Tanya lounged.
It was not often she did this. There was a war on, which meant that she had far, far too much work to do to ever have the luxury of lounging. Not even for a moment.
Perhaps she wouldn't have joined the army if she'd known she was almost as likely to lose a hand to carpal tunnel as to a hand grenade, to lose an eye from straining while reading reports and supply requests as to a piece of shrapnel, to die from overwork as to a bullet to the head.
Of course, it wasn't actually accurate to say that a war was on.
Because it was over.
The eastern front had devolved into an endless stalemate, but her pleas for a way to end the conflict non-militarily had finally been answered – or, more likely, she was but one insignificant voice among a sea of voiced and unvoiced discontent that the writing on the wall was being ignored.
So everything would go back to how it had been. No land was exchanged, and no politicians lost their jobs. Everyone's pride was hurt, and millions of people's lives were snuffed out, but no nation had lost.
Tanya shifted her shoulders and pushed back into the plush surface she was laying on, ignoring the squeak from her adjunct. But Tanya?
In contrast to the nation's who'd managed to make peace, to the vultures hoping to take advantage of their enemies weakness at the end of the war, to the teeming millions who had had their livelihoods and families and lives torn away from them?
In contrast to them, Tanya had won.
She was on a train, laying in her own little room with the most valuable human resource she had cultivated, lounging. She was headed to Berun, to be showered with accolades and honors for all of her grueling, unending work.
She cared little for the award ceremonies and meetings with reporters and her higher-ups and even the Kaiser. Oh, she recognized that they were important, of course, but they just didn't matter compared to what came after.
She was being promoted. Sure, she was only thirteen, but she'd proven herself dozens and hundreds of times to every single person who doubted her capability, whether it be on the battlefield or training soldiers or paperwork. She'd done… so much, and so, so many plans had been interfered with because of that bastard-
She sighed to herself, giddy enough to hum a meaningless tune she didn't remember learning. Because.
Because that promotion meant she'd never have to visit the frontlines again! She'd even managed to dispose of the Type 95 – the cursed Computation Orb that allowed her to perform unimaginable feats of magic, so long as she sang Being X's praises – in the trap she'd set for that American bitch, which meant not even the usage of a unique and powerful piece of equipment could be rolled out to force her back into the fight.
She'd won!
She'd been giddy for well over a week at this point, and everyone she talked to, from Rudersdorf and Rerugen to the 203rd and Viktoriya, had been either confused or terrified because of it.
But she could hardly care. She'd even done something risque and was using Viktoriya's warm thighs as a headrest – after years of sleeping together in the same tent on the Eastern front, what did something like this matter?
She hadn't even waited for Viktoriya's full reply – she'd made sure Viktoriya wasn't going to immediately refuse and then gone ahead and done it.
She sighed again. Everything was-
Knock knock!
Tanya's eyes flickered open, her good mood undamped even by the interruption of her lap pillow. She swung up from the bench they'd been sharing and walked towards the door, her eyes flickering towards Viktoriya for only a moment as she opened it – her face was really red-
"Miss Degurechaff? I have the chocolate that was requested?"
Tanya's gaze flicked back towards the open door. A woman in her twenties, carrying a plate full of chocolate bars. She hardly cared that she hadn't ordered them – her love of chocolate was well known at this point, so someone had undoubtedly ordered it for her as a form of thanks. It had already happened a few times during the week.
Tanya grinned and took the plate in both hands, her mouth almost visibly watering. "Thank-"
"Miss Degurechaff, please, I want to ask…"
Tanya's gaze flicked up to the woman's face and she studied it for a moment.
Her gaze softened as she stared into the eyes of the woman. Though their color was unique, what stood out more was how pained they seemed to be. Tanya froze her motion to close the door. "Yes, miss…?"
The woman smiled gratefully, and Tanya smiled back. Clearly, she had brought the chocolate over as a pretense to try and network or gain some insight into how to rise through the military. She didn't seem to have many medals or a particularly high rank, but-
"I wanted to know…"
She pushed past the opened door, a knife suddenly in her hands.
