The stairs to the ruins seemed to descend forever. The heat from above had faded as the air around us began to freeze, to the point our own breath became a visible fog.

"I-I think I preferred it when it w-was warm." Oshawott complained. Nidoran and I nodded in agreement. Further and further, we descended to impossible depths. After what was certainly several minutes of stairs, we suddenly found ourselves in the middle of a room, the stairs behind us disappearing entirely.

Abandoned Ruins F1

"I don't think I'll ever get used to that." I admitted. The walls and floor were lit by the same bright magical neon lights. The floors were a blue stone, cracked but still together against the test of time. The walls were a blue cobblestone texture. Large cracks would strike through from ceiling to floor at odd angles. It looked far more precarious and dangerous than anything I could describe. Saying the dungeon looked like it could collapse on us at any moment would have been an understatement. Whatever power caused the mystery dungeon was barely keeping the place from disappearing and bringing everything down with it. The corridors out of the rooms only had lights on the walls, or at least the floor lights weren't active. To the north, a rocky passage was partly blocked by a sizable corner of the wall that collapsed. Eastward was a tunnel where the magic neon light was flickering, giving the appearance of something from a horror movie.

"Rocks to the skull or death by fear. Great choice, coming here was." I mumbled.

"I- Yeah. We should continue. The faster we get out of here the safer we'll all be." Riolu said. The others muttered in agreement. At that statement, I thought something. Do they die because of this dungeon? Did I just open the way to their inevitable death? Lost in thought, I stood standing.

"Oh? Hey, hello?" Oshawott wondered, waving his hand in front of my face.

"Oh, huh? Oh. Oh, uh, uh, right. Sorry." I said, weakly shaking my head.

"Were you thinking about something?" Riolu wondered.

"Well, you know I have to keep you safe, but I was just thinking how dangerous this place is. What if I led you to your deaths without realizing it?" I stated. The four of them jerked back in realization.

"That never even occurred to me. Well, all the more reason to get out fast then, right?" Riolu responded.
"Y-yeah." I responded. We took the eastwardly path. The lights on the walls were flickering on and off in a chaotic fashion. Each breath was painfully cold as if we were breathing icicles. With how cold it was, I wouldn't have been too surprised if our breaths were turning into small ice shards. Each step we took was thought out, not only because of the looming fear something would pop out at us, but because we all feared the floor may give out under us at any moment. Turning a corner, we soon entered another room. A set of stairs heading down was on the left. We pressed on.

F2

The room was a single room, somehow even worse looking than the previous floor. While the floor above had large cracks in the walls, it was clear the walls here were mostly collapsed and missing, the light grey walls behind them not looking any better. The path to the north was completely caved in, and the path south was barely traversable. Cautiously climbing over the wall of rubble, we made our way down a completely unlit hallway. It wasn't just dark, however. Any light we made was faded, being eaten away by the absolute darkness. Cyndaquil was able to provide a small light source for a while, but nothing was visible past a few feet.

Riolu was able to read the aura of the surroundings, so he was able to guide us more effectively, but it wasn't perfect. He could only get a vague sense of the nearby surroundings, so if we entered a room he would be almost as blind as the rest of us. Even with the two of them working together, it eventually it grew too dark to see anything but the fire. The darkness was eating away at the light, and soon even the fire became dim and vanished to the shadow. Wandering forward in the dark for a few seconds, I walked straight into a wall.

"Agh." I quietly complained, rubbing my face.

"What? Something wrong?" Riolu asked, walking over to me.

"Wall." I responded bluntly.

"Gotta watch out for that. Remember, use your eyes and not your face." The Riolu joked. I gave him what was apparently a multiverse spanning gesture of disapproval which I wouldn't have done if the others could have seen. Riolu laughed loudly. A bit of dust and rubble fell down on us which quickly shut him up.

"This way." He said, suddenly much more serious. We turned to the left and into a large room which we couldn't see. Riolu was leading us around the room, trying in vain to find the stairs. Eventually I let go of him and took a step to the left, trying to find the wall. I was rewarded by falling face first into the stairs.

