Welcome back, everyone. Yuu here, Did you wait long, huh? Missed me? Aww~ how cute of you guys. Eh! you didn't. Wh-whatever, like I care. Anyway, now we are officially going to begin our third arc of the story. And like I told you, this arc won't contain any love story, probably. Now that this arc has started from someone else pov but it is only for this chapter, Ash will be back from the next one. Also, I hate to mention it but my uploading rate will probably be even much slower than before cuz I don't know how but it feels like I keep getting busy like 24 hours a day. I haven't even got time to watch anime, u-uuu~ my soul is crying.

Well, that's depressing.

Anyway, I would like to thank Mr. Darklord or miss... I guess, Mister, otherwise it would be Darklady, no? Ahem* anyway, I am STILL a dragon. Hmm~mm~ What I want to say is, thanks for the suggestion. I still don't know what I would do about Zoey but I really thought it was amazing to consider bringing Acerola as a member of the harem. Honestly, I really liked it. It feels criminally wrong. Wait, she is not underage, right? Well, I think she is not but it still doesn't matter if she is. Ah... Anyway, really thank you. That was best.

With that said, let's begin our third installment of the story. I hope you all enjoy it. Inner thought, I actually don't care. Bleh...

Also, I won't be doing any answering till the end of the story arc like usual since I don't like to say unnecessary things during chapter time, so I hope you guys wouldn't mind. Just know that I really appreciate a little help too.

"That was close!"

Breathing in relief, I looked around my surrounding. Ugh! Seriously, any second late, and I would be deep under the sea right now. If not for our boss destroying the barrier along with all the walls, and why not, just to kill that damn monster, we wouldn't be in the position of drowning in the first place. I looked in front of me, where my boss was kneeling all on his four, while blood was flowing out of his right eye.

He suddenly started to rain punches on the ground, looking frustrating and cursing all the rouge words there are in this world. Looking at the state the head scientist was, it was pitiful. Though all the attack the boss received was just a right eye getting destroyed, he made it look like he just lost the reason to live. Anyway, if looking at that point of view, in what kind of position do I fall into?

I wonder... where did I make a mistake in my life?

No, I wasn't talking about bailing the monster out. Well, that's one and I am risking my family here. I could just hope that the monster wouldn't go for my family again. I don't know what happened previously but I sure hope that my family would remain safe. After all, I don't even know where am I right now. I just passed through the portal someone opened when running away from the flooded underwater building.

Is it wrong to wish for a good happy and healthy life? Maybe my life was more fulfilled when living with professor Oak, doing nothing but sketching all day. And occasionally learning about pokemons and having fun with my friends. There was Brock, Misty, May, and Max. Oh! and someone who connected all of them, Ash. It was a blissful movement.

Ouch! My head hurts. I grabbed my head, uncertain what to make of such a thought. Why did the image of the monster come to my mind when thinking about Ash? Maybe I am still too scared to face the monster and its consequences. Is it a way of telling me that I don't deserve happiness? Just what am I supposed to do? Cry or maybe laugh... Seriously, all I wanted was a friend and someone by my side. Why did all of this have to happen?

There is a saying, A flower buds the same as its fruit. Do evil and evil will happen to you. Life isn't stable, the path you choose may not always be right. And what about my path? Was it right? No way it could be when the last thing I did was fight with Professor Oak. Maybe if I had listened to him that time, just maybe... then my life would have turned beautiful rather than being cooped on to make some artificial lifeform. The world shows no hope for a person who tarries away from it. But I disagree. It would be like this, May the world show hope, foolish forsakes it.

Here, the foolish would be me. Never would I have done what I did, I wouldn't have fallen into this statement. I don't think even God will forgive someone like me, maybe this is all the result of my karma. And just as I was about to turn my life for the better after I met her, my foolishness once again took that happiness away from me. As I am sitting here, I don't know what is that monster doing to my family. I feel suffocating.

Maybe I would have some time to talk about my nonclinical past, if not for my suffocating feeling to intensify. Is the monster coming here? No, that cannot be right. But the presence was the same as that monster, an entity completely beyond my reason. Even the old man who was bashing the ground stood still when the portal suddenly opened in front of him. It was the same as what we used to run away from the catastrophe before us. Though, the portal opened like the mouth of some gigantic monster.

Like a king descended from their throne, two figures emerged from the mouth. One was a tall man with completely white hair in the middle with a long braid while shaved to both sides. I couldn't tell the feature because of the plain mask he was wearing but he had an amazing built for the body as he wasn't wearing any upper clothes while using frail clothes for the trouser. He was perfect as the bodyguard for the shorter one beside him.

Or that's what onlooker would feel. In fact, I would be feeling the same if not seeing such a scene from my very own eyes. The shorter one appears more mysterious than anyone here, along with his demon-like mask. I couldn't even tell if he was a girl or a boy by his slender body. Though he sounded more boy-like. And the old man looked more frightening when looking at the shorter one than the taller one.