"How do you feel knowing you've helped destroy the lives of millions of people?!"
Tanya's eyes widened. No-!
-OxOxO-
He stared down at the insignificant speck. At the thing that so dared to lounge around in a train car, resting in her adjunct's lap, as if she weren't continuing to plague him, an omnipotent God, with her mere existence.
He sat down and let himself be cushioned by the clouds surrounding him, fighting the urge to grumble.
Despite his brooding, the great calm he'd felt envelop him when he'd smoked some 'burning bush' had not yet left him. After once more deciding that beating her by either reading some insignificant mortal's ideas about philosophy or by finding one of the few deities of philosophy and discussing the subject with them were both ideas he couldn't stomach, he'd decided to simply stare down at her and contemplate his next action.
It seemed that even in the face of overwhelming odds, dozens of enemy mages, and an unwinnable war, Tanya von Degurechaff was simply incapable of bowing her head to him.
The 'victory' of the Empire – a return to the status quo after far too long spent fighting – along with her continued obstinance was what had spurred his decision to take a load off.
He sat up from the bed of clouds he'd fallen into, his attempts to keep calm warring with his frustration. No.
No, she'd ruined a lot – more than she knew – simply by refusing to pray to him. Her presence in that world – giving enough people the right ideas about war and conflict and the future – had meant that the Empire hadn't fallen, which would completely skew the timeline out of order…
He snarled. No, with everything she had ruined… she was not ruining his high!
Once again, he stared down at her as she rose from her lounging, fuming at her while she opened the door.
She was hardly giving him the slightest thought. She hadn't been at all in the past week, unless it was the most pride-soaked bragging he'd ever felt in his life.
And as he stared down at her… Being X smiled.
Yes, this wonderful high he was on had given him an equally wonderful idea.
Punch her.
Yes, he would, quite simply, punch her. Not physically, of course, but he'd send his will and anger at her in the form of a fist – not that she'd see it. And it would hurt her…
Probably. He wasn't sure he actually cared right now, but he did know one thing for certain:
Punching her would make him feel good.
No matter how much he'd probably regret it later, he didn't care.
With a smirk on his face, he wound up a punch, his smile growing larger and larger as he continued to build power, until-
WHAM!
His fist hit the image of her being pushed onto the ground by some girl, and he guffawed at the way she tumbled end over end into the side of their small room. She hit the wall, collapsed to the ground, and didn't move from there.
"Haha!" She was just laying there on the floor, pathetically, undoubtedly confused and feeling quite unwell thanks to his punch.
His smile didn't waver at all, even when she… kept laying there. She wasn't even struggling to get up.
Being X tilted his head, and his smile finally began to fade.
She wasn't moving, and, now that really he looked at her, he noticed the presence of a knife he hadn't seen, and-
Being X felt his mouth pucker – quite a novel experience for him – as he realized that the girl's body did not have a soul.
It seemed he'd killed her.
Hmm.
He caught a brief glimpse of what he thought was her soul speeding towards an ethereal, blindingly bright event horizon that marked the edge of his far-reaching sight that could perceive every single world held in his grasp at once.
And then she was gone.
He breathed in deeply, trying desperately not to rage uncontrollably, and then…
Then, Being X collapsed back into the clouds around him. He would fix the situation, of course, but he was going to smoke a lot more burning bush before he even contemplated tracking down that wayward soul.
-OxOxO-
It was bright. Too bright.
She tried to throw up and couldn't.
She tried to hold her head in her hands and couldn't.
She tried to do anything and couldn't.
She was moving too fast. She didn't feel any wind, but her sense of balance told her all of her blood was pooling in her legs and she should be dead from the G-forces and then the feeling disappeared and she just sensed that she was moving too fast.
She could hardly comprehend what was moving past her – no, she couldn't even do that much. She was moving, unable to even think, a barnacle clinging to the side of an airplane as it tunneled into the core of the Earth, a photon acting not as a wave or a particle but as a third thing, a-
It was too fast.
