As far as anyone could tell, the world was saved, but most trainers still kept tight-lipped about their wishes, so no one could truly be sure. After all, if mythology is any guide, rarely does one who is already the very best make a wish without any destructive consequences for others. The most paranoid in the crowd had joined the more religious fans in hoping Arceus would be the victor in this tournament, if for no other reason than the fact that the creator of all things had already made their own wishes come true.
Yet there were others among the fans, and indeed among the organizers as well (and of course among the contestants) who were hoping Arceus would lose, who had opposed its being allowed into the tournament in the first place, for what was the point of a world championship if all it proved was that God was greater than Man and that striving for greatness was ultimately futile?
Both of these groups would find their passions riding high on this match, for of the six trainers yet to battle this round, Arceus was the first one chosen on the scoreboard, represented not by the face of its human guise, but by the sprite used to represent it in so many video games and religious services.
It would not, however, be a talkative battle, for few knew what to make of his opponent, Red of Pallet Town. This was not because he was mute (which meant less than it once did in this digital age,) but because he had retired to a cave after winning to live the life of a hermit on Mount Silver. Cheers and boos alike for him had only come sporadically in his first match, and were based more often than not on whether one liked the pokemon he used, as opposed to what one thought of their trainer.
The field for this match was a thick forest which recalled the Viridian or Ilex forests, with plenty of plant life growing underneath a thick canopy of trees. It could not claim either Viridian Forest's biodiversity or its bugs, but it was enough to power up the attacks of grass-type pokemon and provided countless hazards and concealment for trainers to use to their advantage.
Red's eyes stared at his foe with a rarely-seen fury as he called his first pokemon to the field: a purple and white cat with many exposed veins, the unholy offspring of a human being (in this case, Blaine of Cinnabar Island) and Mew, its DNA endlessly tweaked to give it extra power. Mewtwo did not share Red's ferocious stare; instead, it averted its eyes from the other trainer.
"Mewtwo, why will you not face your creator?" Arceus asked, genuinely puzzled.
"Because you are not my creator. I am an abomination," Mewtwo answered. "And my presence here is sacrilege, but for Red's sake..."
The God of All Types sighed. "If you insist. Giratina, go!" The snakelike, floating beast which had faced Cyrus was in a different, less ancient form – a model which recalled the shapes of Dialga and Palkia, with spiked wings instead of tentacles and six silver tree trunks for legs.
Before Arceus could call out an attack, Red held up a hand signal, and a path through the forest towards Giratina was burnt away in a wave of blue energy which barely managed to hurt the undead dragon.
"Psyburn. It certainly does look like an impressive attack, Red. But it's not impressive enough to conquer a legend. Giratina, Shadow Force!"
The great dragon disappeared, although all of it Red had seen from his position in the first place was a large mass of gray between an enormous number of trees. And yet Red smiled.
"Red wishes you to know that he had a reason for having me use Psyburn," Mewtwo noted, following Giratina's shadow along the burnt-out forest path, and then bowling a black ball along the ground, striking and revealing its foe. "Also, Giratina should be more careful with its Shadow Force."
The gray dragon disappeared again the moment after the attack hit. The Shadow Ball did not prevent it from soon materializing beneath Mewtwo, disrupting the psychic's concentration and screaming out in a very human response of pain: it did not roar or squeak like an ordinary pokemon.
And Mewtwo had a response already set without even a sign or thought from Red, although the Champion was not complaining. As it was flung into the air, it continued its war of shadows with Giratina, summoning another black vortex which sucked in trees as it struck the God of Terror, striking it with an attack as much grass as ghost.
Unfortunately for Red and Mewtwo, Giratina resisted grass attacks, so the extra trees uprooted and smashed into the dragon hurt a lot less than they would have an ordinary pokemon. Mewtwo continued to float upwards, this time on Red's thought command. It rose above the trees to the delight of the fans, daring Giratina to fly up upon its black wings and make this an aerial (and far more visible) match.
"Giratina, show Red what happens to pokemon who prefer aerial combat. Thunderbolt," Arceus calmly ordered, and Giratina let out a loud roar which pinged Mewtwo's eardrums and shook its body from the force of its sound. "Every pokemon has its own interpretation," Arceus added with a smile. "It's not called 'lightning bolt' after all."
Red barely moved, unwilling to lose his focus with a smile: it was bad enough for his chances that Mewtwo, who needed concentration as much as its trainer did, was starting to become genuinely amused. "Keep your focus," he thought desperately to Mewtwo, trying to think which attack would work best: Shadow Ball hadn't done all that much, despite being allegedly super effective. At least he had come prepared; there wasn't much question Mewtwo would face Giratina to start the match. "We practiced this for a reason. Blizzard," he thought to his pokemon, and Mewtwo twirled its tail, creating a whirlwind of ice and sending it flying Giratina's way.
Blizzard is an unreliable attack, but this unreliability has more to do with the difficulty aiming it. If the wind actually carries it to the foe, as it did this time, there was nowhere for any pokemon to run. Especially if the target was a big, slow beast like the dragon it called its foe.