"Yaa-hoo~ My dear scientist, Blaine." He sounded more playful than he appears and not to mention that he knows the identity of the head scientist. "Oh! Now you look at that, you appear as messed up as usual." I think the 'messed-up' part here refers to his countermeasure to the failure of the project than anything. Or, maybe he was referring to how usual the head scientist does his experiment. But I do agree with how his appearance was.

Even with taunting from the shorter boy, the head scientist dropped his head looking at the ground. Sighing, the boy talked to the head, "So you failed huh..." I couldn't see what kind of expression was behind the mask but even I am feeling the chill when such words weren't directed to me. "Since the experiment failed, tell me this, how did the prototype version of SKIN come out?"

Even to that answer, he still kept his head down. Even to the point, I couldn't tell if he was feeling frustrating or scared. Oh, and the above-mentioned 'prototype SKIN', the demon masked mentioned was obvious the one that head fired to that monster. And I hate to say this, but that was also a failure. Now to point it out, a normal SKIN should be capable of holding up to 6-8 elements, but that would put a serious problem to a person's body. This prototype was built from all the data so that it could handle all the elements and without actually putting pressure on the person's body.

But as seen from the previous battle, it was blasted apart once fired. Though it generated amazing power, what's the use of one time only. Not to mention, it didn't manage to kill its target. Well, not that that kind of target could be considered as a practice target. That was the initialization of the horror itself. Anyway, that's the brief information about the so-called amazing 'Advance SKIN.'

Also, it's kind of a pitiful situation, the boss I always thought of as a tiger was actually turned to be a scared puppy hiding his tail in front of the short demon-masked kid. I actually can't believe that he was someone I asked for help with when I was threatened by that monster. Ugh... If I had known all about this beforehand, then I wouldn't have- Sigh* no point talking about spilled milk.

At least, a meter away from the boss, the demon-masked crotched down, pulling his hand in front, "I believe it is a bad manner to not reply when the person in front of you talking. Or do you have glue inside your mouth, preventing you from speaking?" Of course, neither I nor my boss were speaking back to him. I am safe since it wasn't directed to me while the head kept looking down the floor. In all the minute, he hadn't looked up from his position. Then the masked boy gestured to the taller one, "Well, in that case, my boy can help you to peel it off."

Just as the tall guy moved a step, the head scientist for the first time looked up ahead. "Stop, alright. I will tell you. It ran away, okay. I wasn't able to stop it. It somehow came to life and just ran away. Even the prototype got destroyed with one fire." And thus, the head scientist reinitiated all the story that happened, from how it came to life to how it threatened me to how it ran away. He described it so profoundly that may seem like he was those spoiled kids who usually spoil all the story before the story even begins.

The masked demon took an annoyed sigh like he had things not go his way. Well, I guess I can understand. "Guess, I had it coming when I assigned you. But since I knew it would go somehow like this, I will consider it as my own failure and let you live. Hmm~ your tattoo looks incomplete." Saying that the demon snapped his finger and suddenly, there was a straight line cut in the middle of the 'Z' mark that the monster gave the head as a parting gift.

"With that said, I have to-" Before the demon masked could complete his sentence, the head moved still in his four and begged to the child, "Please wait, wait... I... Give me one last chance. This time, I will not fail. One last chance." The boss actually grabbed the leg of the child while begging for mercy. I don't know but I have a feeling that the demon-masked kid was smiling proudly inside the mask.

"Heh~ That's a good doggy but don't touch me with your filth," As those words escaped the kid's mouth, the boss suddenly backed away, returning to his original position. "Fine then, I shall give you one last chance Blaine, but I hope you know what will happen if you were to bring a defeat to me, right?" At the tilting demon, the boss nodded his head like a chicken picking a grain. And like I said before, just who was this kid, to even know the identity of the boss. Such r=profound mysterious. Well, looking at how the boss was acting, it wouldn't be weird to see the picture.

"I'll not fail. I will do it. I swear."

"Okay then," The kid pulled his finger to show one, "I want you to bring me an item-"

And the next words that left his mouth were...

"Phantom's Identification."

Hearing those two words, Blaine made a face of shock, or more precisely, the face like he just heard something unbelievable. As for me, I was more confused than anything. Because I don't even know what that 'Phantom's Identification' is. Is there a treading of thieves in this world? Well, it sure sounded like that to me.

"But that's impossible. That's-"

The demon masked raised his finger to make a shh~ sound to shut the head. "Don't worry. Ever since the last parade five years ago, the item has left its place. So, I hope you will find it for me, don't you, my dear Blaine."

With all smiles, before Blaine even had a chance to say anything, the masked demon kid with the tall guy wearing a plain mask disappeared back to the monster's mouth like a portal. Just as the kid and the tall man disappeared, Blaine once again started cursing everyone. And by everyone, it was both the monster from before and the kid with the demon mask. I looked up and gasp. Kinda happy actually, looks like I am not the only one filled with misfortune. And the inner network of these people was more complicated than I thought.