It was a small bus ride towards the place that Lia told him to go. However, Hardwin's day wouldn't start out so simply. During the ride, Hardwin had the mistake of letting Jax out along with his other Pokémon. The newly caught Pokémon had far less experience in society and therefore stole a shiny rattle from a baby because he was interested in the toy.
To cut things short, things escalated poorly right after that. So much in fact that he had to step out of the bus earlier than expected… actually he was forced out of the bus along with his Pokémon for causing a commotion.
At least they were a few blocks away from their destination, but it looked like the young clown had to try and teach his new partner the do's and don'ts. "That is why you shouldn't steal from other people, Jax." To try and enforce this into his bug type's short attention span, Hardwin narrowed his eyes for added affect.
It didn't work. At all.
Jax just scoffed at the attempt to be corrected in how to act while with others. Instead, he asked why they couldn't do whatever they wanted simply because they were more powerful than all of those people and why they didn't fight back.
"This isn't the Jungle, Jax. I'm not beating up other people senselessly just to get what I want."
Jax was shocked at that and asked what was the point of getting stronger if you weren't using it to get what you wanted.
Survival of the fittest. It was a basic ideal that really didn't fit with something like a moral code for people raised in society. "While it is true that I need more power to get my goal, that's what I only use it for, my goal. I don't abuse power getting things I don't need. That hurts me only in the long run."
Those words seemed to connect to Jax… for the wrong reasons. The bug and flying type swore that Hardwin instantly turned into a very specific shedinja from his past. And the memory slowly made his temper rise. Jax argued that the strongest got what they want when they wanted.
"And how did that work out for you against us?"
The bug type fumed and shouted out that they only won due to sheer luck.
Yet that argument worked in Hardwin's favor. "My point exactly: it doesn't matter how big or strong you think you are because life screws with everyone. Even if I lost, I would still have people behind me supporting me. You are pretty strong, but I'm guessing you were pretty lonely, weren't you?"
Jax twitched. A memory flashed in his head about a weak nincada that was bullied so much when he was young. How that same Pokémon tried so hard to beat all of his bullies, only to be kicked out by his clan elder for causing so much violence in their clan.
The memory burned fury into the bug type like never before. He cried out and attacked the first thing in front of him which happened to be Hardwin.
The young clown was tackled to the ground and yelled in panic as his own Pokémon started attacking him. Zig and Zu eventually came to the help of their partner, but Jax was strong enough to overpower the two of them. But, the two did leave an opening that allowed Hardwin to pin down the raging bug type into the sidewalk with his hand pressing on his wings. "Will you calm down!? What is your problem?"
"His problem is probably you, asshole."
At the sound of the voice, Hardwin looked up. However, he only felt a pain in his eye and felt knocked back down on the ground. It took him a second to realize that someone had knocked him into the ground.
Cupping his right eye, Hardwin then noticed two figures standing up with rather dark glares toward him.
The clown stood back up and yelled, "What the hell was that for?!"
"That's what you get for abusing your Pokémon, jackass." Now that he got a better look at them, he noticed that either he was hit so hard he was seeing double, or the two in front of him were twins with black hair and blue eyes. The latter option might have been the more sane answer, but seeing his luck so far, he wasn't going to discount some obscure reason for the former being the answer.
Still, Hardwin figured out that this was all just a misunderstanding. He was about to explain so when he noticed Jax pretending to cower in fear.
"Jax what are you doing?" That came out more deadpan that usual.
Sadly, the twins seemed to be getting the wrong message with how their expressions seemed to worsen. "Alright, jackass, there's no way we can let you get away with abusing Pokémon."
Hardwin wanted to correct them but unfortunately for him they were already taking out their Pokémon.
"Geist!" Out popped a haunter from one of them. "Cynder!" The second one brought out a vulpix.
Hardwin quickly tried to get a word in edgewise to explain that this was all a misunderstanding. He got one syllable out before the owner of the haunter ordered an attack without a second thought.
The young clown ducked under the Shadow Ball.
Thankfully, there was some silver lining to all of this. The vulpix was ordered to attack as well, but the fire type hesitated. His trainer seemed surprised. "What the? Cynder, what's wrong? Help me take care of this jerk!"
At that, Hardwin quickly pointed at that twin. "Aha! Now who's messing with their Pokémon?"
