pokeballs on my belt. They listened. As much as this was a battle born from our opponent’s pride, it had been born from ours, too.

  We had never been afraid of Fire.

  “Endure,” I told them.

  Metallic spheres flew through the air. From the ensuing red light, two different forms emerged. I stared at a small, simian Pokemon half my height slouching lazily on the other side of the field. The Simisear’s lips curled into a mischievous smile as he flexed his fingers. For the briefest of moments, his flame-like tufts and tail glowed like wood burning in a fireplace.

  My Bug was only a little shorter than her Simisear. Kricketune stood with perfect posture, but he went a step further. He tucked his arms in and bowed in preparation for his upcoming recital. In most cases, it would have been a show of respect for his opponent.

  Not today. He bowed to an unseen audience instead.

  When Kricketune rose, I knew a quiet fury lurked within his deceptively small frame. I could not see his face, but I saw his back. Twitching wings betrayed his otherwise calm demeanor.

  A Simisear was not what I expected Sierra to lead with, but I didn’t particularly care. She, on the other hand, was visibly bothered by my choice. From here, I could see both the way she frowned and how her shoulders grew more rigid with tension. She was disappointed, upset, wary. I thought I knew why.

  Sierra had expected someone else—the Sun.

  Keep being unsettled. Keep wondering.

  Neither of us paid attention to the layers of psychic shields going up around the field.

  Neither of us heard Burgh counting down.

  Neither of us saw him raise an arm.

  Instead, I focused on the familiar thrill that coursed through me. It told me I was alive. My lips stretched wide in a maniacal smile without me knowing.

  Try trampling a Bug. You’ll find it’s not easy at all.

  The world was still for only a moment.

  Then a thin hand sliced through the air, and it signaled the beginning of the end.

  The early morn saw the emergence of a second sun. Where a single star hung distantly in the sky, a second hurtled upwards to join it, but it could only fly so far. The ball of superheated plasma was forced to hit the highest point within the field’s psychic constraints. Its bright, boiling mass howled out annoyance in the form of crackling winds. Heat from the Sunny Day warped the air and strengthened the one who had called for it.

  Flames, intense and sweltering, were then expelled from Simisear’s fur.

  Boosted by sun and fed by warm winds, they exploded outwards in all-consuming rage. The roar of the inferno and the crackling from the plasmic entity hanging overhead worked together to drown everything out. They tried to.

  “Extinguish.”

  A lone musician on the doorstep of hell still heard me.

  Long, blade-like arms moved before the third syllable left my mouth. Antennae flicked upwards. Kricketune’s gray eyes glowed—an indication of power being channeled from within—and with a sudden, sharp motion, he slammed his arms together ceremoniously. The sound they made upon contact was anything but.

  A high-pitched screech louder than even the raging sun pierced the air. Those present who were attuned to the Bug type had no qualms with its familiar song, but to foes, it rattled them. It shook their souls.

  It was the scream of a Bug who wished to live.

  Another screech coming from Kricketune’s vibrating antennae compounded the initial noise to unbearable levels. The roaring flames that came rushing in with greed petered out from massive, amplified soundwaves. Faster than any fire, faster than either Sierra or her Pokemon could react, the soundwaves crossed the length of the field in the blink of an eye and found the one responsible for their fury.

  A new and very different scream rang out, this one torn from the throat of Simisear.

  “Armor! Flame Burst!” Sierra shouted, fighting to be heard over the din. “Strike it down!”

  Simisear tried to follow her order. He really did, but the thing about Bug type energy was that it overwhelmed.

  Bugs were anomalies in every sense of the word. When people encountered something they feared or didn’t understand, they stuttered in place. The brain tried its best to process foreign stimuli, but it could only handle so much before it became overloaded with too much information—just like Simisear now.

  Sound leaking with Bug type energy racked his entire brain. Simisear reached for a wall, a boulder, any surface that could offer some semblance of support, but there were none. Outstretched fingers grasped empty air instead as the simian Pokemon stumbled, mind flooded with the cries of seemingly a thousand.

  Bugs were the best at instilling anxiety and a pervasive sense of discomfort.

  “Swords Dance. Charge,” I ordered.

  Light that rivaled the two suns in the sky overtook Kricketune’s arms. He raised one in front of him like a knight of old wielding an imperial sword. Thrumming with a song of life, the gleaming blade sharpened at his will. His antennae kept vibrating and flooding the field with noise, but they had to do all the work now that Kricketune’s arms became weapons.

  Dropping the Bug Buzz’s potency by half meant it was far less overwhelming—enough for Fire to naturally devour that which dared to defy it. With much struggle, Simisear seized what remained of his sanity and howled. Flames coated every inch of his body like living armor. Particularly his head and ears, they were the most well protected with a crown of fire as if to keep out further mental disruption. Simisear’s facial features were still twisted with unease from the buzzing in the background, but he forced his shaking body still.

  Kricketune had already taken flight. Half the field was set ablaze from the previous storm of flames, and so he soared above. Small, black wings fluttered rapidly as he flew with purpose.

  It was an act of folly to fly into danger, one might have said, like a Mothim drawn to flames.

  Fingers flexed. Sparks flashed. The swirling, tufted fur that made up Simisear’s head and tail ignited with a roar, and out came misshapen orbs of fire that flew at random through the air. Each one was a howling, screaming mass of flames that threatened to explode on impact.

  Kricketune picked up speed. When the first of many fireballs came inches from his face, his arm blurred faster than the eye could follow. It vibrated.

  Embers scattered into nothing as the fireball was cleaved in two.

  Undaunted and free, the Bug continued flying into the thick of flaming missiles. Every swing of his arms drew beautiful arcs in the air and left afterimages of light more brilliant than any star. One after another, each ill omen of death was cut cleanly with blades that sang of vitality.

  The clash was inevitably near. Sierra and I barked commands at the same time.

  “Combat!”

  “Rondo!”

  Scarlet flames solidified themselves into the shape of a short spear, one that Simisear raised in front of him not a moment too soon. Kricketune came crashing down from above with glowing arms at the ready. The moment weapon met weapon, sparks imbued with green hues mixed with cinders, and they flew among countless parries like fading stars.

  Simisear was more dexterous than he seemed, I calmly noted, but where the Fire type trumped him in terms of power, Kricketune had far more skill. People who fought this particular member of my team so often underestimated him because of his small size, but he ceaselessly refined and polished his techniques.

  Antennae vibrated with renewed intensity. The buzzing got louder. This close up, not even the fiery armor Simisear protected himself with could stop his mind from fraying at the seams, and it showed every time the Fire type hesitated when wielding his spear.

  Kricketune saw those moments when Simisear’s mind stuttered and punished him for it.