"Found them. Ow." I responded, rubbing my forehead.

"Alright, let's go." Riolu stated, undaunted.

F3

Nothing was visible. We were in a large empty void. Perhaps this was a blessing, as I can't imagine what the dungeon itself looked like. We'd probably have left right then and their if we could. It wouldn't have been difficult to distinguish escape orbs from the others, as we learned to mark them with a tiny bit of sap we let dry. It makes and odd, rough texture so their easy to find in a pinch. Just as we were about to leave, however, something in my mind told me to keep going. No, the small, voiceless idea seemingly begged me to move forward.

Through the miracle of divine power, I was being lead onward. With confidence in the being, I grabbed the others hands and called out for them to follow me. I began forcefully leading everyone in spite of complaints from the others. Through a corridor on some side, turning an invisible corner, I continued. Through this divine intervention we were able to find the way to the final set of stairs. I hadn't even realized that we didn't even see any Pokémon on our journey. It wasn't surprising, even wild Pokémon wouldn't willingly live in a place like that. I was just grateful we were finally free from this place.

Abandoned Ruins Depths

The rocky grey room was bright and lit well from an unknown source. On further inspection, there were no actual light sources, thus the room's brightness should have been impossible, however the others didn't seem to notice or care. Honestly, I didn't care either, I was just glad to be out of the absolute darkness.

"I guess that was lucky." Riolu responded. I rubbed the back of my head. I wasn't going to bother explaining how a god helped me through it. We looked around the room, seeing a small book on a carved stone slab. The slab had no designed, and was cracking in several areas. Riolu walked over and grabbed the book, inspecting it for a moment before putting it in his bag.

"You've made it." A familiar voice stated. The others were shocked, looking around the otherwise empty room. The voice was calm, but something felt wrong.

"Who-who's there?" Oshawott asked. The four of them gathered towards me.

"I am the entity which guided you here. Which guided him here." The voice responded. I grabbed my bag and began shuffling through the contents.

"I don't understand. Wait, you're the one who told him to keep me alive right?" Riolu wondered.

"Hahahah, yes. That is what I said. However, the entire truth is I needed him to guide you here so you would die." The voice responded, it's voice echoing throughout the chamber.

"Wh-what? Why!" Riolu shouted, taking a small step backwards.

"Simply, I wish for the world's destruction, and I needed him to guide you here. That way I can easily cause your death. Unfortunately I messed up in this transfer, I had to rush it as powers above my own nearly found me out. Thus his body was crippled upon the transformation. It was like cutting someone apart using teleportation, I'm sure he understands what that means even if you don't." It responded. They looked at me. I nodded. I could feel a lump in my throat forming.

"Wait, transformation? But, these memories I found- Oh. They're fake, aren't they. Well, this certainly explains a lot." I sighed. The others were visibly shaking. I took a few deep breaths. I was scared, but I wasn't going to let them see that.

"Always more perceptive than the others, or at least less stupid. You'll never go home again. Even if by some miracle you survive, you will forever remain trapped in this world. I needed to keep you alive before, but now I don't need you." The voice responded. The room began shaking. Boulders of various sizes collapsed around us. Two large boulders fell and hit Riolu and Nidoran, pinning their bodies. I grasped the Escape Orb and crushed it in my hands. A sudden bright light enveloped us and the world blurred for a moment. We were standing outside of the ruins. The sky had turned dark grey, and the winds had picked up even more. Lightning flickered above us, seemingly eager to consume us in divine fury. We messed up, the three of us knew it.

"Hmm, you thought I wouldn't be prepared for this? Even if you escaped somehow, I made sure you would be convinced to come here today. The storm will be your undoing, even if I am not." The voice responded. It let out a sinister laugh before quieting.

"We have to go." I responded. The others nodded. We weren't in range for our badges to send us home. Grabbing their bag, Oshawott and Cyndaquil picked the other two up as we all rushed forward. A strange feeling washed over me, as if I had seen this before. The winds picked up, the trees began to bend. The storm became worse and worse, until a swirling vortex of death and debris formed near us. We weren't going to make it. The villain posing as a god had succeeded in changing fate, in causing the end of the world. Being picked up by the storm and slammed onto my back, the world went dark.