"Hey! I'm not doing that, and I don't abuse my Pokémon, you di—"
"Will you listen to me? I do care about my Pokémon! You two jumped to the wrong conclusion." The young clown had enough of this crap. If they weren't going to let him talk, he wouldn't let them talk.
Zu and Zig finally came back from being thrown away by Jax a while ago and Zu gave them a rather blunt message. "Ya'all a bunch of twats!" Then the zubat turned his face towards Jax. "And you, good sir, are a scoundrel." A gentleman clip was used for that line.
The fact that two other Pokémon were so ready to fight back the attackers with anger and rage on their face finally caused the twins to pause and really think about their situation. They turned towards the Ninjask who was pulling out mocking faces towards Zu and Zig.
Hardwin felt relief as he saw the two boys slowly look like they had made a huge mistake.
"Wait, so you weren't hurting your Pokémon for just disagreeing with you?" The twin with a haunter asked.
The blunette sighed before he pointed towards his newly caught Pokémon. "I didn't want to, be he's acting out like a child." As the adrenaline was going down, his face felt like something had sctrached his face and punched him in the eye. Oh wait.
"Will!" The three boys turned back in surprise at the sound of the voice. It was a girl dressed up in a frilly white dress, beret, short skirt, and long pantyhose. She looked beautiful to most people, but Hardwin recognized who she was.
"Hey, Lia." The daughter of officer jenny came up to inspect his face with worry.
The girl's expressions changed from worry into that of an alpha predator as she glared at the twins. "Did these jackasses do this to you?"
Hardwin quickly stopped her from going through another violent misunderstanding. "Lia, it was just a misunderstanding. Don't just jump to conclusions as well."
One of the twins started rubbing the back of his head. "Look man, we're sorry. We sorta jumped the gun on that one."
"It's fine," Hardwin then looked over to Lia. "Lia, sorry about this, but think I can pass on helping you out for today? I gotta get this eye some ice."
The blue-green haired girl seemed to deflate and she tried to say something, but she seemingly thought against saying what she originally was about to say. "H-Hey, don't leave just yet, alright? I feel bad this happened to you because I invited you over. I'll treat you to lunch, come on. The place I invited you over isn't too far, and my roommate works in there."
The girl perked up again and was energetic enough to push Hardwin towards the restaurant in question much to the boy's dismay.
After the two left, one twin said to the other, "That was a disaster."
"Yeah but… doesn't that blue haired guy look familiar?"
-]
Regeo Mountain, a large, singular mountain just northwest of Helio City and just a little north of Bluewood Forrest.
It was here that someone cloaked in all black started hiking up untouched path with a Natu on their shoulder. The figure took out a walkie talkie and pressed a button as another voice came back out.
"Zealot, are you en route to the pinned location?"
"Yes. I'll be there in two klicks."
"Good, just a reminder that we can't send anyone else due to the fact we're laying low from the museum attack. This is a solo mission but of great importance."
"I won't fail. Not with so much at stake. The mission will be done." Zealot closed the com device and continued walking up on foot.
…
Zealot didn't know that there was already someone there.
Just a bit ahead, a part of the mountain gave way, revealing a path that led deeper into the mountain. A cloaked figure stepped into this path, walking briskly deeper and deeper into the darkness of the cave. However, they were soon finding out that as they descended further into the cave, the path started to look less natural and more… man made. Symbols laced the walls that seemed to have long been unrecognizable between random scribbles of a child if not for how much dust and dirt had accumulated on the walls.
Soon the figure came to a stop in front of three recently opened doors in a temple like structure depicting different colors despite how faded it looked.
"Who the heck is that?" Despite the area giving off vibes of a sacred and ancient place, the voice that came out and echoed through the walls was not.
"Did you really have to do that, hotshot!? Now they know that we're here!" Another voice quickly reprimanded the first voice.
"Oh please, it totally looked like whoever they are, they were looking for us—I mean why else come in here in this empty cave willingly in the first place? I thought you were supposed to be the smart one, smartypants?"
"Smartypants? What are you, five?"
From the place of the first voice, a dark growl came out with a soft glow of what looked to be fire. "You better shut up or I'll fry—"
"Both of you should shut up!" A third, feminine voice called out. "This isn't the time for your petty squabbles!"
The light died down instantly as the sound of two voices went down to mutters. The figure took out a flashlight and pointed it towards the last voice they heard.