  He spun, he twisted, he lunged, he danced. Kricketune was but a step away from intense fire, but he leaned fearlessly into the close combat. His bladed arms carried the weight of his will, an art he had perfected and made his own through Technician. Swords bore down on Simisear in a mesmerizing display, weaving in and out and gaining speed as they sliced.

  Each cut was sharper than the last, and they stacked.

  Darkness penetrated the fire first, sucking away heat and leaving shadows spilling from slash marks in Simisear’s skin. They created lasting gaps in the armor, ones that Kricketune did not hesitate to layer with a dozen more cuts, and these oozed with something completely different. Particles tinged with green hues infiltrated the opponent's body through the surface wounds. They invaded.

  Not even gluttonous internal flames could stop their overwhelming numbers. Simisear’s movements turned more and more sluggish as his mind was left with an increasing sense of wrongness. The Sunny Day hanging high above started to dim and fade away.

  “BURN!”

  Sierra’s yell barely managed to prompt Simisear into unleashing flames from every part of his body. Some burned Kricketune’s stomach, but most were extinguished by a concentrated soundwave produced from bladed arms snapping together. There was no pause, not for this dance.

  Kricketune spun to the left and sliced anew. His swords shredded through armor and littered Simisear with a thousand different cuts.

  He didn’t stop even when Simisear’s eyes snapped wide open.

  The signs were subtle, but they were there. A body that glowed as if it was made from cinders and dark eyes that flashed with an ominous red hue. Through all the madness injected into his mind, a more primal instinct made its appearance.

  We had cut and cut some more, and now Blaze had come out.

  Sierra’s lips curled into a smile.

  “Burn,” she repeated her earlier command.

  White-hot flames exploded outwards from Simisear without warning.

  They were so bright that I had to close my eyes, but I still could see light behind my eyelids. The sound of something shattering echoed in my ears—probably one of the psychic shield layers around the field—as well as telltale soundwaves from Kricketune. I opened my eyes only when I heard the sounds of fighting resume. Dark spots in my vision had to be repeatedly blinked and chased away before I could see in full again.

  The psychic barrier had been repaired already. As for the field, well… if it had been scorched before, then it was completely unrecognizable now. Half-molten earth sizzled and steamed, but my eyes focused on those still fighting. I smiled.

  Bugs were good at surviving.

  Kricketune was smoking all over with burns, but he had known Blaze was coming and mitigated the worst of it with sound. His body also glimmered with protective Bug type energy that seemed to crawl over his body like thousands of little insects, and they made it distinctly uncomfortable for outsiders to look at him straight on. With ever graceful, lively movements, he danced around Simisear and kept slashing. Fists lit ablaze with flames bigger than anything we’d seen all day swung left and right at him.

  “Again—”

  Kricketune didn’t let Sierra finish. The finale to this dance had been a long time coming.

  With a grand, sweeping flourish, he jabbed one of his arms in Simisear’s direction. A wickedly sharp needle, about the length of a human finger, manifested from the tip and was plunged into Simisear’s incoming fist with pinpoint accuracy. The resounding reverberations made Simisear’s whole body shake violently as if he was having a seizure, courtesy of an extra dose of information overload injected directly into his bloodstream. There was a strangled yell, but it cut off midway.

  Kricketune silently pulled his blade out. Then and only then was Simisear allowed to fall.

  “Simisear is unable—”

  Sierra didn’t let Burgh get more than a few words out. Fury was written all over her face as she returned her fallen Pokemon. So much for respecting battle etiquette and old customs. She was too engrossed in the duel right now to care.

  Then again, so was I.

  She was quick to swap fighters but not fast enough. In that short gap, Kricketune had whetted his swords once more, and now his arms were almost too radiant for a mortal to dare look at. When I whistled, he stuck one of them into the ground and covered both it and his feet with energy so they wouldn’t burn from scorched earth. The swords hummed even more loudly with power and the song of life.

  They cried for a second opponent to cut down, and that came in the form of our newest contender.

  It was another Pokemon native to Unova, a bipedal creature whose body glowed like molten lava. Steam hissed upwards from a pipe-like tail. A Heatmor. He reared his head back, but we snatched the initiative away from him.

  Powerful soundwaves emitting from a certain point of origin—the vibrating arm Kricketune had jabbed into the floor—flew through the ground at insane speeds.

  They tore the whole field apart.

  Chunks of burning, smoking earth were blown sky-high. Heatmor himself was slammed back into the psychic wall so hard that it cracked. When he fell to the ground, so did the rocks and half-melted dirt caught up in the initial blast. They ricocheted off the psychic ceiling and came crashing back down to earth. Between all the smoke and debris kicked up, I barely made out Heatmor being buried underneath their craggy folds.

  “Buzz!” I said sharply, having a good idea of what was coming.

  Sierra did not disappoint. Her order almost overlapped with mine. “Whips!”

  The mountain of rubble was still for only a moment.

  Then countless lines glowing with faint heat appeared around its outer facade, and the whole thing was sliced apart into ribbons. Heatmor emerged with a fearsome bellow. Dozens of crimson, flaming whips flew out from his mouth, each controlled with a surprising amount of fine precision like they were extensions of the body, and each heading for the same target.

  A grating soundwave came blaring outwards from Kricketune’s scraping arms, but they couldn’t smother everything.

  “Wide!” Sierra snapped.

  She had learned from the first time. Instead of a sea of flames, there were lashing vines spread out in the air that Kricketune had to deal with. The ones furthest from the blast zone snaked left and right. One more concentrated Bug Buzz demolished another section, but Kricketune had to hold off on a third when the whips finally converged on him. He hacked and slashed with glittering blades instead. Each severed flame let out a loud, popping hiss, but as fast as Kricketune cut with his arms, there were far too many to get rid of. Dozens upon dozens.

  One cut across his chest. Two struck the back of his head while another lashed his underbelly. Flames even licked hungrily at his vulnerable wings, but Kricketune beat them rapidly without looking. Sky-blue energy gathered at his wingtips and flew out in short slashes to cleave the flames.

  Tolerable but still annoying.

  “Earth Song again,” I commanded.

  “Shape! Storm!” Sierra shouted a little after me.

  With incredible dexterity, Kricketune fended off the rest of the whips with one arm and stabbed the other into the ground. Almost right before the Bug sent soundwaves catapulting through fractured earth, Heatmor spun the remaining fire whips into dizzying speeds around Kricketune. They morphed into rising walls of flame.

  The field screamed again—this time on both ends.