It was yet another boring day at school, the same exact thing I had experienced every day for the past, I don't know, six months? A year? I honestly lost track of how long the school year was lasting. Regardless, it was just another boring, monotonous day. The dying cow fart of a bell rung, and we all lurched out, tired and exhausted. I walked home, something I did almost every day in the boring old town I had to call home. Eventually I got to my house, got something to eat, and fell asleep with a bowl on my stomach. Everything went exactly as expected from there. The voice, meeting my friends, everything was the same. Everything was in a loop.

The loop kept going and going. There wasn't going to be an end. I was doomed to repeat these six months over and over. I wasn't ever fully aware of this, though sometimes small moments of recollection occurred. These were always too little, too late. The unknown and unwilling routine continued on for eons it seemed. However, in spite of the same events occurring, each loop was always somewhat different even though it ended the same way.

"You seem to be the sassy kind of personality. You run your mouth a lot, and you don't seem to mind. Sometimes you hurt others by being so unapologetically you. You are certainly honest, but remember that is not always a good thing. A sassy person like you would be a... Treecko!"

It continued on...

A nurse returned to my room, checking my pulse and vitals, asking a few questions.

"You know, it's lucky you're as healthy as you are." The fluffy pink creature stated. It was a Clefairy.

"I walk a lot." I responded. It wasn't a lie. I walked home from school nearly every day. The nurse quietly laughed and began walking away. Tests continued for the next few weeks. At some point, I was considered healthy enough to leave. With a missing tail and nowhere to go, I sat down by a tree.

...and on...

Oshawott looked at me with sad puppy eyes. It was like looking at a dog in a silly costume begging to be let out of it. I felt bad, but also found it extremely cute.

...and onwards ever more...

I knew moves, but I didn't know how to use them: Slam, Quick Attack, Agility, and Giga Drain. I was apparently level forty-six, and had quite a few IQ skills which meant absolutely nothing to me. Whoever had this body was clearly quite powerful, so whatever killed him was probably extremely dangerous.

...Until it reached it's inevitable conclusion...

"No... No! I can't stop here! N-No! Waaaah!"

Time after time, we lost and returned with no memory of the past as if by some divine prank. Things remained the same for an unknown time.

"Hmm, you thought I wouldn't be prepared for this? Do you know why you are here? I made sure to convince you to explore today. This storm is my final farewell gift, a thank you for being such a good puppet. This storm will be your undoing, even if I am not." The voice responded, laughing maniacally. Oshawott grabbed their bag, and I grabbed the Nidoran. While being cautious about touching the poison barbs, we ran. The storm quickly approached, getting worse and worse. We knew we had failed.

Ultimately how long we remained in the loop was irrelevant. It would have been a living hell if we remembered any of it.

"Ah!"

"No!"

"Augh..."

It all remained the same, it seemed. For dozens of millions of loops, it remained the same. Things varied only slightly for billions of loops. However, those slight variations eventually changed one thing. One memory near the end which changed the outcome forever.

Nidoran and Oshawott followed behind as Riolu and Cyndaquil lit the path. The dungeon was empty, devoid of all life aside from us. The rooms had even less light than they had live. The darkness was eating light itself. It was terrifying seeing Cyndaquil's fire slowly dim until it disappeared completely. Through a stroke of luck, we managed to reach the next floor, even darker than the previous. I felt certain this darkness would begin to eat away at our souls. I began reaching through our bag when a feeling popped into my head. This feeling guided me to the stairs. The final room was a dull, light gray stone square room. A book was resting on a stone tablet on the far end. Riolu walked over to it, inspecting it, and placed it in his bag.

"Ok, then. Let's get out of-" I began, but a voice interrupted me.

"Welcome, the four of you." The feminine voice responded. An ominous feeling washed over me. I slowly reached into my bag.