It was then that something… glided into the light. It was a dragon. No not a dragon type, an actual dragon depicted in fantasy and myth. This was a rather small dragon, only four foot tall, but this dragon had fur instead of scales with a white belly underneath their snake like appearance. It's apperance looked more like a mythological wyrm than a dragon. It was so bizarre looking that it couldn't quite possibly be considered a Pokémon.
The dragon snake bowed politely. "My name is Chocola, a Kilin."
"C-Chocola?! What are you doing!?" The second voice cried out with panic.
The golden dragons snapped her head back towards one are of the temple. "This person seems friendly enough. I don't sense any ill intentions." The figure then turned their light towards where she was looking and spotted two more dragons. One was a red dragon with similar size but stood on two hind legs and had golden wings and red scales; actually instead of a dragon, it looked more like a wyvern. The other one was a scaly blue dragon or drake on account that it had four legs and white wings.
The golden dragon then continued talking. "We don't even know how long we've been asleep. Who knows how long it's been or how much things have changed?"
The golden wyrm looked back at the cloaked figure and asked, "Who are you?"
The figure paused for a second. "… That is none of your concern." A cold and dark answer came out before the figure, in one fluid motion, pulled out something from underneath their cloak and revealed a gun pointed right at the gold one's neck.
The next thing that was heard was the sound of the weapon going off followed by a splatter of liquid and a thud.
With the sight of their friend, bleeding on the ground from a shot to the neck, the other two dragons roared with energy. Several blinding lights shined over the figure as they realized that they were being attacked.
The attack was so powerful that an explosion burst out of the opening with extreme force and caught the attention of many near and far.
"What was that!?" Zealot cried as they ordered their natu to get closer to the explosion. No sooner when they did, something speed out of the dust and downward into the lower areas of the mountain.
Zealot felt their comlink ringing again and quickly answered.
"Zealot, respond! What's going on up there!?"
"I-I don't know! I was on route when…" Zealot stopped as something else came out of the cave.
As the smoke died down, another cloaked figure met with Zealot. However, this figure removed their cloak, revealing something that horrified both Zealot and their natu.
The other figure 'winked' and the with a throw of their hand, blinked out of sight in a steam of shadows.
"Damn it all! It was them!" The trainer with a Natu cursed.
"What they're up there!?" from the other line, screams of different voices were coming in. "Zealot, get out of there! Abort the mission!"
"But if they're here—!"
"The rangers are on their way up there. Get out, now."
Zealot cursed under their breath and disabled the call. They quickly wondered what it was that left the cave, before the natu made them both escape.
The free lunch was greatly appreciated, but hardwin had to go and have a one on one talk with Jax.
"Look, Jax, we need to talk. Why did you lash out awhile ago?
The bug type said nothing for a while.
Hardwin thought back to what made him lash out in the first place and a specific line from awhile ago popped up.
"Are you," he paused for a second, choosing to be more careful with his words this time. "I… I wasn't insulting you if that's what you think I did."
Jax slowly turned to look at the boy. Hardwin slowly reached out with his hand, but stopped when the bug and flying type flinched as it got closer. The ninjasks slowly let down his guard and Hardwin caringly placed his hand on the ninja bug's head and rubbed it.
"I don't hate you unless you give me a real reason to. I've had a lot of immature tantrums in my life to recognize when someone else is doing it, so just take your time. I promise I'll be a friend to you." Hardwin, despite the scratches on his face and his black eye, he had a gentle smile as he caressed the bug type's head.
Jax was confused as to why he wasn't angry at him for doing all those things to him. They would hate him. It's why he was out here.
"Well, I am angry at you for pulling crap like that, but I do really want us to be friends. Wanna start again?"
Hardwin seemed to get his answer when Jax just looked away with some hint of shame in his eyes.
"Good. Because starting tomorrow, we're going to start training, and you're going to be put through the ringer." The clown smiled as he saw his bug type try to argue and say that he wasn't someone to order around, but Hardwin ignored him.
Though, he couldn't say the same thing when he saw smoking on the mountain.
It looked pretty big, but most people—while they all paid attention to that—they also assumed that it was some kind of Pokémon battle with some powerful trainers. However, Jax seemed horrified and quickly flew towards the direction of the smoke.
"H-Hey wait, Jax! Dang it!" Hardwin threw out his other friends and pointed towards the mountain. "You two go after him. I'll catch up when I can!"