  Earth was churned up and spat back out into the air violently. Sound rippled and swam, and it traveled too fast for Heatmor to react. He took the brunt of massive soundwaves and hit the psychic barrier with a boom again. The trails of fire extending from his long snout finally cut off, but they’d long transformed.

  Whips born from the ravenous inner flames of a Heatmor had weaved themselves into an utter inferno of raging flames. They soared as high as the ceiling, but more importantly, they trapped Kricketune within. The tornado was fast, hot, and powerful enough that it instantly melted the ground underneath its destructive form and distorted the air from heat—a storm worthy of any Fire Specialist. Everything burned away like ashes in the wind.

  One only had to listen to realize there was no cry of lament, no scream of agony or pain.

  Above roaring flames, above the thuds of rocks shifting in place as a disoriented Heatmor got up and clawed at his muddled brain, there was the smallest hum.

  It should have been impossible to hear it above the storm, but it was there—a quiet, rhythmic, constant hum. Barely above a whisper, yet it wormed its way into the mind. Louder than any thoughts or a strong, pulsing heartbeat, it stayed there like an itch you couldn’t quite scratch. It only took a moment for it to grow exponentially.

  It only took a moment for the spinning tornado to be extinguished.

  Screeching. A lot of it, and the sound was far worse than nails raking down a chalkboard. It was so intense that eardrums might have ruptured if not for psychic shields to help mute sounds, but inside was a different matter. Soundwaves more powerful than anything displayed so far blasted out in all directions from the tornado’s focal point, and they made the flames dissipate like they had never existed.

  Between small, glowing embers that fluttered through the air like dying fireflies, a terrifying figure hovered mid-air above superheated earth.

  Fire was unforgiving. Kricketune’s body was covered with horrific burns from top to bottom, some so deep that they’d penetrated his exoskeleton to more vulnerable flesh below. Parts of his feelers were gone. Antennae had been cooked until they turned a scorched black, and they remained attached to his head by precarious threads.

  He could have burned alive, but Kricketune didn’t.

  He survived.

  Despite all the excruciating pain, he bore with it and endured.

  Thousands of glowing, squirming bugs too small for the eye to properly make out crawled around his body. They filled in for missing skin and flesh, and they would cling there until he got medical attention. In spite of his wounded, battered body, Kricketune wore a disconcerting smile. His dark eyes glimmered with a hint of madness. Green light emanated from him in the form of a faint mist, but Swarm was not the true source of all the constant buzzing.

  That came from Kricketune himself.

  His antennae were in tatters and the broken strings on his body could not be strummed, but he could still sing an unnerving song with his soul. Just looking at the Bug was enough to fill the beholder with deep-rooted fear and a sense of dread.

  The rules of this match had been deliberately chosen more so by me than Sierra. No switch-ins meant there was nowhere to run. It was a way to screw over opponents, yes, but the same applied to one’s own team.

  With your back up against the wall, the only thing you could do was keep fighting. You had to toe the line between life and death.

  You had to make a stand.

  And Bugs thrived in that kind of environment. They fought back harder than anyone else under pressure.

  Whatever Sierra barked to her Pokemon, it was lost in the noise. So were my own words.

  “Show them what a Bug is.”

  Kricketune tore across the air with singed wings and ceaseless, disturbing buzzing that overtook the whole arena.

  They made it hard to think, a fact apparent from how Heatmor had to bash his own head with a clawed hand two times before his body deigned to listen to him. The little streaks of red and molten amber across his body glowed like lava about to burst. With a jerky motion, he reared his head back and expelled the flames that been building up inside him. Out came trails of fire, but while these whips were fewer in number than the previous wave, they were far bigger.

  They also exploded.

  Each whip that raced and screamed through the sky like dying comets voluntarily split off at the end. They detonated mid-air when they got close enough. Wings sparked with blue from an Aerial Ace, one that propelled Kricketune even faster. Most of the explosions missed their mark, but there were some that popped front and center, and they burned more of Kricketune’s skin away.

  He didn’t stop flying. Dark eyes stared unnervingly at their target without blinking.

  “Incinerate!” Sierra yelled.

  Kricketune got there before the fire even formed in Heatmor’s throat.

  Light flashed, and swords sang as they cut through the air. Their song was one of an undying Bug and its Swarm.

  One single swing was enough to elicit a painful scream. A second made a Pokemon as heavy as Heatmor crash to the floor from the impact, but Kricketune followed him. His sharpened blades descended without mercy.

  Frenzied and yet boasting perfect rhythm, they left gash after gash on the fallen anteater. Each was powerful enough to draw blood and spill inner flames. Little bugs made of green energy slipped inside the wounds carved on Heatmor’s body and burrowed around. The whole time, incessant buzzing permeated the air and simply wouldn’t stop. Neither did Kricketune.

  Heatmor thrashed, punched, screamed. Fire and smoke came out in endless amounts from his snout and tail, blasting the Bug clinging to him, but Kricketune never stopped moving his arms. He let the writhing, insect-like things on his body shimmer with energy that acted as a shield against Heatmor’s flames. When the fire proved too much and burned more of his skin off, Kricketune was content to let the bugs scuttle into wounds and fill them up.

  He kept slashing like a damn zombie—one that wouldn’t die even when flames cooked him from the outside.

  Fire would always hurt, but my Bugs knew how to endure. They had suffered through hotter flames. They had spent years training with the Sun.

  To be a Bug was to defy every odd and live.

  Here and now, that monstrous will manifested itself for all to see.

  Two arms—singed and beaten, but forever shining with a pure light—crossed themselves in one final blow. Stars sparkled along their bladed edges for a brief moment in time.

  Silent, radiant light was then expelled at point-blank range in the form of a giant X.

  The explosion when it engulfed Heatmor shook the field and rattled psychic barriers. Hazy smoke obscured my vision, but I knew what Heatmor’s state was long before it settled. The Pokemon’s body was hardly recognizable given all the gouges and scorch marks inflicted on him. A few faceless bugs darted out from open wounds now that their duty was done. Compared to Simisear, Heatmor had been subjected to a lot worse.

  Kricketune was faring only marginally better. His body was a charred, tattered mess that was more flesh than color at this point. Nothing I was too worried about. My Bugs had bounced back from far worse before. Though I was well aware Kricketune still had fight in him, he wasn’t going to last much longer.

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  We’d still proved our point. I had to focus my eyes, but I smiled when I saw Sierra’s face contort into an ugly expression. I probably looked a bit unhinged.

  Two Pokemon downed by one filthy Bug or so I imagined her to be thinking right now.

  These Bugs had climbed to the top of the food chain and never stopped struggling. She’d overjudged the moment she issued a challenge, but there was nothing to be done. Leading with Kricketune of all Pokemon had been a conscious decision on my part to put the first few cracks in her pride.

