The group head out early in the morning just after breakfast. Lucario led the way to the Tree of Beginning while Kidd drove everyone in her Humvee. Brock and Steven, being the tallest and largest in body size out of the group sat up front with Kidd while May, Ash, Max, and Hariel squeezed in at the back.

Brock looked to be on cloud nine sitting next to his idol while Steven contently sat at the window seat.

Everyone listened intently while Kidd explained what Aura actually was. Steven was unsurprised as he already knew, and Hariel was comparing Aura to magic. They were both essences of life that could be channeled in many different ways. Though whereas Aura was in everyone, Magic was not. Magic was created and used when channeling earth's natural energies. Over time, humans had come to refine their abilities and bred with magical creatures such as vampires and Veela, strengthening their magical abilities and heritage. Even muggleborns had ancestors of magical descent; it would have been impossible for them to have gain magic otherwise.

After a few hours of driving, everyone agreed to take a break for lunch.

Brock was pleasantly surprised that Hariel could cook too and things went much quicker as the two quickly prepared lunch.

As the two cooked, Kidd, May, and Ash helped Steven set up the table to eat. Then Max gleefully help the champion feed the pokémon. Steven then took a bowl of chopped up berries and a couple of Chocolate PokéPuffs and gave them to Lucario, who was eating some wild berries growing nearby.

"Here you go, Lucario. Hariel made this for you. She didn't know what food you like, but berries are a staple to just about every pokémon," Steven smiled.

"She made this for me?" Lucario asked, looking thoughtfully at the dark haired beauty that was plating everything up before it was going to be served. "And what are those?"

"These are called PokéPuffs. They're a kind of treat that are enjoyed by both humans and pokémon alike," Steven said, "Hariel thought you might like to try one."

"PokéPuffs?" Lucario asked and cautiously took a bite out of treat. He widened his eyes. "This is delicious!"

"I'm sure Hariel would love to hear that you like it," Steven smiled.

Soon there was a small commotion where a Bonsly had taken one of the lunch plates, but Lucario quickly snatched up the stolen plate.

"Do not take what isn't yours. Here, eat this instead," Lucario scolded before handing the pokémon a vine of the sweet wild berries he had been eating before Hariel had graciously gave him some food.

The Bonsly quickly snatched the vine of berries from Lucario's hand and hid behind the boulder Lucario was sitting on, munching on the berries while looking at the group of humans with great curiosity.

"Those pokémon treats look just like cupcakes!" May squealed as she near drooled at the sight of desert.

"Thank you. They're much more popular in the Kalos region. Hoenn is famous for their pokéblock, Sinnoh for their Poffins, and Kalos for their PokéPuffs," Hariel said, "If you want, I can give Brock the recipe so he can try them another time."

"Thanks a lot!" Brock said happily.

A few hours later, the group were stopped by a valley of active geysers, and could not pass until the geysers calmed down.

Even though Steven offered to have his Metagross use Psychic to carry everyone including the Humvee across the valley, they voted to stay to take a break at the hot springs that was situated right next to the geysers.

As everyone had fun in the water, Hariel felt that Lucario was feeling both sad and nostalgic at the sight of the hot spring. As evening was fast approaching, the group decided to pass the valley of geysers after breakfast the next morning. Though the discovery of Time Flowers were interesting.

Hariel happily made stew for dinner and even shared some with Lucario, who had never had such a thing before.

Everyone was curious at how Hariel had met Absol, and she had revealed to them a bit about her past and why she had started her journey late.

She had met Absol when he had been cornered by a Pokémon Poacher, and scared the poacher away with her powers. Absol had decided to follow her ever since and officially became her first pokémon.

When Ash was telling the story of how he and Pikachu became friends despite the fact that the latter had clearly disliked him when they had first met, Hariel could sense Lucario becoming frustrated.

"Lucario, can I talk to you for a moment?" Hariel cut in before Lucario could blow up at his anger.

The witch suspected the reason why Ash had bothered Lucario so much was because his Aura felt similar to that of Sir Aaron, who brought up both good and bad memories.

Lucario nodded and Hariel led the Fighting and Steel type pokémon away from the group to cool off.

"I suspect the reason why you're feeling so frustrated right now is because you have yet to find any answers regarding Sir Aaron," Hariel said as she and Lucario stood under a nearby tree, looking up at the moon and stars.

"…Yes," Lucario confirmed.

"I see. And what do you believe about Sir Aaron?" Hariel asked gently.

"I want to believe in the good times I had studying under Sir Aaron but…" Lucario said with hurt in his tone.

"But the sting of Sir Aaron's apparent betrayal still lingers strongly within you," Hariel finished.

Lucario nodded.