On Regeo Mountain, deep within a normal cave, two figures were pacing back and forth with worry over a third figure.
"I don't get it! We're supposed to have great power! What was that thing that pierced her body!?"
"Calm down, Mugen… it's faint… but there's magic on whatever was used. But I've never seen this type of magic before. How long have we been asleep?"
"Who cares about that!? Can't you pull the thing out, Ian? It's hurting her!"
The blue dragon like creature snarled back. "I am aware of that, but please understand that it's slowly festering in her wound. I've never seen magic like this. If I try to pull it out with just my telekinesis, something bad might happen."
The temperature around the cave grew as the red dragon started seething through his fangs. Smoke was starting to rise until a sound came from deep within the cave. "Shedinjaaaa."
The two dragons looked towards the sound of the voice to see a shedinja in the front of a clan of nincada.
"Get lost!" The red dragon snarled before being quickly reprimanded by the blue dragon.
"Mugen! This is their home; we should be the ones leaving!" The serpentine dragon bowed his head towards the ghost type. "Please forgive us for intruding, but our friend needs help."
The ghost and bug type slowly flew towards the injured golden dragon. With his eyes glowing, his body turned see-through. Then he phased into the body of the gold dragon.
"Hey!" The red dragon stopped when his friend stood in front of him. "Why are you stopping me!?"
"Because that guy is trying to help us! The last thing we need is you using your muscles and not your brain!" The blue dragon turned back to their friend as the bullet that pierced the flesh of their third friend was ejected out and quickly vanished.
The Shedinja popped back up, only looking weaker than before as his body barely seemed to stabilize back into solid form. Whatever magic that was infused with the bullet, suddenly shot out a dozen tentacles and ensnared the ghost type. The ghost elder gave an unearthly wail of pain, which prompted the blue and red dragon to try and help.
Or at least that's what they should have done.
However, the blue dragon jumped out of the way from a speeding bug type that tried to ram into him. The same couldn't be said for Mugen as the speeding Pokémon then hit him into the cave wall.
Ian noticed that it was a ninjask that had attacked at such blinding speed, which made sense since these Pokémon were capable of moving faster than human eyes could catch. But he was more than able to pin down the bug type with his psychic powers. The bug and flying type struggled against the hold, but was pinned down hard.
"What the heck was that!?" Mugen asked as he got back up from being body checked by something he hadn't seen coming.
"It's a really speedy Pokémon, I barely had time to warn you." Ian responded as he kept focus on the attacker.
The blue dragon then flinched. "Hey! More are incoming—" He had to stop what he was doing to avoid a bolt of thunder coming his way.
Jax felt the pressure lift and as he came back up, he noticed Zig and Zu following after him. he was surprised that they followed him, but the two explained that they were only here because hardwin told them to do so.
Mugen and Ian stood in ready as the other three readied themselves for a fight.
"Shedinja."
The two opposing parties stopped as they saw the shedinja, slowly floating up. For some reason Jax seemed worried, but instead…
The shedinja started to scream at him. Since no human was there, no one heard the profanities and dark cursing that the shedinja gave out towards the part flying type that simply went along the lines of being a source of trouble since the very beginning of their clan.
However, while this shouting was going on, everyone but Jax noticed how… twisted the darkness around the ghost type was getting.
The body of the ghost type suddenly started twitching. It spazzed around mid air erratically until it disturbingly stood still.
Then a crack appeared across his face.
"Oh crap!" Mugen cried out as he and Ian jumped out of the way as the body of the Shedinja started changing violently. More and more shadows circled around the hollow body until something… inhuman came out. A grotesque humanoid figure with the hollow and cracked body of the ghost bug etched into his front torso.
"Ian, what the hell is that!?"
"How the hell should I know!? We're supposed to sense when the world is imbalanced, and that is a FLIPPING clear sign of the balance getting out of whack, but I still don't sense a disturbance!"
"ꙈꙚ‼ꝏ‼Ꙉ!" The shadowy, humanoid figure roared to life. From its back the 'wing-like' spikes of the shedinja grew into long tentacles. One of them quickly scooped up the still unconscious Chocola, and several of the nincada.
"No, Chocola!" The red wyvern cried out in horror as he suddenly jumped with fire breathing in his mouth and his body glowing so bright that it looked like he was about to unleash a powerful attack.