"You're all finally here. Now you will finally die!" It shouted, clearly ecstatic about our inevitable deaths.

"Wh-what? But, I thought we were required to save the world!" Riolu shouted.

"Yes, and for that you must die. I posed as a benevolent god so I could-" The voice began.

A feeling washed over me. A feeling of anger and familiarity. It felt like I should escape, to not listen to the false god monolog. I don't know where this feeling came from, but I knew I had to listen to it. I gripped an escape orb, hand shaking in the bag before taking a deep breath.

"But, why!" Riolu shouted.

"Because I wish to see the world destroyed." It responded. With an odd resolve, I shattered the orb. A bright light shone, exiting us from the dungeon. The skies above were a deep gray. It was extremely dark, with the only light leading us forward being an occasional flash of lightning. "Oh? I didn't even get to finish my-" It started to speak in our heads, but I spoke up.

"Run!" I shouted, bolting. My friends were left standing there, surprised by my sudden action

"Huh, wha- Uh, okay?" Riolu stated, looking at Oshawott. Oshawott shrugged his shoulders, clearly just as stumped as the others at my running. They followed soon after. With some of the power of nature at my command, an Agility boosted the four of us. The wind-bent trees became a blur of green and brown as we rushed past. Lightning struck around us, loud explosions surrounded us. Rubble rained down where we had been standing just before.

"Too close!" Riolu shouted.

"Less joking, more running!" Nidoran shouted. So we ran and ran, to the river we had crossed earlier. The range for teleportation with our badge was just past there. The rain had caused the river to rise rapidly. We had to take this chance, however. Cyndaquil hopped on Oshawott's back. The five of us grabbed an appendage of the other, creating a strange living raft we hoped would be buoyant enough. Swimming across while utilizing the current to our advantage, we slowly made our way through. With enough luck on our side, we had successfully made it across the swift moving river. Safety was less than a few hundred feet away. We took a second to catch our breaths, finally feeling freed.

"No. No!" The voice rang through our minds.

"I will not let you stop this! I will destroy everything!" It shouted. A ring appeared in front of us as an unusual creature popped out of it. It was a small purple creature with rings on it's arms. I thought it was kind of adorable.

"Wha- who are you?" Oshawott wondered.

"I am known as Hoopa. I make portals and like to cause mischief. However, somehow you managed to escape in spite of everything. You are far stronger than I thought you were. Regardless, I'll stop you here." Hoopa stated.

"W-wait! If you destroy this world, won't you be destroyed as well?" Oshawott asked.

"I can make portals to other worlds, it's how I got him here," Hoopa explained, pointing one of her stubby fingers towards me, "so it doesn't matter what happens to this world."

"That's psychotic!" Nidoran shouted.

"Hah! Maybe it is, but I don't care! All I care about is that you've stopped my fun. Now you all will perish." Hoopa screeched. She held her arms out horizontal to the ground. The hoops on her arms suddenly grew to a massive size, flinging away before returning and hiding her diminutive form as they covered her completely. They turned horizontal to the ground. The rings began to lift higher and higher, growing in size each second. For a moment, nothing seemed to happen, then a small bottle popped out of the bottom ring. A large hand clawed its way out of the top ring, followed by another. Seemingly stretching the rings themselves, a gargantuan monstrosity appeared. The monster was around thirty feet tall, appearing almost like a genie. It's wet purple skin shone in the lightning. The spark of light revealed a malicious grin.

"I am Unbound!" Unbound roared to the sky, stretching it's arms wide.

"That a name or a title?" I joked. The others glared at me.

"It's a word which means your death!" It responded. It swung a massive fist towards us. The four of us nimbly dodged. I jumped on their arm, running up it before slamming my entire body into their eye. A shining blue light blocked me before I could connect.

"You think you can harm-What! What was-?" It questioned, looking down to see several attacks connect into their legs. It lifted it's leg up, unharmed but clearly annoyed.

"You little pests!" It shouted, reaching for the four of them. After sliding down it's arm slightly, I jumped back up ran across their shoulder as fast as I was able. I slammed into the side of their head with my tail.

