Chapter 8: Unexpected Happenings in Both Sides of the Continent

In Crystal Luminous' cave, Diancie was humming and busying creating Mega Stones with her fellow Carbinks. All of a sudden, she felt a sinister presence behind her. She turned around and saw Hoopa came out of her Hyperspace Hole and it closed immediately behind her.

"Diancie," asked Hoopa furiously, "why did you prevent Eterna from summoning The Null?"

Diancie simply replied, "Then, what is the point for her to be summoned by Xerneas in the first place if Eterna awaken The Null and have her powers sealed? I believe Eterna is powerful enough to defeat The End."

"You don't understand. Yes there is a chance that she could defeat The End with her friends without The Null, but what comes after that is when The Null is needed to save us all."

"So why it is needed for him to be summoned then?"

"Something worse than the wrath of Nature will befall on us. All I saw is this continent will disappear…and nothing more."

Diancie gasped, "Is…this true…your vision showed you this?"

"Yes! And I have this again before I come here! Because of your interference, I have to prepare to protect Horizon Town from the face of this disaster! I knocked you out that time because I know you may say something to stop Eterna from summoning The Null. But I did not expect her to manage to wake you up."

Diancie was thinking, "I knew it was you since you are the only ghost I allow to bypass my barrier, but I will let you off since the situation is dire." Then, she said, "You could summon The Null here, so why you refuse to do so?"

Hoopa dipped her head down, "I am already not qualified to summon him. You had seen what I had done before…and that is the reason why I am confine in this part of the continent."

Diancie hugged her, "Oh my friend, don't be too hard on yourself. And, put more faith in Eterna. She will do something to prevent the catastrophe from happening."

"I hope so Diancie…"


It was daytime now and the group had not found a good place to rest yet. As Aura carried them on its back during the flight, it told Chestnut, Timburr and Snover the situation. Now they understood why Eterna had awoken and they did not comprehend why Gourgeist would do this to them, and how did he know that they would challenge The End. Chestnut concluded that since The End knew their presence and was getting fearful of them, he instructed the Pokémons to take them to his domain and he would defeat them himself. Timburr objected that not all Pokémons heard of this, such as Mightyenas and Poochyena group as they were helping them in goodwill. It could be that The End had some selected few that did the work for him.

Eterna was still unconscious. No matter how many times the group tried to wake her up, they failed to do so. They hoped by finding a Chestnut Berry in Unfathomable Cavern would wake her up.

Aura found some tall graphite rocks surrounding a small patch of dried grass. It landed on the ground and insisted that they should rest here. The rocks blocked the morning sunrays from reaching the ground. It would take three more hours for the sun to align at the zenith point for them to be exposed to the rays. The group placed the slings bags on the ground first; and then placed Eterna on Aura's body to keep her safe. They lied on the floor and snoozed away.

What they did not know was that Eterna was not exactly sleeping. She was trying to control the dark rage within her. It was different than her dark aura; this rage was actually her true self which fuelled the dark aura to do what it wanted. She knew that when Life carries darkness, aka the black dragon, it was not born with hatred. It was when it was utterly defeated by the King that it succumbed into one. And the hatred had passed on to her, waiting for the day it could torture any living being. She was impressed that she could control her rage that time, but the feeling when being in that form was just anger and it was hard to refrain herself from attacking. She feared that should she be awakened again, she would not care less about saving the world and maybe, the light within her would be her salvation and will end her.

She did not know how much the time had passed when she was concentrating. She decided to depend on her hunger to snap her out, and it did as her stomach growling shocked her to open her eyes. She looked around to find her friends sleeping within the shade of the tall rocks. Then, she felt she was laying on something cooling. She turned her head and realised she was on Aura's belly.

Eterna conversed with it, "Uh…how long was I out?"

"Not that long. Well, you are in time for breakfast."

"Haha. Hey Aura, I do remember what I did in Horizon Town in that form, and you saved me. And then today, you had saved me again. I thank you for that, but please do remember what I had said to you before."

"I know. You have my word. Additionally, I think you should learn to break the spell even when you are asleep, bind or silence. Your light might be able to resist any dark magic."

"Yeah since The End has finally acted. Well, it is better than he's doing nothing! But first, is there anything to eat?"

Aura passed her sling bag to her. It was heavier than usual, maybe because her friends had put something inside. She opened it to see items floating in the colourful dimensional space. The dimensional space allowed forty-eight items in it no matter how big they are inside. She saw some Mago Berries floating around and used her right paw to pull one of them out of the bag; then she immediately chomped on it. Sweet tangy juice filled her mouth and she squirmed in joy.

Once Eterna noticed she was watched by Aura, she felt embarrassed, "Umm…haha, I am easily satisfied with just a delicious food. It is enough to make my day. Okay! Now I shall practise creating something to block spell attacks!"

Eterna closed her bag and faced at a rock. She closed her eyes and conjured a Shining Sphere behind her. Then, she requested Aura to shoot a dark aura at it. It did as it told and once the black blob hit the light ball, a visible dome barrier was seen and the black blob disintegrated. Aura was astounded that she had created a wall that effectively nulled dark attack without her looking at it.