At least that should have happened. In actuality, one of the tentacles swiped a rock off the ground and slung it into the maw of Mugen, interrupting the flames of his attack and stopping the bright light around him. In that same instant, the same tendril that threw the rock ensnared the dragon and expelled an energy that made the red dragon scream in pain.
"Mugen!" The blue dragon then tried to use an psychic type attack on the monstrosity holding his friends, however, his attacks were nullified before they made contact.
The shadowy monster stabed his tendrils into the ground, but instead of piercing the ground, they suddenly became shadows and quickly grabbed a hold of Ian's shadow with intense speed. The tendrils shot out of Ian's own shadow an ensnared him. While the dragon was fast, he wasn't expecting such an attack to happen outside the realm of normal moves and that shock left him open to attack.
Whatever that thing was, it was slowly drawing everyone closer to it's core. However, several shots of water hit the six tendrils, followed by a blast of cold wind. The result ended up freezing the tentacles, yet made the main body still untouched.
A loud-glass shattering sound was launched and then the frozen tendrils shattered, freeing everyone captive.
Te monster looked over towards the new attackers, Zig and Zu, primed and ready to fight whatever this things was that was hurting all those other creatures.
However, the monster had slowly turned its featureless face over towards a still heartbroken and frozen Jax. The two newcomers panicked as small bits of ghostly fire were fired towards their teammate and quickly moved to get him out of the way.
Zig the linoone quickly fired several Water Pulse moves at the monstrosity, only for his attacks to fail reaching the creature as well. The monster stepped back as several attacks came from behind it, revealing that the red and blue dragons were getting back up and were more than ticked off.
The three began firing whatever attack they could at the creature, but it started evading their attacks with unpredictable movements such as jumping and sticking into the ceiling and crawling like a spider to name a few unnerving moves.
While they were doing that, Zu faced Jax. "What the heck!? Get your head in the game, man!"
Jax curled into fetal position. Muttering how he was just trying to help, how he never wanted this, how it wasn't fair.
Zu slowly listened to enough ranting to gather pieces. Jax was bullied when he was young, but when he finally got stronger and fought back, the bullies blamed him for all the commotion. Because of that, he was unjustly kicked out of his home and forced to survive on his own. It's why he was so bitter and bent on being strong in the first place, he had nothing to begin with.
"Jax." The ninjask froze as he heard Hardwin's voice coming from Zu. "Listen, kiddo, and listen good. You're a jerk, but you're our jerk. And we made a promise that if you mess with one of us—you mess with all of us." Zu didn't say more as he went in and fired Venom Drench to in any way slow down the strange trashing monster.
The ninjask just stared in awe. On one hand, the people he was born and raised with, they abandoned him at the first opportunity. But his new… trainer… why was he so different than everyone? Why was he trying to give him a chance when you're not supposed to care for anyone else but yourself?
Meanwhile with the battle, despite it being four on one, the creature was either avoiding attacks, or nullifying them.
"Ian! Why can't we hit this guy!?" Mugen yelled.
"I'm trying to figure that out dingus! That shield he has isn't magic or psychic, I can't tell what it is! We've been asleep for to dang long, who knows what happened while we slept!?"
The monster roared before turning back to the clan of nincada. It fired more twisted versions of Will-O-Wisp towards the bug types unti Zig slid in and fired more Water Pulse attacks at the flame.
Jax just continued to stare at the fight. They weren't doing well, and he honestly… a piece of him just wanted nothing to do with them.
"J-Jax!" The bug turned around to see an exhausted and out of breath Hardwin holding himself up by leaning on his knees. "Oh god, what was I thinking run up a moutian…" He said in one hushed gasp and looked ready to collapse.
The sound of an unholy screech made the young clown look up. Needless to say the scene in front of him made his mind stop coherently working for a good moment. "What the hell is all of that?"
The figure stopped and turned towards him. Right down the middle of its face, a crack opened up revealing a sideways mouth with dozens of bloodshot eyes behind the red, glowing fangs.
To be fair, Hardwin reacted in a much more restrained manner than most people would in his situation. "I was so not prepared to see that today."
"שׁꙝꙞᾨꚅ!" The creature gave an echo of unintelligible sounds as it started running right for the boy.
"Oh crap!" Hardwin scooped up Jax to avoid the arm of the creature trying to grab him.
"What the heck is going on!?" The bluenette yelled in surprise before he noticed another bunch of attacks hitting or rather not making contact with the beast and causing it to look back.