  Did that deter her? No.

  Fire was ever burning and ever seeking, and Sierra was known for being the type of trainer who ramped up instead of down.

  Heatmor went out, and fighter number three came in. It was the final form of one of Unova’s regional starters, ones bred and given in limited quantities to the best and brightest young trainers every year.

  This massive, heavy Emboar was released only a short distance away from Kricketune, and it was because he wanted to pack a punch—literally.

  Right out of the gate, he launched a surprise right hook full of searing flames. Tiny insects buzzed to life around Kricketune’s body as he darted back, but the passing heat was still strong enough to completely sear through the first layer of his living shield. Kricketune knew as well as I did that he was running out of steam, so he opted for doing as much damage as possible before the inevitable.

  He plunged both arms into the ground this time and blew up the field.

  Layers of burning earth and solid rocks hidden underneath flew everywhere with loud booms, but Emboar was heavy. The soundwaves Kricketune blasted didn’t so much damage him physically as they did mentally. Grunting, Emboar made himself work through the uncomfortable feeling spreading in his mind. The hulking Fire type hammered his feet into the fracturing ground. Once anchored, he smashed flying debris out of his face and took the first opening he got. He was naturally slow, but he built up fire around himself and charged. Every step quaked the earth as if he was an incoming freight truck.

  Kricketune barely managed to pull out his arms and stab Emboar’s chest with them. It was the closing act to his recital. A fist dancing with flames smashed into his vulnerable stomach, and the Bug went flying backwards from the impact. Part of his stomach was caved in even after shielding himself with concentrated type energy—an indication that Emboar was clearly as powerful in close combat as he looked. I quickly returned my unconscious Pokemon before he rolled to a halt. In one smooth, fluid motion, I reattached it to my belt and tossed out another Pokeball without hesitation.

  I saw it again. Sierra’s body posture grew more rigid as she watched the capsule fly, wondering if it was finally time.

  She bit her lip when she realized it wasn’t.

  “Build,” I ordered.

  High up in the air, an arachnid Pokemon native to Unova made her presence known.

  Electricity crackled underneath Galvantula’s feet as she ran through empty air at astonishing speeds, a feat second only to the massive quantity of silk she spat out. It split into countless strands and flew up, down, sideways, and in every direction as if it had a will of its own. In mere seconds, the entire psychic box enclosing the field had lines of thick webbing that connected one surface to another. Beautiful silk hummed with powerful electricity and a greenish hue.

  The sky was a hazard zone, but so was the destroyed arena. Galvantula was good at multitasking, and she’d deployed an Electric Terrain the moment she came out. Sparks flew in between sizzling boulders, and some of them rose slightly into the air from magnetism. The electricity coursing through cratered earth jumped erratically and zapped whatever it could find—namely Emboar.

  “Blitz Combat!” Sierra shouted. She sounded noticeably more irritated now that my second Pokemon had been revealed. “Take down the webbing first!”

  Every part of Emboar’s body lit up with scarlet flames, but none more so than the wreath he wore around his neck. It flared the brightest—

  And then all the flames sputtered as if someone had doused them with water.

  Kricketune had left a little parting gift before he made his exit. The arms he’d stabbed Emboar with had injected darkness from Night Slash. Kricketune was no Dark type, but he was still proficient enough with the move to buy a few seconds. The void that had spilled inside Emboar’s body was so vast, so empty that shadows temporarily severed the connection between the Fire type and his inner type energy reserves. He roared with frustration and flexed his arms.

  Nothing. The fire coating his body continued flickering in and out of existence.

  “Acid.”

  Galvantula scuttled down her webbing and spat out a wave of light, sparkling liquid that looked more like water than actual poison. Emboar tried to burn it, but what he got was a bucket full of acid because weak embers came out of his fist instead. It wasn’t there to deal damage—although it did sting a little and melt some patches of fur off—but to give him some internal problems. The Gastro Acid seeped through his skin and started corroding the flames Emboar had deep within him, the ones that grew stronger in times of adversity.

  It was now that the residual Dark type energy inside Emboar finally dispersed, and he lit himself ablaze with a roar. The first thing he did was smash both fists together with heat and one-two punch the closest piece of webbing.

  The moment it caught on fire, it screamed.

  Bug type energy had been layered inside of it, and both it and the electricity were working overtime to fortify all the silk. Fire rapidly spread and burned, but the webbing managed to hold on. It had been infused with the will to survive.

  Sierra gnashed her teeth together. “Heat Crash.”

  “Give them some help,” I offered slyly.

  Flames covered Emboar to the point where his body couldn’t be seen anymore. Thick, powerful muscles bunched in preparation for a jump, but he didn’t have to try so hard.

  Electricity roared to life underneath him, tore out the earth, and catapulted both him and the ground he stood on into the web. The living fireball known as Emboar flailed wildly as his fingers and feet sought purchase. More webbing burst into flames in the process. Eventually, he stopped his sudden flight by grabbing part of the web and yanking himself to a stop.

  The silk didn’t break under his weight—it was as strong as any steel.

  I could practically see the gears spinning in Sierra’s mind as she wondered what I was up to. Ultimately, she seemed to believe she could blow through it.

  “Ignite!” she roared.

  It was hard to tell through all the fiery armor, but Emboar grabbed a separate strand of silk with his other hand. He didn’t flinch even when electricity zapped his body. The entire web trembled from his herculean strength. Scarlet flames hissed and turned white as he flared brighter than the sun, getting ready to expel everything he had—

  “Boom,” I ordered, preemptively closing my eyes and turning my head away.

  Back when Emboar went on his little flight trip, Galvantula had darted off into an isolated corner of the psychic ceiling where she built a fortified silk dome for herself. She bunkered down inside the small structure and listened for vibrations through a single string connected to the larger web. The instant she heard rather than saw Emboar begin to blast out flames as if he was a furnace, she cut the string off and screeched out a command. All the electricity in the ground traveled up the webbing and amplified the existing currents. Silk everywhere turned a vibrant green.

  Then the storm of hell came rushing out of Emboar.

  Electricity was raw energy and movement. Unbound. Unstable. What happened when it was strengthened by the overwhelming tenacity of Bug type energy? What happened when all of that clashed with selfish, destructive Fire?

  They couldn’t coexist, not in harmony at least. Something had to give.

  Everything exploded. Everything.

  Shrieking—

  Howling—

  Rushing winds burst forth complete with hot, suffocating smoke and light brighter than any plasmic entity. If my gaze was still on the field, I might have likened it to a firework show but a hundred times worse. Every single part of the web blew up in response to oppressive flames. I couldn’t hear anything else above all the explosions. They would have been enough to make my ears bleed if I wasn’t outside the psychic barrier. As it was, they left me with intense ringing instead.

