"Hey guys, do you think we could take a break from heading to the next gym?" asked Ash.
"Why?" asked Misty. "Scared?"
"More like the annual Rota Kingdom tournament is coming up and I know for a fact Riley is going to be there this year," said Ash.
"Riley, as in the cousin who trained you?" said Misty.
"Yup. I really want to cheer him on at the tournament," said Ash.
"I'm in," said Silver. He had never been farther than Johto, and he had a bit of an interest in history.
"You're not just doing this to skive off our official match, right?" said Misty.
Ash shook his head.
"It shouldn't take more than a few days to a week at most out of our schedule."
"I'm in," said Brock.
Seeing she was outvoted, Misty sighed.
"Fine, but this had better be worth it!" said Misty.
"You get to meet actual royalty, and dress up like a real princess," said Ash.
"Wait, what?" said Misty startled.
"You get to rent actual costumes during the tournament and people are encouraged to dress up, even if they're not competing," clarified Ash.
Misty's enthusiasm about the idea went up after hearing that.
A few days later...
Ash took a deep breath after being stuck in the rather cramped seat for several hours. In order to keep from being completely broke, they had gotten the cheapest seats available for four people.
For Silver it was an interesting experience. Since his father was so well respected and powerful, he had always gotten a private ride to wherever he went. Being in a cramped seat with other people next to him was something he had never dealt with before.
Ash rarely took planes or other vehicles. He preferred to travel by foot or by Pokémon to better experience the area he was in.
Once they were at the castle, Ash had a quick chat with the organizer. Once the rental fee was settled, since Ash wasn't taking part in the tournament, the group went in to pick their costumes.
Ash, predictably, managed to track down the Sir Aaron costume...which he knew for a fact wasn't a costume, but one of the spare sets that Aaron had outgrown.
Misty happily dressed as a princess, Brock put on a scholar's outfit, and Silver...with some consideration...put on a ninja costume as a joke. It even came with a few items of shinobi gear, though the weapons were deliberately left out for obvious reasons.
Pikachu and Totodile got some pom poms to wave around and cheer on Riley with. They were dark blue, which matched Riley's usual color preference and his aura color.
Riley, when he saw Ash at the tournament, grinned.
Ash had no hesitation in hugging his older cousin.
"I should have guessed you'd come visit once you were old enough to travel solo," said Riley. He eyed Silver for a moment. "You must be Silver."
Silver tensed slightly.
"You look so much like your mother," said Riley. "You have your father's eyes, but your face and stature is all her."
Ash had clued Riley in to the fact Silver wasn't exactly 'close' with his father. He hinted that Giovanni had become a bit too closed off after his wife's death and had kept his son at a distance, causing their relationship to be strained.
Ash was cheering for his cousin, and Silver was right there with him.
To no one's surprise, Riley won the tournament.
Ash was just glad he wasn't stuck on the sidelines this time. That had been incredibly boring and he had to be on his best behavior until the end.
Riley waited until a lull to approach the queen regarding something he had noticed about the staff. Specifically it had the aura of a living being contained inside.
Riley attempted to release the being inside, but his aura was incompatible and it refused to come out. Since Ash was slightly stronger and more adept at the art, he handed it to him.
Ash knew he was likely going to regret this. But it was ridiculous to keep Lucario stuck in there for too long. He had been trapped inside the crystal for centuries now.
Lucario became pissed the second he sensed what he thought was Sir Aaron's aura again. Ash, being aware of what was inside and the likely state Lucario would be in and why, immediately dropped the staff the second Lucario started to come out and went into a guard position in front of Silver who was the physically weakest of the group.
As he guessed, Lucario was mad as hell and went into attack mode the second he detected what he assumed was Sir Aaron. Though there was some brief confusion over why his cultivation level had dropped significantly, he assumed that Aaron had been badly injured by his treachery.
It was only when Riley slammed into Lucario, thus giving the Pokémon a good whiff of his scent, that he attempted to hear reason.
Ash might have gotten an almost identical aura to his ancient ancestor, but Riley had inherited the bulk of Sir Aaron's genetic profile...including his scent. There was enough slight variations to throw Lucario off, but it was close enough to confuse him.