"Well…let me tell you a story then," Hariel said and sat down, gesturing for Lucario to do the same, and he did.

Hariel sighed and looked up at the stars.

"When I was a girl, I knew a man that I had thought despised me. He called me names and insulted my father, and I in turn despised him and insulted him back. But the funny thing is that after he died, I had found out that he had been protecting me all along," Hariel said softly, "Despite what he had thought of me, he protected me from the shadows and looked out for me when I was in trouble. I had found out that he had been childhood friends of my mother, and was deeply in love with her. But they had a falling out and she never spoke to him again and ended up marrying his greatest rival and bully, my father. Still, despite that, he looked after me. I daresay that if it wasn't for him, I would have been died or worse."

"Who was after you?" Lucario asked.

"My family comes from old money, and I stood to inherit it all. Not to mention, I was a strong psychic, there were many who hoped to get rid of me before I became a real threat. Let's say…there was another clan of psychics who despised my clan. They thought that Psychics should rule the world and those who weren't born with powers were those of lesser being. They called them mudbloods…those with dirty blood," Hariel sighed, "But the point of this story was to tell you that things aren't always what they seem. I had thought the man had despised me had hated me, but he had saved my life instead."

Lucario nodded, deep in thought.

"Until we find out the whole truth, don't listen to the anger within you. Rejoice in the good memories you had with Sir Aaron," Hariel said softly. "And don't mind Ash too much. He just greatly misses his friend."

"Do you miss Absol as well?"

"Of course I do. He is my first true friend since coming on this journey, and I trust him to stay safe until I can find him again. I would never give up on Absol just like I would never give up on you either," Hariel said, "Because you're my friend too, Lucario."

"I'm your friend? Why?"

"Because I like you. Is that not enough?" Hariel asked before she got up and pulled something out of her pocket.

She unwrapped it and broke off a piece before handing it to Lucario.

"What is it?" Lucario asked curiously, looking at the brown block with questioning eyes. It was the same color as the PokéPuffs she had Steven give him earlier that day.

"It's called chocolate, and it was the main ingredient in the PokéPuffs you ate at lunch today," Hariel said and broke off another piece before putting it into her mouth.

Lucario looked at her before putting the piece of chocolate into his mouth, widening his eyes at the burst of flavour from within.

"It's wonderful," Lucario said with awe and was handed another piece.

The two continued to share chocolate with one another until the entire bar was finished. Now that Lucario had sufficiently calmed down, they headed back to camp.

Lucario still sat a bit distantly from the group and Hariel headed straight for Steven.

"How is he?" Steven asked.

"He's still working through some issues involving Sir Aaron. If I hadn't had cut in, he probably would have blown up at Ash," Hariel said, basking in the warmth Steven's body heat.

"You're doing a good thing," Steven said and kissed her forehead.

Hariel just smiled and cuddled into his side. The group slept under the stars that night.

The next morning after passing the valley of Geysers, Lucario had come across a Time Flower and accidentally triggered it.

It revealed a vision of Sir Aaron sealing Lucario into the staff and flying away on a Pidgeot before an army passed through the Valley.

Lucario had gotten both confused and upset at the vision, thinking the army was real and started attacking the illusionary army using Aura Sphere.

"Stop it Lucario, it's just a vision! It's not real!" Hariel called out.

Lucario snapped out of it and ran a short ways away, feeling even more resentful than before.

"I think Lucario is right, Sir Aaron is not hero. He just abandoned Lucario," Brock said with a scowl.

"And he fled from the fight too," Max said, disappointed.

"So the legend was wrong?" Kidd asked.

"You guys aren't looking at this properly," Hariel said, calling everyone's attention.

"What do you mean? It seemed pretty clear to me," May said.

"Didn't you see where Sir Aaron was headed?" Hariel asked before Steven blinked with understanding.

"Where he was going? He just flew away," Ash said.

"He may have fled from this particular spot, but he went that way. In the direction of—"

"The Tree of Beginning!" Steven finished.

"And the legend said that not long after Lucario had disappeared, the Tree of Beginning let loose a light that stopped all the fighting!" Ash said excitedly.

"So Sir Aaron is still a hero!" Max said excitedly before Lucario dashed towards the group clearly sensing something.

Lucario was much more adept at sensing than her, but even she could start to feel the annoyance of something.

Then, out of the ground came out a large rock pokémon.

"Regirock!" Steven said, astonished.

Regirock threw the Humvee and attacked when with a Hyper Beam.

"Metagross, intercept that with Psychic!" Steven commanded and released his pokémon.

"Meta!" Metagross' eyes glowed blue and the Hyper Beam was redirected towards the sky.

Lucario then shot an Aura Sphere at the legendary pokémon to distract it before leading everyone away from the area and into a tunnel, where Steven had to recall his pokémon because it was too big to fit.