She saw colors – blinding white and unending darkness and blue squared and green-magenta and inverse-brown and every color she'd ever seen compressed into a single impossible color and-
She tasted wood paint and plastic and gunpowder and possibility and the perfected idea of a platonic solid and magma and-
She smelled a pillow and grass and the sun and the fender of a car and home and the color pink and unwashed water and the constant reformation of a small rural town across the eons and decay and progress and-
She heard nothing and everything. It was a cacophony that burst eardrums she didn't have. It was a silence that painted her ears bright blue and swallowed up her outsides. It was things she couldn't have ever put a name to, except their names introduced themselves and then waved goodbye and left her feeling hollow and-
She could feel her skin going to war with her muscles, her heart and brain dueled on a tightrope made from her lungs and stomach, and none of it existed at the same time and left her feeling naked and alone and vulnerable and-
And then she could scream and she did, because she was spinning end over end through some giant empty void and if she didn't stop soon she was going to puke her guts out and she couldn't even see properly an-
"OOF!"
She had collided into something, but that hardly slowed her down. When she did start to slow down-
Energy Magic Bright Light BEING X!
"You fucking bastard!" she shouted when she wasn't dry-retching, "I won, so you decided to kill me!? What… what even was that, you son of a bitch! I won! Send me back, you self-important piece of shit!"
She continued to cuss the bastard out, even as the power surrounding her faded somewhat. Where the hell had he taken her? She jerked her head around, trying to figure out what was going on and where that bastard was so she could denounce him face to face, at least.
She'd known, even if she sometimes speculated – hoped – that maybe his abilities were limited to cursing people and reincarnating them, he held all of the power in their 'relationship,' that if he wanted to wipe her off the face of the planet instead of 'converting' her he'd probably do so. That hadn't stopped her from doing her best to seek out her own security and spiting him, but now…
Her anger, her fury, built. It was all gone. Thirteen years of her second life wiped away in an instant. The bright light hovering in front of her began to coalesce, and her mouth jerked open, ready to fling every last philosophical and logical argument denouncing the existence of god, every invective she could think of, and the kitchen sink at the farce.
"Hey, my phone!"
She was confused for long enough for the being to finish coalescing, and her waiting mouth spat out the first thing on her mind, tinged with malice and no small amount of confusion.
"Why the hell do you look like a horse?"
Being X spared her a glance and then turned. She jerked her head back, towards the voice that had said something about a phone-
Tanya blinked, confused, as she beheld the thing she'd slammed into on her way into here… wherever that was.
He looked to be your average teenage kid from Japan. The logo on his t-shirt wasn't familiar to her, but what was he doing here?
Then, horrified understanding dawned on her.
"I can't believe it. You're isekai-ing some poor kid? Or is he like me? Who'd you make murder him? His parents?"
"M- Murder? No, Arceus didn't- and who are you, anyway?"
She rounded again on Being X, who had enveloped the kid's phone in some bright light. "I wouldn't use that if I were you," she cautioned as it floated back to him, "last time Being X messed with something I had on me, he cursed it."
The kid seemed to be growing more and more confused, looking at her like she was insane. She rounded on Being X, who was still ignoring her. She could feel her anger building.
"My words yet remain true, Lucas. Seek out all Pokemon, and thou shalt find-"
"Pokemon?"
The two turned to her once more, looking confused. Tanya doubted they were as confused as her, because had Being X just mentioned… Pokemon?
Tanya rapidly tried to figure out exactly what Being X's game was, because she certainly wasn't seeing it. "What… Why drag me through all that… stuff?" she finally settled on calling the kaleidoscope she'd been dragged through, "What could Pokemon possibly have to do with anything?"
Being X's face didn't change, though Tanya got the sense that he had realized something.