Ash's arm was broken pretty good and he had busted three ribs shielding his cousin from any accidental aura attacks. Riley hadn't been idle either, as he had several bruised ribs and a nasty concussion.
They would need at least a day to recover from their injuries. Another perk of cultivation, though Ash would have to funnel most of the energy from the special potions he was given to his Pokémon. His body wouldn't be able to handle cultivating for at least another month, and that was if he devoted most of his time into training his stamina.
Silver, to prevent that from happening to him, would often join his training exercises on top of learning the limited martial arts Ash knew.
Lucario was understandably upset about the whole mess. And who could really blame him, he had been trapped in that crystal for a thousand years after Aaron had trapped him.
Fortunately, Ash had an idea of how to explain the truth to Lucario and let him come to terms with their new reality at the same time.
"Why don't we go to the Tree of Beginning? I remember reading somewhere that Mew sometimes appears in the castle and borrows stuff all the time. Maybe it picked up something to explain what really happened," said Ash.
Brock only vaguely remembered the incident with Cameron castle...he did remember that they had to avoid another near disaster with multiple legendaries though. And something to do with aura.
To be fair, Ash got into these messes at least every three months. At some point it was bound to blur into memory unless certain events triggered a specific set of details to make things easier.
He also vaguely remembered that Ash had mentioned something about Lucario seeing his former Master in the Tree, which was why Ash was likely bringing it up in the first place.
Riley and Lucario, eager for proper answers, agreed to the idea of visiting the tree. Misty, however, was not as pleased.
"How long is this going to take?" she demanded of Ash.
"At least a few days, to be certain," said Riley.
"Ash, you only said this trip was going to take a week. And I get the feeling you already knew about Lucario being in that staff," she said with a glare.
Ash wondered if it was weird he missed the old Misty. This one was still very much a brat and it was getting rather irritating. While she was still a loyal friend, he could do without the selfish behavior and snide attitude that had an annoying habit of cropping up.
Brock, though he didn't bring it up, would have silently agreed with the assessment if Ash had ever dared to bring it up.
"So Ash...have you been keeping up with your homework?" asked Riley. They had all piled into his jeep, with Ash sitting next to him.
"I've been trying," said Ash.
"Wait...is that why you brought that laptop with you and spend several hours on it whenever we're at the Pokémon center?" asked Silver.
That had surprised Brock and Misty, because Ash wasn't very studious before.
Riley looked pleased enough when he saw the scores on the site Ash was using to keep up with his studies, once they paused long enough to stretch their legs.
"It could be better, but considering you're on the road a lot it's acceptable," said Riley.
Once they reached the Tree of Beginning, Ash paid a bit more attention to the surroundings since they weren't trying to retrieve Pikachu from Mew who was just bored.
Mew appeared before them as they entered the Tree, looking curious.
Ash smiled at the eternal kitten.
"How strange! Humans don't normally visit me anymore," said Mew. It moved around, excitedly.
"Part of that is because the tree is considered 'protected', so people aren't normally allowed to come visit," said Ash gently. "But the queen said she doesn't mind if you visit the castle to play."
Which was true, Ilene was rather fond of the mischievous Mew.
Mew looked a little sad about that.
"Mew, we were told Sir Aaron came here a very long time ago," said Riley. "His partner Lucario would like to know what happened to him. We were wondering if you picked something up during your many visits to the castle."
"You want to see Aaron?" said Mew, blinking in surprise.
Ash had the sudden epiphany that events were not going to happen like they did last time. He really should have expected this, because plot twists like this were extremely common in cultivator novels.
They followed Mew, being careful not to disturb things too much. Lucario was tense the entire time, mostly at the perceived "betrayal" of Sir Aaron.
"Wait, why did you ask if we wanted to see Aaron?" asked Silver, catching on to that particular bit of wording. He had been mulling it over when after that particular question.
Mew didn't pause much, but it did reply "He's been sleeping since the last time he came to visit."
Ash wanted to groan, as he mentally filtered that phrase into "he's been trapped in the crystal just as long as Lucario".