"Grah!" It shouted, beginning to stumble. With another few attacks at their legs and another hard smack to the head, the genie was toppled as I jumped to safety. Acting quickly, we rushed towards the safety of the forest. Then we heard it shout.

"Enough!" It screeched, voice echoing in spite of the howling winds. We turned towards it, the tornado inching closer every second. A portal appeared above us and unleashed a purple tidal wave of psychic energy. Nidoran pushed Riolu away, but he still took a sizable hit. The five of us collapsed. The golden light of a reviver seed shown over my body, indicated to Hoopa that I was revived. I stood back up. My friends were too badly hurt for the reviver seed to help them. I knew we had to escape. I grabbed two of their limbs in each hand and very slowly dragged them away, uncaring about being poisoned. The genie advanced just as slowly.

"Good thing you made me pretty powerful, huh? I wouldn't have survived your attack otherwise." I stated.

"I didn't make you powerful. I know not of where this strength of yours originates from." It responded. I stopped. Somehow I knew it was telling the truth. I shook my head violently and continued dragging them.

"I will enjoy slaughtering you." It stated, a malicious grin plastered on their face.

"Not if I have anything to say about it." I responded.

"Do you really think you are powerful enough to defeat me?" It questioned. The howling winds of death seemed to be forgotten by the mad djinn.

"No, but it can." I stated, dropping my friends and grabbing my badge. In a split second we were teleporting home. One by one my friends disappeared. Hoopa had a shocked expression, followed by one of anger. Just before I left, it lifted it's arm for an attack. As sudden as this storm, Hoopa Unbound was hit by a tree from behind and knocked to the ground. Flipping onto their back, it finally noticed the tornado behind it.

As the magical yellow light consumed me, the last thing I heard was Hoopa shout was "No!"

The enigmatic emergency system of the badge had initiated. In a second blast of light, we were sent right outside of the hospital. I grabbed Oshawott and began to pull him into the main hospital building. Several Pokémon were there, including several nurses and some of the patients. The nurses saw me dragging my friends and quickly rushed to help get them inside. Once they were, the doctors and nurses began to administer whatever treatment they could. Luckily they had several supplies on hand. Apparently they had brought them in case there was an emergency with one of the patients.

"You really shouldn't be out in this storm." The nurse stated.

"We were in a dungeon, and it wasn't storming then." I explained. The nurse sighed.

"Check the forecast before you travel then." Blissey stated, clearly angry but not able to yell as it would disturb the other patients.

"Yup, gonna do that from now on. Anyway, are they gonna be alright?" I asked. The dimly lit interior didn't diminish the bright smile of the nurse.

"Yes, they should. However, we will need to monitor them for a few days. Then after that they'll need more time to recover." She explained. I sighed, collapsing on the floor. Crawling over to my friends who had been placed on a mat neat a corner, I noticed the book hanging out of Riolu's bag. I took it. Walking over to a nearby sleeping Charmander, I used their tail as a light to read. It was a large book with a blank red cover. In spite of being found in an ancient ruin moments away from collapsing, the book itself was pristine. I was about to read, but clutched my head the moment I opened the cover. An unusual dizziness began, making the room seem to spin. Strange, and seemingly new memories flooded my mind. I remembered everything. The dizziness stopped just as quickly as it began.

"What. Hrmm." I mumbled. I shook my head, somewhat confused by these new experiences. I hoped the book would have more answers. The book, seemingly large and full of info, was actually mostly blank. Only a single page had anything written on it.