She scowled. Was he putting that feeling in her head? Probably – he'd never shied from reading her mind before. One more tally on the long list of reasons she hated this fucking-
"Get out of my head!" she screamed. Shouting wasn't conducive to her situation, of course, but after whatever she'd just been dragged through, for however long it had been – because she didn't know, felt she couldn't know – she didn't care. "I finally had it all! My stable, peaceful life was in reach, and then you yank me here and try to convince some kid that Pokemon is real? Why? WHY!"
Her words rang through the empty space, and Tanya ground her teeth. She was on the verge of- something, she didn't know, but the look of incredulity was going to send her over-
"Lucas. The door for thine travel closes. I shall explain this to thee at a later date. Go now."
Light began to form around Being X – an impressive amount of light – and Tanya figured if she was going to strike him, it had to be now.
She took in a deep breath and reached for her mana. It was incredibly inadvisable to try and use magic without a computation orb. The human mind couldn't do equations fast enough for use in modern combat, the inefficiency meant you couldn't fly, and there was a very real chance of blowing her hand off or her chest open.
She aimed, building her power and ignoring the pain.
It didn't matter. She wasn't getting out of this with words, which meant she had to try something.
Just as the light, the pressure, the power surrounding Being X burst, she released her own spell, her eyes squeezed shut due to the light but sure that her aim was true-
The light dimmed, and her eyes flew open, hoping that something, anything had happened…
She grimaced and continued glaring at Being X. There wasn't any sign that the thing in front of her had been impacted in the slightest.
He turned his attention to her. He loomed large in the vast expanse of infinite gray. She opened her mouth to challenge him, to repeat that she would never pray to him-
"Welcome to my realm located beyond both time and space. I am that which humans call Arceus. Perhaps we could have a conversation?"
Tanya scowled automatically.
That… that was new. What was his plan?
"Why bother talking? Just read my mind like the first time we met," she groused.
He stared at her, through her, and hummed a discordant note. "Reading your mind without your permission would be… rude."
Tanya continued to glare at Being X, wondering what the hell his game was. Why even ask her to have a conversation? "What's your game? You've never asked, never done anything even close to this."
He paused, for a moment. "You seem to believe I am an entity called 'Being X'? That is not a God I am familiar with. Perhaps describe-"
"Quit it with the charade! That kid isn't even here anymore."
Being X didn't say anything back to her, and she continued glaring. After a few moments of silence, he sighed. "If you do not wish to converse, why intrude upon my domain? How do you know of Pokemon yet think them immaterial?" Being X asked.
She stayed silent and still, besides expressing her disdain for the last, ridiculous question.
The void around her grew colder. "If you do not wish to speak, then I shall have to reincarnate thee."
Tanya blinked. "Wait just like that? No… monologuing about the waning faith of humanity, or my stubbornness?"
Being X… no, it seemed to grow more curious at her second question, but it nodded all the same. "Yes. If you were not reincarnated, and I did not focus on ensuring your integrity, your soul would deteriorate. It needs a body to inhabit."
If… this really was Being X, it was doing a very good job of not acting like it. "I…" she started to say, intent on answering his first question.
Why was she there? She'd been about to eat that delicious chocolate, she-
Her eyes flew open. "I… died. Again."
The realization took her remaining anger and doused it. That girl with the weird eyes had jumped at her with a knife, which meant she must have been stabbed to death. Without the Type 95 or even a Type 97 – all of the 203rd's had been confiscated to be taken back to Schugel – she didn't have a chance against a fully grown woman.
Well, at least she didn't remember being stabbed very well – Being X had made sure she remembered every excruciating detail of being hit and run over by a train. At the very least, this death wouldn't become a recurring nightmare.
"My apologies," this… Arceus said in a mournful tone that she half-believed. She shrugged helplessly.
"You… asked about Being X, and Pokemon?" she said, more to herself than Arceus, "Being X claimed to be God. I didn't believe him, so he gave me a new life and Hell-on-Earth to go with it. Pokemon…"
She shrugged, shaking her head. "It's a… kid's game. A media franchise. One of the most popular in the entire world. It was nearly a quarter decade old in my first life," she explained.