  I swung my head back when the explosions petered out.

  Smoke still obscured the battlefield, but there was enough visibility that I could see Galvantula darting down the side of the barrier. Her stronghold up on the ceiling—now a burning mess—had served its purpose and burned away. So had her massive web. Nothing remained of it.

  Emboar, at least, was still alive and kicking—a point he drove home by rushing out of the smoke wreathed in a cocoon of flames. He was panting, bleeding, and battered from all the explosions, but he was not a bulky Pokemon for nothing. His biggest asset—the inner flames that blazed to life when he grew weaker—were out of the picture at least. Little droplets of poison still ran deep within him, and they suppressed the Blaze that should have activated.

  It looked like Emboar was going to charge straight into the barrier, but I knew that couldn’t be it.

  “Shields! Buzz!” I called.

  Case in point, jets of fire suddenly blasted from Emboar’s feet and sent him flying through the air at startling speeds. A spurt of electricity went up around Galvantula—layers of electric shields—along with a rippling sheen of energy that gave her thick fur an emerald hue. Clicks turned into powerful buzzes as she scuttled away through the air, but Emboar faltered for only a moment from the soundwaves.

  “Propel!”

  Another burst of heat, and Emboar changed directions. He rocketed through the air and crashed recklessly into Galvantula shoulder-first. He didn’t need Blaze; he was already strong enough. A pained scream left the arachnid as explosive fire and hard skin alike tore through her shielding. They scorched her abdomen, oozing pale blood, and Sierra seized the opportunity—

  “BLITZ!” she yelled.

  —but Emboar stuttered in place. Being this close to a Bug, especially a Galvantula, was never a good idea. Multiple blue eyes glared at the piglike Pokemon and forced both his muscles and mind to lock up from their innate ability.

  The unnerved Emboar began to fall from gravity. Galvantula watched him go and screeched vengefully.

  Thunder, huge and deafening, fell down on his head.

  Guttural screams and violent spasms continued until the moment Emboar hit the messed up field below. Galvantula didn’t wait to see what had become of him. Conjured insects started crawling over her body and slotting themselves into her torn, bleeding flesh.

  As they did that, a string of red light shot toward the field and recalled Emboar’s hidden form. Sierra must have had better visibility from her vantage point. Though she was down three to one, the most she showed on her face was a defiant scowl. She didn’t hesitate with her fourth pick. A humanoid Pokemon that matched Emboar in height took to the field.

  Whatever battle-crazy grin I had probably grew enough to split my face in two.

  It was a Magmortar, imported and evolved from Kanto-Johto in all likelihood. I’d always wanted to fight one. Magmar were rare on this side of the world and their evolution rarer still on a global scale, even.

  To think it was Sierra who offered me the opportunity on a silver platter, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.

  Simply standing around was enough to heat the air around Magmortar to unbearable levels and warp it. The ground beneath his feet hissed and sizzled. Out of all the Pokemon Sierra had chosen so far, this one had the most dangerous internal body temperature.

  Long range. On the move.

  I even said as much out loud to Galvantula.

  This was not going to be a battle of attrition, definitely not. No, this was going to be—

  “Columns!” Sierra commanded.

  This was going to be a quick and explosive battle to see who broke first.

  Heat surged through Magmortar’s feet and destroyed the ground.

  Erratic, pulsing, uncontrollable geysers tore through screaming earth one after the other. Fire transformed into vengeful lava. After every match-up, the field had been wrecked and made unrecognizable all over again, but now it had truly become a hellscape of its own. Lava spilled onto the ground turning it a smoldering red where everything melted away. Pillars of it blew sky-high and turned white at the ends from intense heat.

  Through all the eruptions, a yellow spider flew nimbly in and out of splattering lava. Electricity coiled around her legs and made it seem like Galvantula was swimming through air. She concentrated briefly, a glow overtaking her body, and then she raced infinitely faster away from columns coming for her.

  “Bolt!”

  Even in all the chaos, compound eyes still found their mark. He was half-hidden between chunks of upturned earth, but Galvantula easily fired a powerful bolt with pinpoint accuracy through the narrow gap.

  My eyes narrowed when it seemingly fizzled out inches away from Magmortar.

  He hadn’t outwardly moved. Had to be the heat he expelled then. If I had to guess, the immediate air around him was acting like a lightning rod zone. Electrical charges weren’t so much phasing out of existence than they were being forcibly diverted into the ground. Magmortar’s body temperature was insane enough that he could raise it even further to manage such a feat.

  But something like that took conscious effort, and he could not divert everything.

  “Cannons!” Sierra roared.

  “Field, Overload, Green Thunder!” I yelled without pause.

  Yellow-green sparks crackled to life around the shifting field of lava at the same time that a titan finally moved. With a sinister smile, he snapped barrel-like arms together out in front of him and angled his body to the left.

  Heat swelled inside cannons before he fired.

  Fireballs—shrill blue flames condensed into deadly projectiles—hurtled through the air with endless bangs. They left rapidly flickering, warped air in their wake, and they screamed for violence. Just one of those would be enough to severely wound or kill more fragile Pokemon. The only reason Sierra and her Pokemon used such lethal firepower in this match was because she believed a Pokemon of Galvantula’s caliber wouldn’t outright die—flattering, I supposed.

  Galvantula jumped away from three fireballs that came in rapid succession. They pelted the psychic barrier far behind her instead and shattered it completely, forcing Burgh’s Orbeetle to quickly repair the innermost layer.

  They didn’t only rock the entire field from ensuing collisions but combusted. Solidified flames ricocheted everywhere like stray shrapnel, and the air quickly became a hellzone where Galvantula had to continuously run. It was because Magmortar kept firing without a care. That didn’t mean Galvantula only ran.

  No, with electricity pulsing along the ground and empowering her, she fired back Thunders like nobody’s business.

  Booming, cacophonous thunder beamed down while she dashed around the sky. Mixed with emerald hues and brilliant specks of golden light, they struck one after another like hammers from the gods. These didn’t fizzle out like the Thunderbolt had but were more visibly redirected into the ground. Still, they were powerful enough that Magmortar had to work for it.

  Each Thunder didn’t come with only a deafening clap or boom but a primal screech that sent soundwaves rippling every time they hit. The Bug Buzz mixed inside them would have disrupted Magmortar’s brain, so he had to double the intensity of his inner fire to keep out the mental pain.

  It meant he was burning through his reserves twice as fast to keep up.

  He tried to run around at some point to make himself harder to hit, but that was useless against a Galvantula. Compound eyes would always seek out a large, slow target like him without fail.