"If you are reading this, then it means you have survived. I feel I must explain a few things. You may have felt a weird dizziness as your memories returned. You should know by now, but you have been stuck in a time loop. We cannot intervene directly with this threat, but as you were there I had to put my trust in you. However, even upon seeing you perish, I decided to give you another shot, attempting to keep your memory intact so you would know what to do. However, something unexpected had occurred. By adjusting time to loop when you perished at those moments, your cumulative strength and experience remained. This was due to the unusual circumstances of your current existence. Hoopa had unknowingly allowed you to become far stronger than any normal Pokémon, however you no longer remembered the events of the past clearly. You could only vaguely recall what needed to be done, for the most part anyway. Your ability to recognize and react to a situation, to not panic when under extreme duress was also a cumulative experience that was retained. From level five to maxing several stats, you ended up becoming far more powerful than many Pokémon become in a lifetime. However, as you saw with Hoopa, even sheer power would not be enough for you to survive this storm. You had to remember the right things at the right time to truly escape. I had placed my bets on a one in a billion chance, one which I knew would eventually occur, but at what point even I was unsure. I know you wish to return home, however the dark machinations of Hoopa prevents this. The power Hoopa used cannot be undone. You will never be able to return. For that, I sincerely apologize and offer you several gifts.

You will keep your current levels and physical statistics. Very few ever reach your levels of strength, though you are still less powerful than most legendary Pokémon. You will also no longer be bound by the normal physical limits, allowing you to grow to rival even Me should you train enough. In other words, your stat cap has been completely removed. You will find your rank has been boosted to Silver, matching the other Rescue Teams in the area. Finally, you will find ten thousand extra Poké in your bank. Once again, I sincerely apologize for you being dragged into that mess. All I ask is you do not involve yourself too much with saving the world, leave this to the ones we have chosen, as it could result in the destruction of the planet. Perhaps someday we will task you with helping save everyone, especially if you continue to grow. John, congratulations. You may not be a chosen one, nor were you even meant to be here, but you have proven yourself to be a capable Rescuer and a true hero. Keep up the great work, Rescue Team Guardians." It read.

I felt a strange energy pulse though me. I looked at my hands, studying them closely. They didn't look different. That's when I realized the book had disappeared. Walking over to my friends, grumbling about the disappearing book, I quietly looked over them. I was completely exhausted.

"I'm glad they're alright." I said. Sitting against the wall near them, I closed my eyes and soon fell asleep. When I woke up, the sun was shining, and my friends were nowhere to be seen. I was lying in a hospital bed. The light was seeping through the reed ceiling, and my arm was bandaged and in a cast. I looked at it as it pulsed in pain.

"Ow, didn't know I was so hurt." I responded to no one. Wandering out of my room, a passing doctor noticed me and called a nurse. Ushered back into my room, a few quick tests were performed. I was given an okay to wander.

"Where are my friends?" I asked.

"Oshawott and Riolu are three rooms down. Cyndaquil is the room after, and Nidoran is currently under more heavy observation. He's going to be fine, but he took a bigger brunt of the blast, so is going to need more time to recover." The nurse Clefairy explained. I nodded. Walking over there, I noted they looked less severely injured. Even being far tougher than them I was still more injury prone. I quietly giggled at this. It doesn't seem funny to an outside viewer, or even myself when I think about it, but I was truly relieved that my friends were alright. My emotions were all mixed around and weren't making sense, but I did know I was very relieved. Wandering back to my room, I laid down and fell back asleep for a few hours. Eventually I was allowed to leave. In a two week span, I noticed that the mysterious deity had kept his promises. We had ten thousand more money in our bank, and our badges had become silver. I was doing a bit of exercise the doctors recommended, but mostly I was pushing my body a bit more to see if he had also kept his other promise. I couldn't say for sure, as I wasn't training as hard as I could with a broken arm. Nearing the end of the two week span my arm was in a cast, I walked to the hospital to visit Oshawott and Cyndaquil. It was decided they would share a room as they needed the space for other patients. Riolu had woken up by this point. Him not taking the full blast meant he was relatively uninjured, and was allowed to leave sooner than the rest of us. I noticed Riolu as I walked to the patients rooms, deciding to say hello. He was visiting his friend, Nidoran, who was sharing the room with a Nidorino who was apparently pretty badly burned. I nodded and we separated. Wandering into the hospital room, I stood next to their beds. The two of them were stirring awake.