Her words hung in the air, and Arceus's tail flicked through the air in what she assumed was frustration. She continued.
"I played the first one." Even she, with how focused she had been on applying herself and reaching a secure job and stable life, had been unable to escape the craze. "There are… a lot more."
It shook its head. "This Being X… which God did he claim to be?"
Tanya opened her mouth to respond, only to shut it again as she thought back to her interactions with Being X. "I… don't believe he ever explicitly said which one," she finally settled on saying, "but he was clearly going for the style of the Old Testament one."
Arceus reeled back a bit. "The Abrahamic one?"
She nodded slowly, and Arceus sighed tiredly. "That… I do believe I know him as well. I use one of his creations in many of my own worlds after all."
Tanya raised an eyebrow. "Your worlds?"
It nodded stiffly. "Indeed. The Pokemon you know to be fiction are reality. My reality. It seems he has stolen my creations."
"Huh," Tanya said.
"But," Arceus explained, "this is an opportunity. I currently… owe him, for being allowed to use the humans he inherited in my works. Perhaps I can even utilize people from his world…"
Tanya didn't like the sound of that. "In what way?"
It blinked in realization. "Oh, no, not you! My chosen champions are few and far between, in the grand scheme of my universes, and all realities have been growing far more unstable, as of late. I require help."
She raised an unimpressed eyebrow – this seemed to be the second entity claiming to be divine that couldn't manage its resources well.
It sighed, unaware of her internal dialogue. "What heroes I do have have been run ragged – do you know of Ash Ketchum? Or Red?"
"Yes to the former," she replied. It nodded. "I cannot simply create a Pokemon or a hero of that caliber – it has been an uncountably long time since I was capable of that," it said wistfully.
With a shake of its head, it continued. "Shuffling people around is tricky and requires specific circumstances to be met, while pulling in people from a different reality is a gamble… but the chances of success from pulling people in would be far higher if others knew about Pokemon."
She bit back her first response – to tell him to find a different way, because she'd had her life destroyed because of the capricious whims of some otherworldly being, and though she didn't often complain about circumstances she couldn't control, it sucked to have your life uprooted.
On the other hand, if she helped Arceus, and this wasn't some elaborate trick by Being X, maybe…
Maybe she could finally make her life stable and peaceful?
Arceus shook its head once more. "But that will take time to figure out. For now…"
It chuckled. "It seems I forgot to ask your name. My apologies. What do you call yourself?"
"Tanya von Degurechaff," she replied.
It's face didn't change, but she could feel that it was smiling despite that fact. "Tanya von Degurechaff. Though your presence here was out of your control, I thank you for informing me of what 'Being X' has done."
She nodded her head, and a silence stretched on. She wondered if it would send her back…
And then she reconsidered her question. Did she even want to go back?
She had died, which meant she wasn't getting her second life back, which meant being at the mercy of Being X once more. Considering he'd found someone to kill her even on that train while in the middle of the Empire, even if he did put her back in that life, he could seemingly have her killed at any time. Getting sent to hell, reincarnated without her memories, or put into some third life in some desperate attempt to convert her despite having had to fight in a world war with magic all sounded like horrible options…
She looked up at Arceus. They especially sounded like bad options considering she might have a much better one in front of her.
"Arceus, I have a few questions. After which… could I ask you for a favor?"
It nodded. "Of course."
"Why do you need outside help? Can't your humans take care of the problems you have?"
It let out a single laugh. "People… I have found that most people, like you, want to live their lives in peace. People sometimes decide that living in peace means ignoring problems until they do permanent damage or can't be undone," he said sorrowfully.
She nodded as it continued. "On the other hand, Pokemon love conflict. Most evolve to enjoy battle. Unfortunately, that isn't always the best way to solve problems," he admitted. Tanya could attest to that, considering how the war had just ended.
"Then," she continued, "How much difference can a single person make?" she asked. Arceus tilted its head at her after a moment. "How much difference have you made in your world?"