"Hey ugly!" The red dragon cried out, glowing brightly again. "Let's see you dodge this!" Suddenly a large ring of fire surrounded him—
Until he was hit in the head by his blue ally. "You idiot! You can't use that move! There's a forest all around us!"
"Guh! Stop hitting me!" The red dragon cried out before Zig rammed into both of them to avoid a the creature from cutting them into pieces with all of its tendrils cutting the area around them.
Hardwin saw this and saw on the side there were still a clan of nincada and a dragon that looked similar to the red and blue one. "Okay, one madness at a time then. I swear it's my third Thanksgiving all over again." Hardwin's self defense mechanism was trying to be witty in the face of maddening confusion. It helped him find some semblance of collectiveness whenever things got too chaotic in a circus.
"Zu! Get the nincada out of here! You three, keep it distracted while everyone gets to safer ground, do not let it touch you!"
The red dragon snarled. "Why should we listen to—"
"Less talk, more fire blasts that don't hit any of the trees. Zig, cover him if he does!" Hardwin started running towards the clan with Zu right behind him. As he looked over towards the four foot tall dragon, he carefully slung her over his shoulder and told Zu to lead the nincada further into higher ground.
He looked back at the three who seemed to be doing as well as they were awhile ago in that they weren't doing well at all. But then, the clown decided to pay a little more attention to something.
That creature… it had a shedinja etched to his torso, right? And the attacks weren't connecting? It wasn't completely true. That creature seemed to avoiding all the fire blasts coming right towards him. That meant… it was using Wonder Guard? It would explain why he doesn't avoid all the other attacks, and why he so focused on that red dragon. It's the only one nearby that has a move to hit him.
Wait, shedinja? And nincada?
Hardwin looked over to Jax, who unlike just this morning, he was sulking and trying to hide from the other nincada who were also huddling in fear.
The clown sighed before he carefully placed down the gold dragon and let go of his newly caught Pokémon. "Jax, watch her. Protect them. Zu your with me, I have a plan."
"Nin?" The bug type asked in confusion.
Hardwin looked back at Jax then… petted him. "What am I doing? Basically, something really stupid, but I'm not abandoning those that need help."
With that, Hardwin picked up a rock and threw it at the figure, it smacked it's head and turned back towards Hardwin. "Hey guys! It's got a Wonder Guard ability! Pin it down and hit it with a fire blast!"
The attackers all looked at each other and nodded. Quickly, Zig threw a large amount of water into the ground and froze it over, trapping the feet of the creature. As it tried to move its tendrils, a large gunk of Venom Drench came on it by curtsy of Zu the poison gunk quickly hardened and a psychic power was used on them to restrain them from moving or breaking free by the blue dragon.
"Finally! Take this!" Mugen cried out as he finally unleashed a Flamethrower on the pinned down creature.
The flames grew closer and closer to the mad beast. However, something happened that no one expected. It suddenly dropped—and fell into his own shadow, ducking under the flames.
"W-Was that Shadow Sneak?!" Hardwin cried out before the other Pokémon realized that they had forgotten this thing could move into the shadows. But instead of going for them, the shadow darted quickly towards… Hardwin.
The four quickly panicked as they saw the figure leap out from the ground and launch itself with its tendrils drawn back ready to pierce the normal human boy.
Everyone, despite their best efforts, was too far away and not quick enough to stop the creature in time.
For a second, Hardwin's eyes widened, his heart stopped moving as his eyes saw the unholy creature reach over him…
But then, he heard a sound.
It was like a sonic boo—
SLASH!
A large gust of wind made the young student step back before he realized that he was still alive.
"ᾨᾨᾨᾨ‼‼" Hardwin looked up to see the creature wailing in pain and with three sliced-off tentacles. As it took a step back and let everyone see that right between the beast and the human, was Jax with both of his scythe claws shrouded in dark energy, symbolizing he had just used Night Slash to coat his blades like miniature swords.
"Jax…"
The bug type floated in the air until suddenly, he stopped his wings mid flight. It only paused for a second, before they suddenly started speeding up to the point it no longer looked like he had wings anymore.
With a loud cry, Jax vanished and in that same second, the other three tendrils of the creature were cut off. The ninjask's image appeared for a brief second nearby the others before it vanished again, which was followed by another gust of wind.