"Why did that Regirock attack us?" Ash asked.

"We're close to the Tree of Beginning. Legendary pokémon don't attack without reason. It was probably trying to give us a warning," Steven explained.

"Precisely," Lucario agreed.

Steven had to resist the urge from taking rock samples because even he knew it wasn't right to mess with something that legendary pokémon fought to protect.

Once they reached the end of the tunnel, everyone gasped in awe. Inside there was a large underground lake filled with crystal clear water. The cave chamber was lit by a giant glowing crystal attached to the ceiling and the place was crawling prehistoric and rare pokémon.

Pokémon that most likely wouldn't have survived if it wasn't for the Tree of Beginning.

Now that they were just below the Tree, Hariel could feel everything. It was if the place was alive!

Running up a head with Steven, Ash, and Lucario, she didn't witness Kidd planting probes otherwise she would have destroyed them on the spot.

There were just some mysteries better left unsolved.

"Pikachu! Are you there, buddy?" Ash called out.

"Absol! Can you hear me?" Hariel called out as well.

Despite beautiful view, they wanted to be reunited with their pokémon as soon as possible.

Pikachu's ear twitched and he swore that he had just heard Ash's voice.

'I hear Hariel's voice as well! Let's go!' Absol urged before he and Pikachu ran off. Mew and Meowth were quick to follow.

"Pikachuuuuu! If you can hear me, give me a sign!"

"Absol? Are you there? Please give me a sign as well!"

Pikachu and Absol looked at each other with happiness and called out to their respective trainers.

There was a faint echoing, but Pikachu's and Absol's voice could be heard quite clearly.

"Oh thank goodness, he's alright," Hariel sighed in relief.

She and Ash hurried ahead with Steven and Lucario hot on their heels, but the former two were stopped with Regice got in their way and shot an Ice Beam at them.

Lucario was able to deflect the second Ice Beam with Aura Sphere and stopped Steven from battling the legendary.

"It's no use trying to reason with it. Let's backtrack instead," Lucario said and led them in another direction.

No matter what, they were still trespassing on a sacred pokémon habitat.

As they were led into other part of the Tree after reuniting with the rest of the group and Kidd, along with some other people everyone but Hariel and Kidd recognized as Team Rocket, Regirock rejoined the chase with a new partner Registeel.

Before Steven could admire the legendary Steel type pokémon, Hariel dragged him off to follow Lucario.

"Metagross, help Lucario, keep Registeel and Regirock off our tail!" Steven commanded.

"Meta!"

As they were running, the group witnesses some sort of red blob on the shape of a pokémon capture Jessie, the Team Rocket woman with the red hair, and made her disappear.

"Uh…you don't think those red blobs are like white blood cells, do you?" Hariel asked nervously.

"White blood cells?" Kidd swallowed.

"Yeah…the Tree is the body, the red blobs are the white blood cells, and we're the invading bacteria…" Hariel said and everyone paled at her words.

It was then that James (seriously, blue hair? Hariel thought) was caught as well. Before he was fully consumed, at least the man had cared enough about his pokémon to release them before he disappeared completely as well, leaving his pokémon confused as to what had happened to their trainer.

Before they could the other direction, Regirock and Registeel caught up with them.

Lucario shot an Aura Sphere at the legendary pokémon while Metagross bulldozed through some red blobs with Meteor Mash, clearing the way to run.

Kidd's informant ended up telling her exactly what Hariel had just said moments before.

However, the woman dallied too long recording the red blob's activity and would have been caught if it wasn't for Lucario who pushed her out of the way.

But the red blob didn't harm him like it did Jessie and James.

"This is a sacred pokémon habitat. I would suppose that the Tree doesn't consider them to be a danger," Hariel mused before Regirock and Registeel caught up once again, prompting everyone to keep running.

Honestly, if it wasn't for Absol, she would have taken the group and apparated out of here a long time ago. Kirlia could help in that regard too.

When it came to two tunnels, Ash convinced Kidd to take Brock, May, and Max to find an exit where they would meet up later while his group distracted the legendaries.

Hariel then noticed that Lucario wasn't leaving either.

"You aren't leaving, Lucario?" Hariel asked.

"I won't leave until you find Absol and Ash finds Pikachu. I'd know you both would do the same for me," Lucario said with a smile.

Hariel smiled before she noticed Regirock and Registeel get closer.

"Kirlia, come on out! Use Shadow Ball!"

"Metagross use Flash Cannon!"

The two pokémon charged up their respective attacks and let loose, pushing the legendaries back a bit, though Metagross' Flash Cannon had blown Registeel much farther back due to its higher power.

The four continued.