If this world really had been turned into a cultivator novel, odds were Sir Aaron had been badly injured and his cultivation damaged when he healed the tree with his aura. And in order to protect himself, had likely gone into a sort of healing coma but hadn't figured out how to get out of it.
Considering immortality was very much a thing in novels like that, Ash wouldn't be surprised if he looked exactly like he had that day, and was at a high enough cultivation level that he was pretty much immortal (or close to it) now.
Sure enough, when they reached the center of the tree, they found Sir Aaron's body trapped within. Lucario was angry, and understandably so.
Ash, mostly on a hunch, went to a nearby time flower and injected a bit of aura into it to replay the last memory it had stored.
Lucario's anger turned to shock, mostly realizing that Aaron had abandoned him to avoid Lucario sacrificing himself as well to save the kingdom.
"This is troubling," said Riley. "I can't in good conscious leave our ancestor trapped in there."
"I bet Sir Aaron just hasn't figured out how to get out," said Ash. He walked up to it. Following his instincts, he carefully channeled his aura into his palm.
Sir Aaron's hand was mostly free from the rest of his body, having been encased in crystal. To the surprise of everyone, Ash's hand practically melted through the crystal. In fact it seemed like his aura was causing the crystal to melt like ice before flame.
Pure instinct caused him to suddenly jump back quickly, and Riley was quick to get everyone to do the same, particularly Lucario.
It was a good thing to. The second Ash's aura made physical contact with Sir Aaron's hand, there was a massive outpouring of aura and power. So much so that the tree quite literally lit up with it.
Ash covered his cousin while Riley protected Brock and Misty from the worst of it. Lucario stood there stunned while the aura began to finally stabilize and the crystal melted away completely, revealing a very much alive Sir Aaron.
His breathing was ragged, and he didn't look very well. Once the worst of it was over, Riley checked his pulse.
"He's alive...I think the toll of cultivating for so long without pause must have knocked him out. We need to get him expert help immediately," said Riley.
Sir Aaron's final cultivation level, before he disappeared and was presumed dead, was at the Immortal Vulnerable level.
However there was no mistaking the fact that he was now at the Immortal Emperor, if not the God level of cultivation.
The problem was that his body wasn't at the same level and was having trouble handling it. Hence why it had shut down and put him into a coma for the moment.
Mew was kind enough to teleport the group (including Riley's jeep) back to the palace grounds.
Lucario refused to leave Sir Aaron's side the entire time.
Some time later...
Ash and Silver sat up, when Riley came back from the private room.
"Well?"
"He'll survive, but it's going to take a while to get him acclimated to modern life. And he will have to re-train his old pathways because the level he's at now is too high for his body to properly handle at full power. Fortunately Lucario's own stores are a bit too low, so he's been siphoning off the worst of the excess to keep Aaron alive," said Riley.
"That's great!" said Ash.
"Ash, what is the next gym you plan to challenge?" asked Riley.
"I promised Misty a match, so we're heading to Cerulean next," said Ash.
He also planned to find Charmander and hopefully rescue him before his asshole trainer abandoned him twice. He had been reading up on laws and there was a rule that allowed cultivators to challenge each other and bet their Pokémon.
If Ash could defeat Damien and prove he was more compatible with Charmander than the idiot was, he could legally remove the starter from him without any chance of Damien taking him back. At least not without doing some major training for it.
Riley smiled.
"Let me know when you're close to Celadon, okay? I'll be sure to have a good present for you and Silver waiting."
"You got it!" said Ash enthusiastically.
"And you had better keep your grade levels up! No one is going to take an Aura Knight seriously if he can't answer basic arithmetic questions correctly!" said Riley.
Ash winced at that.
"I forgot to pack my calculator and I have trouble keeping the numbers straight."
"You'll get it eventually," said Riley. "Oh and your mother expects regular pictures of you and Silver. She wants to put them in a proper photo album since she has almost none of him."
"I can do that," said Ash. He would also make a note to ask if his mother could forward the doubles to Giovanni. He had the feeling that the man did care for his son, but he had pushed Silver away both to protect him and because his jobs were not something a child should be involved in.
He had seen it plenty of times before, around Riley in the other world to recognize the signs.