The monster did some kind of action that seemed like snarling as it quickly vanished into the ground before the area it was standing on had a large gash across it. Beneath Jax's shadow, new tendrils burst out and tried to capture the creature. However, instead of Jax, the tendrils just grabbed empty air that suddenly repulsed them from the pressure.
Everyone stared in awe, until their shock turned to horror as Jax suddenly fell down, consumed by purple flames. Unknown to everyone, but the beast, when Jax hit these tendrils that time, they were laced with a small fire that suddenly expanded a few seconds after Jax had touched them, casuing him to be enflamed and engulfed in fire.
"Jax!" Hardwin yelled as he ran to his Pokémon. Yet he slid to a stop when the monstrosity jumped out of the ground in front of him.
Slick!
The being slowly turned its head at the sound coming from its left. The ninjask was still there, one armed glowing with dark type energy and it seemed like it had been just used. The burn had cut his attack power greatly.
But he didn't need his full strength to do this. He just needed the beast to expect he was down from the count.
The beast took a step forward—only to notice his entire view was suddenly upside down. Wait. Why was his sight slowly falling to the ground despite being upside-down? His head had been severed from his neck!?
As those thoughts finally caught up with the creature, his hold on everything finally weakened and the humanoid body fell to the ground. The shadows then started to fade and nothing but a Shedinja was left.
The ninjask undid his attack. And instantly the fire around him died down. His body still felt like a furnace, and he could still feel weaker, but the battle was finally over.
"Okay, what was that." Hardwin started before pointing over towards the creatures near Zig and Zu. "And who are you guys?"
"Uuuuhhh…"
The two dragons perked up when they heard a new moaning sound. They both looked up to see their third dragon friend looking at the scene before her. "W-What happened?"
At least Hardwin knew one thing: he wasn't the only one lost in all of this.
"Okay, Okay. So you're telling me… you guys… are the Kilin? I thought they were an ancient civilization?" Hardwin couldn't believe it, yet now that he got a closer look at the three. They did look vaguely like the pictures of the bell and other artifacts from the museum.
"The Kilin aren't a civilization. That's us. We had a bunch of people who worshiped us though." Mugen, the red dragon huffed with pride. "It was pretty cool."
"Had being the key word there, Mugen." Ian, the blue dragon turned back to Hardwin. "You said ancient civilization. How old are they to you?"
Hardwin swore if he wasn't so used to Zu, talking Pokémon would be weirding him out. Actually it still was since Zu spoke in clips than proper language. "Uh right. From what the experts said, they date back to the legendary cities of Pokélantis, if not older. So that's like… around 1,000,000 years ago."
The red dragon's eyes widened and his maw dropped. "I'm sorry, what!? 1,000,000 years ago?!"
Hardwin flinched backward. "I-I think they said it was older than that."
"Mugen, calm down, he's at least helping us." The yellow dragon, Chocola, she introduced herself as, tried to calm down her friend while Hardwin was putting the bandage around her neck. He did keep some first aid kit around him since he was a trainer.
"At least he isn't like that one being that we first met." Mugen snarled at the memory.
"Now that confuses me. Someone, shot you?" The blue haired trainer spoke up.
"Shot? I'm not familiar with that expression. I'm sure our telepathy should be translating your language to ours, but then again magic is far different than I recall."
"Magic? Not a lot of people believe in magic besides the ones legendary Pokémon can perform." Hardwin shook his head. "Well uhh, a lot has changed in a million years. For one, there's a significant less amount of tyrantrum running around."
"I was wondering where they had all gone." Ian noted out loud before looking around. "But from the sound of things, so much really has changed while we are gone. … What are those spherical devices you're carrying?"
"Huh? Oh these? These are Pokémon Balls, or Poké Balls for short. It technically means that Pokémon can be—well—brought in our pockets."
"Why would you do that? Can't they just go wherever they want?" The red dragon brought up.
"Uhhh that… is a good question. I mean, I never really used them a lot myself but I guess it's been a part of my society for a long time that I never questioned it as much."
"Guys?" Chocola spoke up after Hardwin put the finishing touches around her neck. Despite getting pierced by a bullet, it seemed like it didn't fully pierce her skin, which was a good thing. However, the magic was doing something to her powers, making her feel much weaker than before.
"What are we going to do now?"
"Well from what I understand, the world has changed a significant amount in the time we've slept. Not only that, I'm getting the distinct feeling that something bad is going on even though we still can't seemingly sense what is wrong with the world."