  Once more: this was a quick and explosive battle to see who broke first.

  Thunders still dropped from the sky onto Magmortar. He was tiring as fast as my Bug.

  As fast as Galvantula was, there was too much going on for her to outrun everything. Lava sprayed when it hit the psychic ceiling and melted patches of fur. All the heat in the air made steam rise from her body as bright fur began to burn.

  Most damning of all were Magmortar’s bread and butter: his fireballs. When they hit, they hurt.

  One smashed into Galvantula’s back leg and scorched it black. The only reason it remained in one piece was because the spider was protecting her whole body with electric and bug type energy, but they couldn’t hold off flames as powerful as these forever. A second fireball followed up and ripped her leg clean from her body. Yellow blood sprayed everywhere.

  Another smashed into her abdomen where Emboar had left a previous burn, and the fire dug deep and cooked flesh.

  Another, another, and another—

  She burned. She bled. Even when she lost another leg, Galvantula kept going by forcing electricity to carry her through the sky. Tiny, dark insects swarmed over her wounds and missing legs, and they filled in. She looked horrific.

  Still, bright eyes never lost the will to live—they hardened.

  And the moment a fireball destroyed a part of her abdomen, the moment droplets of blood went flying again and her body surged with green aura from Swarm—

  “Overload!”

  Galvantula screamed and gave back twice as much as she got.

  The ground crackled at her command.

  Every emerald Thunder that she’d fired, every single Thunder that Magmortar had meticulously redirected into the cratered ground that couldn’t tolerate any more currents—

  The mixed Electric and Bug Terrain, long fed and bursting at the seams with unbridled power, now released everything it had onto the being that had inadvertently nourished it.

  The world flashed white.

  Blinding. Ears ringing.

  The roar of mighty thunder never seemed to end.

  After what seemed like an eternity, it finally did.

  There was nothing but scorched, molten earth and pools of glowing lava. Magmortar lay half-submerged in one, but even a bath wasn’t enough to revitalize him. He had become a smoking, charred husk darker than any coal—cooked and mentally frayed by a Bug’s specialty Thunders.

  Galvantula weakly gripped one of the walls with sticky feet. Even though she was missing chunks of her body and bleeding everywhere, she screeched victoriously.

  Magmortar was the first to break while Galvantula clung to life like the monster she was.

  And for the first time, Sierra wavered after recalling her Pokemon.

  Two Bugs had proven they could survive through any pain and Fire that her Pokmeon could inflict on them. Two Bugs had proven they were not merely insects but living horrors.

  But Fire could not burn out without repercussions.

  If the woman standing over there wavered any longer, her flames would possibly die forever. So, to her credit, she squared her shoulders and pressed onward. It was the only path she could take.

  Red light beamed outward. The field seemingly darkened with the appearance of a half-Ghost, a Chandelure whose flames swayed side-to-side in the air with hypnotic motions.

  “Shades, floor, Spin!” Sierra barked.

  Five different clones came out of Chandelure, but these faceless apparitions were mixed with scarlet flames that morphed into color—Fire created as much as it could destroy, and I reckoned these became illusions so real that they were given shape and power just like the real Chandelure. I couldn’t tell them apart.

  While the clones spun rapidly in place, the main body became a shadow that sank into the floor.

  I snapped my fingers. “Field. Smoke it out.”

  With her makeshift, eldritch legs made of wriggling insects compacted tightly together, Galvantula went back on the move and darted along the sides of the psychic barrier. A familiar hum came to life far below. Arcs of electricity lanced between smoldering lava. The ground trembled, then—

  Lava exploded upwards. More solid rocks beneath were torn out and magnetically launched. Chandelure quickly slipped out of the chunk of earth she’d been hiding in, but before Galvantula could send everything falling back down on her exposed body, the Night Shades made their move.

  Flames burst out of their rotating bodies and ignited the whole field with blazing twisters. They melted boulders hanging high in the air and lunged for Galvantula.

  She couldn’t get out of this. A glorious exit, then.

  “Discharge!” I yelled above the inferno.

  Galvantua screamed. Electricity exploded from her body with everything she had left. One shade was zapped out of existence, two, even Chandelure’s main body couldn’t shield itself in time and let out a distressed wail—

  Then fire met wild, untamed electricity, and the resulting explosion blasted Galvantula back against the arena’s wall with a nasty crack. She didn’t move.

  The moment I recalled her and went to get a different Pokeball, a voice cut strongly through the air.

  “Why haven’t you used it?”

  My hand paused mid-air. When I flicked gold eyes over, I found Sierra staring at me with a clenched jaw.

  I’d been wondering when she would get so impatient as to ask.

  Technically, we’d both been ignoring referee outros this whole time with our rapid style of swapping Pokemon in and out after defeats. That was just how engrossed in the match we both were.

  Now that she’d partially pulled me out of my zone, I figured I’d humor her with the thirty or so seconds I had remaining to decide my next Pokemon—twenty-six now, I believed.

  “You want to fight him that badly?” I drawled with mocking amusement made clear in my tone.

  “I challenged you in the name of Truth and Ideals,” Sierra scowled. She had to speak a little more loudly for me to hear, and it was because the underpass grew more noisy with passing cars. “Are you telling me this is the best you have to offer in the eyes of the Heroes and their Dragons?”

  I kept a serious face, but I arched a brow. “Should I remind you that it’s 2-4 right now? I don’t think you know what you’re asking for. No switch-ins, remember?”

  Each one of my Bugs was a monster that could probably take on at least two of hers, so logically, I didn’t see what she was so upset by. Emotionally? She had to have realized by now how things would end. I could understand wanting to go out with a blaze of glory, but this was my last warning for her.

  Sierra bristled, eyes blazing brighter instead of dimming. That pride of hers—the one that had carried her through so many decades—was fractured but still intact.

  “If you think you belong here, then prove it,” she ground out.

  I cracked my neck. I wasn’t doing this so much for her as for me and my friend’s personal satisfaction.

  “Suit yourself. May the Heroes and Dragons watch over us.”

  Two seconds. That was all the time I had left to send out my next fighter.

  I felt Sierra’s gaze on me as my fingers reached for a Pokeball on my belt—one that barely stood out and yet one I knew contained my oldest partner—and held it up to the sky. The release mechanism made a loud and audible click as it was pressed.

  What was the Sun?

  It was a symbol of life and power—something that shed warmth on humanity and made life sustainable. A magnificent, brilliant star that always rose in the sky and promised new beginnings and yet so much more. You couldn’t help but raise your head to look at it even though you knew it would blind you.

  For me, the image I had of the Sun would forever be a grumpy, scrawny little Bug who’d been fighting and struggling all his life to survive—just like me.