She opened her mouth… and shut it after a moment. She certainly hadn't saved the Empire singlehandedly. Her ideas on war – stolen from and influenced by the future – may have altered the thoughts of her superiors, and her tactics may have ensured the survival of quite a few people, but could she say she's single handedly changed the future of the entire world?
Hardly. If she hadn't had the idea, someone else would have. Her presence might have changed things, but history would have played out, with or without her.
Of course, she also wasn't being helped by the entity that had first reincarnated her, so perhaps she could have done something that grand with a benefactor that important behind her.
Regardless, her opinion about history and how little a role she had in it wasn't the answer Arceus wanted, and pissing off something claiming to be divine had worked out very poorly for her last time, so she simply said, "Point taken."
Silence, again, as Tanya deliberately considered her words. "Are there… any limits to what I can ask?"
Arceus chuckled. "For this information? Anything."
Tanya merely raised an eyebrow. Oh, she really did doubt that.
"Protection from Being X?"
It inclined its head. "Up to a point." Tanya frowned. "What point?" she pressed.
"I shall protect thee as if thou were one of my own."
Tanya nodded and kept her expression neutral. That was… disheartening. She recognized the logic of the situation, obviously – Arceus didn't owe her if it didn't want to, and she had no way to force it to protect her.
Still, it altered the plan she was coming up with.
"Could he evade your protection without you knowing?" she asked.
It took a moment, but it did answer. "Perhaps. However, the speed at which he could search for your soul without alerting me and my creations to his presence would take a long time – years, or even decades. Unless you called out to him."
"Called out to him?"
Arceus inclined its head. "Indeed. Your soul originates from his realm, so he will have some sense as to the reality it resides in, at least. Calling out to him will hone his sense of direction… such as that energy you directed at me while I sent Lucas to his new mission."
She bowed her head. "My apologies. I thought-"
"All is forgiven. I am not unfamiliar with how those held against their will act against their captors."
She thanked it for the forgiveness and continued their conversation. "I… for this favor, could you send me to one of your worlds?" It would, of course, be a pain to get reincarnated for a third time, but the benefits would heavily outweigh the risks… assuming she got some help from Arceus determining where she would end up.
Arceus reeled back a little bit and then nodded eagerly. "Of course. That is certainly something within my capabilities. Is… that all?"
She quickly shook her head. "Ah, well, could I specify what kind?"
It nodded again, and she started to talk. "I want… a quiet, peaceful life, similar to my first life."
It tilted its head. "May I read thy mind and soul?"
She shook her head, and then Arceus tilted its head. "Then, how shall I determine which world is similar to your first life?"
"I'll describe it, of course," she replied, "And you can ask questions."
It agreed, and so she explained what she remembered of her first life. Japan, her homeland. History as she understood it.
She… honestly hadn't realized just how much of her first life she remembered. It had felt like her memory had been slipping away from her as the years of war and strife took their toll on her, and it was quite… refreshing to reminiscence.
Of course, Arceus did have questions, and some of them were… odd, to say the least.
"Do extraterrestrials exist?"
"I don't have a clue."
"Has artificial life been created?"
"A sheep got cloned, if that's what you mean."
"How many types were there in that… franchise?"
"Uh… I don't remember. Definitely more than ten."
"Do platypuses exist?"
"Yes… why?"
In the end, after her recollection and Arceus's questions, it felt as if well over an hour had passed. It'd even managed to get her to discuss her second life as well. In the end…
"I do not have any that match precisely. That is only to be expected, considering making a world without any of my own creations would break the agreements I have with their creators… but even with that in mind, I do not have any exact matches," Arceus said.
"However," it said, cutting off her sigh of exasperation, "I do have a few… experiments that are much closer."
"Experiments?" she asked cautiously.
Arceus nodded. "Indeed. I prefer my worlds to have more flexibility and change to encourage growth. The world you described seeks growth on the basis that solid foundations of stability are required for growth."