Giratina had not only been badly injured by the attack: it was encased in a block of ice. It did not respond to Arceus' call of "Rest!" - at least, not with the kind of rest which healed an injured pokemon, although it wasn't exactly exerting itself within the ice. (Except, perhaps, by trying to break out.)
The ice was soon shattered by another Shadow Ball from Mewtwo, for the vortex clanged off enormous chunks one by one to reveal an unconscious Giratina.
"Return," Arceus said, holding up a poke ball to recall his first pokemon: there was no question as to who would replace it. Dialga didn't need to freeze time to disrupt and resist psychic pokemon, although it certainly helped to be encased in armor. The steel blue beast, as much like a Girafarig and a mech in appearance as what one conventionally considered a dragon, roared as it emerged from the poke ball. It was not the sort of roar which shattered the space-time continuum, nor one which forced a pokemon back to its poke ball, but the sound alone was terrifying enough.
"Mewtwo, Focus Blast." Red thought, It had been a baseball player and a bowler in this match with Shadow Ball alone, but the sphere of raw energy it generated was too large for Mewtwo to give it anything but a two-handed basketball shot Dialga's way.
"Time Rewind," Arceus answered, and Dialga's whole body flashed as Mewtwo and the ball froze, then came flying back Mewtwo's way, but the energy was harmlessly reabsorbed into Mewtwo's body; it was, after all, its own ki.
"Huh... not sure why Dialga did that against this of all attacks. But how can that move be legal – it seems completely unbeatable. Mewtwo, try another Focus Blast."
This time, Arceus was silent.
This time, Dialga was frozen in time.
This time, Mewtwo's aim was horribly off and the blast flew harmlessly over Dialga's head into the psychic shield covering the arena.
"Mewtwo, try a bounce pass," Red thought: Focus Blast was a notoriously hard attack to control, and even Mewtwo was struggling; it became clear his prior attack had been rewound precisely because it would have been a direct hit.
"Earthquake," Arceus said, and Dialga reared up on its hind legs, then slammed them into the ground: Mewtwo tried to float away, but if the earthquake didn't knock it out, the falling trees certainly did.
It was a whole new match. Except that Red had lost his only legend, and Arceus had brought nothing but legends to begin with. He needed to throw up a roadblock, lest Dialga sweep his remaining pokemon.
And he had just what he needed. With an underhand toss, Red launched his poke ball high into the air, releasing a Snorlax above the clouds, facing him as he sent it a signal. The great blue and off-white stuffed animal of a pokemon plummeted towards Dialga in what looked like the mother of all Body Slams. Spooked out by the prospect of such a landing and goaded on by its trainer's cry of "Run!" Dialga galloped through the forest to the other end of the arena, leaving the Snorlax to pancake a few trees and send a tremendous Earthquake Dialga's way.
Arceus was as surprised as Dialga by the attack: even the Gods were subject to fate, and he thanked fate that the dragon of time was not defeated in a single strike. Perhaps ultimately it would be better for even Arceus to be defeated, but in the heat of battle, they were every bit the hotblooded competitor as Red. "Roar of Time!"
Red said nothing, nor did he send any signal to his pokemon as a time-shifting sound filled the air. Snorlax did seem wounded by the attack – or perhaps what truly hurt it was its own fall – for it was in obvious pain, and in the absence of a signal had not relied on instinct, but began chowing down on trees like a Donphan or an oversized Munchlax. Unable to shout, Red could not figure out how to regain his pokemon's attention as Dialga rested, again exhausted by its own attack; he was tempted to throw a rock like he was in the Safari Zone, but he doubted the judge would look kindly on such a move.
Ironically, it was Arceus' booming call of "Brick Break" that made Snorlax turn around and face his trainer, who had furiously been throwing up the sign for "Earthquake." Snorlax stomped the ground, which started to shatter. Dialga jumped to dodge and was pounded again by falling trees. Attack by attack, the forest began to break. And then Dialga's knees extended and rammed through Snorlax's fat to the body underneath with a force which could shatter walls.
Yet when it landed, it did so on still-rumbling ground: Snorlax had taken care to land in a way which would make the earthquake hurt as much as possible, even if it would be at the center of its own attack. While Dialga recuperated, Snorlax, its head tilted back to receive a signal, obediently closed its eyes, rejuvenating itself with a Rest.
"Sleeping in the middle of the match," Arceus remarked. "That's Snorlax for you."
Red wanted to retort something about the nobility of his pokemon or Dialga recharging half the match anyway, but was of course unable to do so; he doubted even Arceus knew the obscure sign language he had invented in Pallet Town to communicate with family and the neighborhood children he now called best friends and rivals.
Instead, he let his sleeping Snorlax do the talking. There was no signal he had for Sleep Talk, for his pokemon would not have seen it anyway: it was up to the brains of his Snorlax, who battled so strangely it might as well have been random chance.
He was hoping for another Earthquake.