  Inside the barrier, heat levels climbed faster than they ever had when Magmortar was out. The source was a massive Pokemon that materialized with hardly any sound. Six leaf-like wings beat the air in long but steady intervals, and with every flap, embers hotter than any flame you could think of flew. Tiny as they were, they instantly melted whatever they touched. Smoking holes appeared in the barrier and ground where they landed, and I knew Burgh’s Orbeetle was going to have to strain itself to keep up.

  Once, people had worshiped it as a Sun God and Deity of Fire.

  Once, this great being had descended upon a frozen land and saved hundreds of thousands of people with mere flaps of its wings.

  The respect it commanded in the past had ebbed with the flow of history and time, but it had never faded. It never would.

  Even today, it was still known as the Embodiment of the Sun. Parts of Unova continued to revere it, and its name had risen to further hallowed heights because of Alder Adeku and his partner.

  This was mine. Rune the Volcarona.

  This time, the Sun had finally come out, and this time, Sierra fully tensed up.

  It was one thing to desire a worthy fight and another to stare down the barrel of a crisis. Even if she’d fought a Volcarona before—and she undoubtedly would have given that she was once part of Alder’s Elite Four—no two Pokemon of the same species ever fought the same.

  “Ice!” Sierra yelled.

  As fast as the heat levels had risen, they dropped again as Chandelure and her clones waved their arms. The half-Ghost was a master of thermal manipulation, and she sucked away all the surrounding heat into herself.

  The whole field erupted with ice and froze over.

  Crystals, shiny and tinged with spectral hues, encased the ground. From their glittering shells came a flurry of shards that flickered in and out of existence. They flew through the air almost too fast for the eye to see—deadly and nigh invisible dangers.

  “Wave. Overload.”

  In response, beautiful wings in the hues of the sun beat powerfully at the air. Rune’s whole body became one with radiant flames. He only needed a moment and then—

  Fire. So much fire. The whole air was blasted full of it in one direction.

  The flames consumed everything.

  Shards—invisible or not—burned. Crystals, no matter how strong or frozen they were, melted and produced caterwauls that resembled those of dying Ghosts. Thin, metallic arms spun rapidly to suck in all the heat because it was harmless for Chandelure and her clones. Their innate ability meant fire was nourishment for them.

  It should have been.

  But how much fire can someone safely consume until their vessel bursts? What was the limit?

  The fiery cloak Rune wore intensified to the point where he became the sun personified. He beat his wings harder, and flames rushed out in explosive waves. They were no longer simply scarlet or golden-flecked but mixed with vibrant green. Chandelure held firm. Her ghostly flames flared defiantly as she ate the flames that willingly came rushing in, shades starting to make a move of their own—

  They disappeared. Evaporated. Gone.

  Extinguished from this plane of existence from flames too hot and too many for them to bear, and heat that did not destroy but kindled a disturbing will.

  Too late, Chandelure realized the things crawling inside her mind, the ones cleverly weaved into fire, and she felt her thoughts scattering to the four winds. She was a Ghost tethered to this plane by emotion, but the Bug type energy leaking inside her was just—

  Too. Overwhelming.

  A monstrous will to live that was beyond anything she could comprehend as a spectral being born from the void. Flames she had mistakenly believed she could hold. They were hot, far too hot, and her mind was breaking apart from information, so much information—

  Her metallic arms creaked and rattled violently. Spectral flames on her head and arms turned an ominous green, and her body heated up and sizzled and popped—

  And Chandelure imploded.

  Bits and pieces of her shadowy form splattered around the field like hot puddles of paint.

  She wasn’t dead. Ghosts never truly died barring certain circumstances, and unless you were a Dark type, they would not ‘die’ so easily in the mortal world either. It would just take her time to regenerate.

  Enough pieces of Chandelure’s core—a writhing pile of purple flames attached to a black stone—remained on the floor for Sierra to recall.

  Our eyes then met from opposite ends of the field. My gaze was a challenging one.

  Even without words, she understood what I was trying to convey.

  She had dared to trample on Bugs, and she had dared to challenge the Sun.

  This was what you wanted. Bring out your supposed best.

  She did.

  Her final Pokeball sailed through the air. The Pokemon that came out from it was heavy enough that he fractured the earth when he landed. An ever-present smile was etched onto the Fire type’s face as he smashed powerful fists into the ground.

  Sierra’s starter, Darmanitan.

  Funnily enough, the story went that Sierra Brooks had caught him somewhere in the Desert Resort in her youth. He was an old Darumaka then and a wise and powerful Darmanitan now. We’d both found our lifelong partners in a place full of sand.

  Rune’s bright blue eyes did not move, but they radiated displeasure. She had been a little passing blip in Rune’s memories, but he still remembered the woman who had shown hostility to me in my youth.

  Now, we would tell Sierra and her partner the story of who we had become.

  This was the last act to this story of Truth and Ideals.

  “Quiver! Ascend!”

  “Work Up! Follow!”

  Orders flew from our mouths.

  A flicker of light. A reverent hum. Protective scales were kindled by an ancient, forgotten song, and they glowed like the first stars in the night sky. The buzzing deep within its bearer grew louder and empowered Rune as he ascended higher into the sky, but Darmanitan was hot on his tail.

  He was faster than he seemed, and he tore across ruined earth with a fervent grin. Each breath he drew was deeper than the last. Inside, he fanned the flames of passion and fury, and warm, burning blood answered with an internal roar. He seemed to grow larger as he ran, muscles tightening, and legs kicking against the ground with restless vigor. Flames darker than blood coiled around his legs and lower body.

  Darmanitan was almost right below Rune already. With the distant sun at his back, the Volcarona hovered at the highest level of the sky bound within psychic constraints. He poised there with eyes brighter than any sea or sky and faint lights gathering on his wings like stars plucked from the cosmos.

  “Rain. Green,” I ordered.

  Lights instantly coalesced into dozens of blindingly fast, emerald-hued lasers that fell like droplets in a sunshower—except they hurt.

  “Shield!” Sierra shouted, but Darmanitan already knew.

  Fires begging to be set free burst from his body and allowed him to fly into the air. Trails of smoke sizzled where he went. He was better at this than Emboar had been, and he had more maneuverability. Limbs were set ablaze with a bellow. He punched the air—a single powerful swing—and flames roared to life in a massive, protective arc, but the lasers pierced through.

  Six tore into his dominant arm with thunderous bangs—and little insects that were swatted away—before Darmanitan reacted. Flames around him burned even hotter, and he propelled himself with short, explosive bursts that made it seem like he was bouncing through the air.