"Hey." I said. They looked at me. Oshawott's head was bandaged, and his chest was wrapped in gauze. He had a few bad scrapes, but he had mostly recovered by then.

"Mmph." Cyndaquil responded, looking away. I frowned at this. Cyndaquil was pretty severely injured, even if he didn't seem that hurt. A special fiery organ on the inside of him ended up being punctured and filled with rain water. While he would recover, it'd be quite a while before he was able to use fire type attacks. It's apparently quite painful, especially since he got pneumonia from the rain. His lungs were full of phlegm, and his body was recently drained of rain, so he was fairly miserable. Cyndaquil sneezed and began coughing badly. It sounded like a cat was vomiting up a chainsaw underwater.

"Someone end me." He whispered. I smiled for some reason. I couldn't help it, I was glad they were alive.

"So, how are you doing?" Oshawott asked between the coughing noise.

"I'll have this removed soon." I stated, gesturing to my arm cast.

"Oh good. I hope we'll be out in a month or so. Doctors say Cyndaquil will be here for a while more, however." Oshawott responded.

"End me..." Cyndaquil responded, laying flat and covering his face.

"Hey, stay on your back, remember. Doctor's said you can't have fluids drain into your flame organ until you recover." Oshawott stated. Cyndaquil gave him the biggest glare he could with his eyes closed before shifting to his back. It didn't look very comfortable.

"It'd be more intimidating if you opened your eyes when glaring at someone." I spoke. He glared at me, eyes still closed. Oshawott and I laughed.

"I'm, I'm sorry?" I said with a big grin. My voice raised at the end, making it sound like I was asking a question.

"I'm glad to be alive, and I'm sure Cyndaquil will be to once he's recovered." Oshawott stated, failing to hold back all of his laughter.

"Once we all do, it'll be back to rescuing!" I responded.

"Yeah, hopefully we don't find ourselves in a mission like this last one. We didn't even find anything besides that book. What happened to it, anyway?" Oshawott wondered.

"Probably dropped into the river." I responded, looking to the side. I wasn't going to explain the book disappeared as it had a message for me in it. Not then, anyway. We chatted for a while before eventually we parted ways. My cast was removed that day as well. I walked just outside of town, to a small hill in the north that looked over the town. It was called Breezey Hill. Standing on the hill, I thought about all the thousands of millions of loops I had, every bit of knowledge I gained and forgot. I took a breath and felt the breeze on my face and the green grass swaying below me. The flowers were blooming, and the grass was more green than ever. Everyday was an adventure, and I had two amazing best friends who'd stick by my side no matter what. It was a paradise. This new life was everything I ever wanted in life, yet I couldn't clear my thoughts. One sentence rang out in my head over and over.

"You will never be able to return" I was never going home again. A twinge of guilt led to a buildup of sadness. A few tears began falling from my face.

"I'm never go-ing home again." I stated, voice cracking. Curling up into a ball, I cried. Even with a new life of adventure, I was going to miss everything. After crying for an unknown amount of time, I stood back up and began walking to my new, probably permanent home. I might have been sad, but knew I would always have my friends by my side, and always had a new adventure each day to look forward to. Walking into my home, the sun was setting as I crawled in my bed.

"Goodbye, everyone. I hope you're okay, and hope you know I am too. I'll survive, I promise. I'll be happy if you can be." I stated, trying to smile. I looked at the ceiling before closing my eyes.

Several weeks passed, and both Oshawott and Cyndaquil had finally recovered from their injuries. Riolu and Nidoran had mostly recovered as well. Nidoran wasn't going to explore any dungeons with his broken leg, but he was deemed healthy enough to travel home.

We waved each other goodbye and gave the usual "hope you meet you again someday" statements. As a team, we had been out of commission for a while, thus we were taking missions the day Cyndaquil was deemed fit to leave. Cyndaquil still had a cough, but if we didn't push him we knew he'd be alright. His fire had returned, so his cough wouldn't get any worse than it was. With two easy missions in hand, I looked at my friends who smiled in response. Oshawott with his Rambo Style Power Band, and Cyndaquil with his Zinc Band on his foreleg. I smiled back.