"Are ya sure it wasn't the person who just tried to kill Chocola?"
"Mugen, I was alluding to that."
"Allu what?"
"Dear god, you're an idiot."
Mugen rose with a flare. "What did you say, smartypants!?"
"Both of you, shut up!" To the blue and red dragon's surprise, both Chocola and Hardwin yelled at the same time.
"Why don't we stick around Hardwin and his friends for a while? He seems to know what's going on." Chochola offered.
Hardwin nodded at the fact, until he repeated that line in his head and did heard his mind scratching a record abruptly. "Wait what?"
"Well, he is the only one so far to help us and give us some basic information. Staying with him would be our best option in this new age."
"He fought for us and helped us win! That's a big yes from me!" Mugen agreed with Ian for once.
"Wait don't I get a say in this?!" Hardwin started. How the heck was he supposed to take care of three potentially legendary Pokémon!? He was in a school dang it!
"Well you can save all of that stuff later. So what kind of foods do they have in the future?" Mugen asked.
Hardwin opened his mouth, but despite his best intentions—or the fact the sheer incredibility of this situation had left his mind temporarily incapacitated—he couldn't find a way to turn these guys away.
The clown boy sighed before looking back to see Jax seemingly talking with the shedinja and the nincada. They were talking for a while, but it seemed like they were finally ending with all of them heading back into the cave.
Jax, followed by Zig and Zu, floated up to Hardwin.
"… Jask."
Hardwin gave a small smile and reached out to pet the bug type. "Apology accepted. How was your talk?"
Difficult, but he did something he never thought he would do. Jax thanked them for pushing him away since he wouldn't have gotten this strong if it wasn't for that. What happened next was them somewhat inviting them back into the clan since the elder believed he didn't have much time left.
Jax, respectfully declined. He was thankful, but at the same time, he said he would never forgive any of them for unjustly kicking him out.
"Wow, a-are you sure about that?" Hardwin asked carefully at the rather cold thing he told them.
The ninjask explained simply, when he needed help none of them helped him. A better man would forgive them, but he admitted he wasn't and the painful time he had all alone out there did not help him. Maybe he will forgive them, but that will only probably happen if he stayed with Hardwin long enough.
In the end, Jax admitted he wasn't any good at doing anything but fighting, but if Hardwin would have him, he wanted to learn how to be a better person.
"I-I'm not that good of a person as you're making me out to be, Jax. I just… know what's it's like to feel like the world is against you." He admitted with a sigh. "But I can promise we can try to be better people together. Is that alright?"
Jax put out his claw, and Hardwin shook on it.
The moment seemed nice… until everyone heard sniffing.
They all turned towards Mugen who was sniffing in his eyes.
"Are you… crying?"
"N-No! I-I just got something in my eye is all!" The red dragon snapped quickly.
"Aww, Mugen, I thought it was pretty sweet too." Chocola cooed in agreement.
"Shut up!"
Ian chimed in agreement. "There's nothing wrong with feeling emotional response from that."
Smoke started coming from Mugen's mouth before he flared at Ian, telling him to shut up. However, because he did so, Ian avoided the blast and it ended up flying towards Hardwin. The young boy tilted to the right to avoid the blast, but his coat got caught on fire.
"Oh crap!" Hardwin stood up before looking at Zig. "Use Water Pulse—"
Unfortunately, in his panic, Zig used a Water Pulse much stronger than he intended. It didn't hurt Hardwin, but it did imbalance him causing him to fall…
While he was on a mountain path…
"Black Copter down, Black Copter down! Men, time to save our captain!" Zu cried out before all six Pokémon sped after the falling teen.
"… (I see so what your saying is that the spell you used to summon that fragment… did not work?)…"
"(I had underestimated them. Forgive me. I imagined that it was more than enough, but it appears they had more resistance than I expected.)"
"(No matter. If our enemies are preparing their pawns… so must we.)
A/N: Finally! You guys have no idea how long this took to write! So many things came in that really slowed down this process, but hopefully the next chapter will not be as long.
Okay for this chapter, the following had their characters star in.
Hofund: (Three using one account.) They all made Chocola, Mugen, and Ian as fan Pokémon. It was really something unique so I incorporated them into the story.
The King of Ranting: He made the twins that appeared as more of a cameo, but they'll appear again soon.
Sorry again for taking so long, but things in my life are picking up again so this may update slower again. Sorry.