  He punched more furiously, this time melting some of the lasers when they dropped, but for the others he simply tightened his muscles. Lasers drew blood and embedded themselves into bulging arms, but they couldn’t fully pierce through all the mass.

  “Grab!” Sierra screamed once he was in radius.

  Rune flew back, but Darmanitan strained himself. His naturally long arm grabbed a hold of one of Rune’s wings and pulled, but every part of the Volcarona was stronger than it looked. The scales on his body could harden and burn at his will, and they were so hot that even Darmanitan’s skin started to scream. Darmanitan pulled back a clenched fist with his other arm—

  “Cut! Invade!”

  Faster than Darmanitan could react, Rune’s wings erupted with sweltering crescents. They slashed, they gouged Darmanitan’s chest and even one of his eyes, but he didn’t let go even when insects burrowed inside him.

  “Superpower!”

  A furious, primal scream echoed as two glowing fists hammered Rune’s abdomen. The moment the Volcarona went hurtling backwards from the impact, Darmanitan blasted more fire from his feet again to follow. He nearly dropped out of the air a few times from involuntary freezes. Bug type energy had infiltrated his insides, and there was a pervasive rattling he couldn’t shake off. An unpleasant buzzing filled his ears and made him shudder—

  That was from Rune.

  The Volcarona hadn’t taken long to stabilize himself, and now he was up in Darmanitan’s face with unnerving blue eyes. The Fire type couldn’t react in time.

  “Blast.”

  If one had ever seen the Sun, then they knew how hot and bright it was. Rune didn’t need weather on his side because he was the entity.

  The sun’s rays, radiant and pure, exploded outwards from Rune at point-blank range.

  They blinded everyone who looked directly at them. For the screaming, foolish being who looked at them first—Darmanitan—they seared his outer fur off and sent him crashing upwards into the ceiling.

  Then he fell tumbling back to earth with a boom.

  One had to remember not to fly too close to the sun.

  Still, there were always those who would try again and again.

  Blinded and scorched, a very different figure could be seen when the smoke settled. A large, immobile rock made of rusted blue stone sat on the floor, but it had a face and eyes. Zen Mode Darmanitan.

  Light concentrated in his eyes and poured out in wide, pulsating cannons. Spurred by psychic energy, the Hyper Beams ripped through the air and split into tendrils. They peppered the Sun high above one after another, making explosions and trying to tear through scales—

  “Cocoon.”

  Rune burned anew with flames.

  Like legends of old, blistering hot fire wrapped around the Volcarona in a protective embrace. They burned hot enough for the Hyper Beams to fizzle out, and they grew outwards ominously. No hint nor hide of the Pokemon inside could be seen.

  “Bloom.”

  Then layers peeled back like fiery petals, and fire descended in a concentrated pillar. Psychic shields instantly went up around Darmanitan.

  They tore through them like butter and engulfed Darmanitan in fires more powerful than anything he could produce.

  A sea of flames had swallowed the sky, and Rune emerged from an unraveling cocoon with glowing eyes. Darmanitan was still burning alive, but he flashed and hardened, trying to protect himself with Steel.

  I whistled, drawing Rune’s attention.

  It was time to wrap things up. I wanted to put an end to this certain chapter of my life and the pride of this woman who had never believed that I belonged here in Unova.

  Clouds would come and go, but the sun would always, always be there.

  Ever burning, ever seeking.

  Fire was many things, but I liked to believe it was transformation. Through Fire, we suffered and became stronger. Through Fire, we dared to struggle and live.

  We were able to shape our own fate and be born anew.

  That was a Will forged in fire—etched in eternity and forever ours.

  “Emblaze. Green.”

  Flickers. Whispers. Little lights sparked with brilliance along Rune’s wings again. He flared his wings wide and screeched.

  A wave of light hotter and brighter than any star or sun came pouring out, and it rippled with emerald green. It sang a song as it descended from the heavens.

  These weren’t flames but the will of life given wings.

  They swallowed the world whole.

  Silence.

  Silence, but that wasn’t right. It was because I couldn’t hear anything above ringing in my ears from the ensuing explosions. The entire field quaked and rumbled and shook some more.

  Almost every single layer of psychic barriers around the field shattered from Rune’s specialty move. Skin might have been burned clean off if Burgh’s Orbeetle didn’t repair them instantaneously like he did.

  We had to wait a long time for everything to settle.

  Rune hovered high in the sky with embers and green sparks falling from his wings like snow. Below… Darmanitan was charred beyond recognition on the ground.

  He didn’t launch another attack.

  Just in time to hear Burgh’s words, I snapped out of the zone I’d been in this whole time.

  “—unable to battle. With a final score of 6-2, Kayden Sterling of Castelia City is the victor of this duel.”

  I didn’t smile. I didn’t laugh.

  Only a small, quiet breath left me.

  I didn’t even register the cheers that suddenly went up around the field, the furious clapping, or the kids, teenagers, and adults who’d seemingly popped out of nowhere. There was a whole crowd gathered outside the grated fencing surrounding this old and now destroyed field.

  Kayden Sterling of Castelia City.

  That was who I am, and that was who I would always be.

  The boy who clawed his way to the top of the world when others thought it was impossible.

  The boy who came back home in glory and…

  The boy who took his rightful place back in Unova.

  Kayden Sterling was here to stay.

  Thanks for reading! I really appreciate all the support. :) We are now caught up to the other sites I've crossposted this fic on by the way. Follow the fic if you'd like to get notified for updates!

  When I first envisioned this battle in my head before the fic’s conception, I imagined something like a 6-3 for the final result. Sierra is a prideful woman who clings to past glory and impedes her own growth because of a rigid mindset (which is ironic given what Fire is supposed to be, but that’s her character flaw), whereas Kayden is the complete opposite. Always traveling, always moving, always fighting, always struggling—just like a Bug, and eventually, he became one of the strongest.

  The final result ended up becoming a 6-2 when I realized Sierra’s pride had to come into play in the worst way. Thematically, I thought having Rune tie things up fit really well, too.

  Note 1: If you want a general idea of average power levels in this universe (I repeat, general, not set in stone), it’d be something like Gym Leaders could defeat 0-1 Champion-level Pokemon in a six-on-six, and Elite Four should be able to handle 2-4.

  Note 2: Pokemon in this universe can have and learn more than one Ability, but they would have to train extensively for it. So you’d see this more with higher-leveled trainers than one with only five badges for instance. Would be kind of crazy otherwise if everyone was running around with multi-Ability Pokemon LOL.

  Join the server (named after WTMR, another Pokemon fic of mine) if you're interested!

  I also have some cool fanart of our MC and Rune that I have permission to share. A wonderful Discord user named Alkinus drew it!