"On to the unknown." I thought, smiling. A pit of sadness welled up in me, but I pushed it down and ignored it. The breeze wafted the scent of Pecha Berries from my scarf. I took a heavy breath in, relaxing. Whatever happened next, I was glad to at least have my two best friends by my side.

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It's... finally over. I can't believe it's finished. I-I don't know what to say. It's been a long time coming, yet I still managed to finish it. I'm not really sure, what's next. I mean, I know what I want to do next, well kinda? Not really? Not sure. That's the answer, I', not sure if I know what I want to do next. There's a few things I know I could try, but for now, I'm happy I finished this after all these years. This became even more viewed than my original. I'm really glad for that, it's a million times better. It's way WAY longer than the original in words and chapters. Not counting this author's note, this CHAPTER is longer than the original. The original was notably bad. Things are formatted oddly (though I remember a glitch at the time caused a part of that problem), and there's so many things that made no sense, like apparently the main character knew LATIN? I was around 12 at the time, I swear I'm not that bad now. Though if you're reading this, you probably realized this already, I hope.

Sometimes I feel sad that something I've put several hours of work into doesn't get much attention, but then I start writing again and forget about it. I love to write. When I can see a scene in my head. All the details are there, the breeze of their face, sand under their feet, listening to the sounds of the ocean, breathing in the strange foul stench of rotting seaweed bunched up on the shore a several yards to the right... I want others to be able to picture it as well. When I imagine what happens next, I lose myself imagining the struggles and pain the characters find themselves in. I find myself enthralled by the details which I made in my head. I forget about my life and dive into the shoes and location of the character I am writing. I love to create stories, and I love it even more when others enjoy my writing. To all who read and have enjoyed this story, thank you, you make this beyond worth it. You can expect more from me in the future. If you didn't like it, then you should still expect more in the future because I'm not stopping. (Also I question why you'd be reading the authors note of the final chapter as well...)

I don't have anyone in particular who I want to thank, aside from BirdKeeperToby of all people. I stopped writing fanfictions a long while ago, but when you came out with Pokémon Tempest, I began writing a story for your fan region (Which you can read by checking out the story under my profile if you're interested). At times I felt obligated to write it, but many times I did it because I really liked it, because I was filled with ideas. I forgot the joy of writing, and you reminded me, even though you weren't intending to do this. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. Even if you'll never see this, I will always be grateful for that.

To all fans, new and, well, I'd say old but I don't have any old fans! Hahahahah. Anyway, to all fans and strangers passing by, thank you for reading. I hope to entertain you with my next stories. I think I will do something somewhat goofier, updating a slightly sillier story of mine to be better and more fun. Wherever I end up going next, I hope you all will join with me in the chaos. Thank you all very much. I think I'm repeating myself, heh. Ah well. Anyway, there were some bits of foreshadowing to the time loop, see if you can recognize them. Here's one: The "instincts" he has is actually just experience and knowledge from a different loop. Not all Pokémon actually know what another is, especially if they've never seen the species before.

A bit of information I have decided on: The first loop went humorously poorly, him unable to attack, barely able to walk, and fumbling over his words constantly. Riolu and Nidoran drowned trying to save him from the river the first time they crossed, which was only a few feet deep. Oshawott was a bit too slow to react. Thus god/Arceus/? took pity on them and also realized "This clownish moron is the only thing that can keep the world from ending. *sigh* I don't have a choice." Of course, as a deity, He could intercept them sooner, but They have a history of not helping or only helping when it's almost too late in the PMD world. Hurray for consistency?

This story actually ended up being quite a bit more bittersweet than I was intending, but I think it works out well. It isn't completely terrible at least. He's a lizard who can climb walls and can shatter boulders by hitting them. He has two amazing friends, one of whom can breath fire, and he lives a fulfilling life of adventure, rescuing, and exploring. The important thing is, while things could be much better for him, he's happy and content living this way, and that's more important.

One last time, thank you, reader, for sticking through this. Until next time, see you soon.

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