She opened her eyes and spoke to Aura, "Yes! I guess this is good enough. It can protect me or my friends from spell attacks even when I am sleeping! It will use its own energy to deflect them. That means it has limitations for it will vanish after there is no more energy available to use. I named this new move Divert Deviation. I guess the Joy Ribbon really helps me learning new skills."

Aura responded, "Impressive. I believe the more Shining Spheres being formed, the more frequent they can protect us from spells. But you do not need to protect me as spells only work on the living."

"Really? I guess that is good. Hmm…the dazzling light may prevents us from sleeping at night. I will need to hide the light balls in something." She tilted her head up at the sky. Then, she looked at Aura and said, "Aura, are the Dark Type Pokémons born from darkness?"

"What I do know is that even though they can use dark powers; they are not born from darkness. I can feel their spirit not radiating any form of darkness in them."

"But what about The End?"

"I am not sure about him. I can only analyse him when I see him."

"Hmmm okay. Thanks for answering and providing me tips Aura."

"You are welcome Eterna."

Eterna could not find any more words to converse with it, but she felt apologetic for blaming Aura for awakening her that time. Still, it is better not to bring this topic anymore so she decided to stare at her sleeping friends.

Eventually, she grew bored of waiting for them to wake up that she played with her Shining Sphere and moving it back and forth like it was a firefly. She even moulded its shape differently but restricted to flame shape. However, she lost control and the light ball slammed on Chestnut and vanished. Chestnut who felt a sudden warmth in him jumped out and panted. He eyed at Eterna and said:

"Why did you disturb my sleep? It is rare that we can…huh?"

A bright light radiated out of him and he felt himself changing. When the light finally disappeared, he looked at himself and was stunned of his plumped hands and feet. He had evolved into his second stage!

He stuttered, "Wha…what!? How did I suddenly become this form? Eterna! Did you forcefully evolve me?"

"I don't know! I just accidentally rammed Shining Sphere on you!" Eterna was equally bewildered.

The commotion caused Snover and Timburr to awake. Their yawn was interrupted by being surprised of Chestnut's transformation.

"No way! You evolved without being in battle? I wish I could evolve now!" Snover cried foul.

"Snover was right. There is no way for a Pokémon to evolve unless an evolution item is introduced to it." mentioned Timburr.

"But I just evolved am I? I was hit by Eterna's light attack and poof, I became Quilladin!"

Timburr and Snover gazed at Eterna. She backed off from feeling a 'Can she do that?' vibe from them.

"If that is the case, can you try to evolve us as well Miss Eterna? I think we really need to power up for the challenges ahead." requested Timburr.

Eterna objected, "This is wrong! Isn't my light attack just works like a purify attack? It should not have forcefully evolved Chestnut!"

"Maybe that it is depending on your state of mind. You could have sub-consciously want Chestnut to evolve aren't you?" implied Aura.

Aura could be right. It was true that she had been dreaming of Chestnut evolving into his third stage so that she could Mega Evolve him.

She gave up arguing, "Argh, fine. I will try to do this for you two."

"Yay!" they cheered.

"Oh, I really miss my cute self." said Chestnut."

Snover laughed, "You aren't cute in heart Chestnut haha."

Chestnut glared at him.

Eterna intervened, "Ok stop it dudes, I gonna hit you with all I got!"

She psyched herself of wanting Timburr and Snover to evolve; then, she created two Shining Spheres and tossed at them.

Nothing happened.

She did the process again but this time she thought the importance of their second stage forms in a difficult battle. The two Shining Spheres became flame shapes and they gave off a powerful vibe. She tossed those at them and it was a success; they had begun to evolve. In a flash of light, Timburr had evolved into Gurdurr and Snover evolved into Abomasnow. Gurdurr had a buff upper body and looked like there were veins popping out, while Abomasnow had more leaves and a beard. They looked at each other and danced in glee of their new forms.

Eterna took a sigh of relief and said, "Alright, it worked. So, should I address you two in different names or something? Your names are species name right?"

"Hmmm. Why don't you give us nicknames as a way of thanking you for fulfilling our selfish wish?" suggested Timburr.

"Hmm! You won't regret what I gonna name you both! How about Loggerhead for you and Ice Kacang for evolved Snover?"

"Uh…" Timburr did not like his as Loggerhead means slowpoke and he could feel that Chestnut was sniggering at him.

"What does my nickname means Miss Eterna?" questioned Abomasnow.

"It is an ice dessert in my country."

Ice Kacang happily replied, "Ooh! I like it! Thanks!"

"I guess I will accept this nickname of yours." said Loggerhead reluctantly.

Eterna grinned, "Okay! It is decided then! Well then, since we are awake, why don't we move on?"

Loggerhead nodded, "Yes we should. Unfathomable Cavern is not that far away from us if we go there by flight. We could do some training in the mystery dungeon as well."

They took off by riding on Aura's back. Eterna did not ride on her Shadowable as she wanted to conserve energy for conquering the dungeon and she would have to put her team cooperation skills to the test.