Dialga charged to another call of "Brick Break" from Arceus, running low to the ground so that the armor on its chest would break through Snorlax's blubber. With a loud snore, the sleeping pokemon cloaked itself in a teal light, then Selfdestructed like a Voltorb, although it didn't look any different when fainted than when simply asleep. Dialga, caught at ground zero of the blast, was flung high and outwards into the psychic shield above the ruined forest; in an ordinary match, the distance the attack flung Dialga would have made it a ring-out, but the shield prevented this. Yet its cracked armor and failure to get back up once it fell meant the result was the same: Dialga was unable to battle.
Each trainer had one pokemon left. It wasn't actually overtime, for it was their third and not their fourth pokemon, but it certainly had the same feel. Two trainers held their poke balls aloft, and on Arceus' count of three (for neither was willing to move first, even though they both thought they knew what they were up against) opened their poke balls.
Out of Arceus' poke ball, after a cry of "Palkia, go!" came a silver and purple dragon with a pearl in its shoulder, its design intended to recall a pearl itself given dragon form, with small white, almost angelic wings, and a neck and head many have taken as a representation of male fertility.
Red had hoped for Snorlax to save its Selfdestruct for Palkia, allowing him to win the match without resorting to a third pokemon, because no one matched up especially well against Palkia, who did only have the one weakness. But in a battle like this, there was only one choice; losing was one thing, but losing without even using Pikachu would always leave him wondering "what if".
So a small, chubby yellow rodent with red cheeks and a lightning bolt tail appeared on the ground from Red's poke ball, sitting in what was once strongly resembled its natural habitat, but which had been washed away by some the strongest pokemon who had ever lived and was now merely a mess of dirt and toppled trees.
"Rain Dance!" Arceus yelled. Red had to count himself as confused by the command: his Pikachu certainly had a reputation for power far beyond what other Pikachu could accomplish, but did Arceus really believe it would take a rain dance for Palkia's attacks to wash such a tiny pokemon away?
But if Red was given an opening, he wasn't one to pass it up: it was only seconds before rain started drenching the field that he gave Pikachu the sign for "Thunder." An enormous cloud made entirely of electricity arced from Pikachu's cheeks to Palkia's stomach, well out of the way of the falling water which was already up past Pikachu's feet.
Red had expected the next word out of Arceus' mouth to be "Surf" given the rain pouring onto the field. What he had not expected was a cry of "Spacial Rend" followed by the creation of a large, sickle-shaped void hurtling Pikachu's way, but slightly above the rodent's head and harmlessly creating a hole a few feet in the air above the back corner of the arena: it would have sucked in the fans if not for the psychic shield.
Red was for a moment still suspicious, wondering if that attack could properly be called a miss: he had seen Palkia's strategy in its last fight and begun to suspect spacial rend was of more use as a hazard than a direct assault.
And then he realized what Arceus was doing.
Palkia's attack had missed not to set up a hazard, but because it was being very careful to make sure that if it missed, it missed high.
Palkia had not used Rain Dance to power up Surf: in fact, using Surf would defeat the purpose. It had used Rain Dance to change the field and leave Pikachu as vulnerable as Palkia to its own electric attacks.
Arceus had staked the battle on a strategy dependent on no logs drifting by of the right size for Pikachu to climb on to in a forest which had been washed away by water. And worse, it was working.
Red could signal a Surf. But Palkia was virtually immune to water, and as long as rain poured down upon the field, the water would just replenish itself. Which left one stupid, crazy option.
Again, Red put up the sign for Thunder. Again, Pikachu's cheeks sparked, although this time the rising water level meant the cheeks were level with the water, Pikachu was swimming, and even Palkia was up to its legs in water. A targeted Thunder wouldn't do the trick.
Pikachu hesitated, turning around to Red for confirmation. Arceus was too shocked by the sign to command a thing. Red pointed down to the water.
And Pikachu flooded the growing pool of an arena with enough electricity to take down out a nearly full-health Palkia – and itself as well, were it not holding a Focus Sash in its mouth. The sash crumbled to the ground and an injured Pikachu swam victoriously into Red's trainer's box as its opponent floated face-down in the water.
For ten seconds, the judge was too shocked to move. And then he spoke. "Palkia is unable to battle. Arceus has been toppled. Victory in this match goes to Red of Pallet Town!"
Although the bitterness was one-sided, there would be no handshake. The field rotated to normal and the flood drained out, but only Arceus ventured out of the trainer's box.
"I'm sorry. Even I make mistakes." He whispered, remorseful as he walked past Red on the way by. "That's why you entered, isn't it?"
Red nodded, tears streaming from his face.
"We'll talk about this later. Meet me in the Hall of Origins after the tournament." There was no mistaking Arceus' emphasis on the word talk. Arceus was not the God it was often imagined as: it could not see the future, and was basing this judgment on nothing more than research and observation.
But it was clear that Arceus itself believed Red would win the tournament, and that alone was enough to replace an angry glare with an enormous smile – maybe he really would speak at last. He only needed two more wins to do it, after all.