It shrugged as best it could, given it was a horse-thing. "These experiments are similar to your world – they certainly will allow you to reach the kind of job you described seeking in your last two lives."
She nodded eagerly – that was all she wanted.
Then she narrowed her eyes. "I won't have to be some 'hero' like you mentioned earlier, right?"
Arceus began to exude some kind of positive emotion that she could somehow taste. It was… mirth?
"I certainly won't place you into a situation that requires thee to become a hero and wouldn't dream of forcing the role upon thee. Your choices shall ultimately be your own."
She raised her eyebrow at that but bit back her response that she certainly hadn't been anything close to a hero in her last life and wasn't going to be one in this one. The mirth in the air was literally palpable and she was starting to feel drained, after all the talking and her trip through that kaleidoscope.
Arceus continued. "Of course, if what you want above all is stability, these experimental worlds do not compare to some I have. If what you seek above all is stability, I could offer you some other options?" it asked.
She weighed the offer in her mind for a moment. If all she wanted was stability…
She shook her head after a moment. No, as much as a life with absolutely no chance for conflict would be wonderful, that wasn't really an option for her.
Tanya was but one insignificant life, after all.
No matter if Arceus would 'protect her as if she were his own,' Arceus and Being X were far from perfect, all powerful gods. She knew that meant whatever time she spent in this third world was likely to be relatively brief.
Being X wasn't logical, but he also wasn't completely stupid, considering he'd analyzed her words and beliefs when deciding which world to reincarnate her into. If he had thousands or millions or more universes at his beck and call, he would understand just how hard it would be to find her on his own.
Therefore, he would come to Arceus looking for her, and Arceus wanted access to 'heroes' who could act as its running dogs to patch holes in its system. If they came to an accord, she certainly wouldn't have any say in it. Arceus could even offer her on a silver platter to Being X in return for more concessions.
On the other hand, if Arceus didn't offer her up, she doesn't know the lengths Being X would go to to get her back. If they fought, at a point when 'all realities had been growing far more unstable?' That would be a bad idea for a rational actor, and Arceus, at least, seemed rational.
In the end, regardless of how it happened, she wouldn't have any say in whatever deal they worked out. Her fate, in the long term, was completely at their mercy. She didn't have any hope of overcoming either using force – and though Arceus had said something about wanting to do battle with that Lucas kid once he sought out all Pokemon, it probably meant in a Pokemon battle.
Tanya did not remember a lot about those animal-catching games, least of all how to beat a self-proclaimed god at its own game.
With her long term future out of her hands, her goals in this third life would be to maximize the value of her short-term future and prepare as best she could for the long-term. She had no way of knowing what Being X would do when he got her, but if he decided to reincarnate her again, obtaining skills that might help her survive was a viable way to achieve the second of her goals.
If she was going to prepare for Being X's inevitable and unfortunate return to her life, going somewhere more stable was out of the question. It was doubtful Being X would choose to send her somewhere she couldn't 'grow her faith,' after all, which meant she was more likely to find relevant skills in a less stable world.
Furthermore, a world where she could apply her skills would mean maximizing the value of her short-term future as well. The better she did at that, the more time and energy she could put into working on her second goal.
Of course, if that Lucas kid being sent to seek out Pokemon and Arceus's discussion 'shuffling people around' being tricky and requiring specific circumstances to be met, perhaps she could find a way to seize her long term future away from Arceus and Being X? She didn't imagine traveling worlds or dimensions was even remotely easy, much less what the logistics of reincarnating herself would be, but it stood to reason that such opportunities would not be present in a world where things were more stable.
"Thank you for the offer, but… I would prefer a world more similar to one of my own," she said. Arceus inclined its head, and the great rings of light she'd seen when Lucas had disappeared faded into existence and began growing in power.
"One last question. Would you like any help from me? There is a risk that, if Being X were to hide, he could track my location and perhaps locate you that way, but I would not begrudge you the aid after what you have done for me… and the lives you've lived."
Tanya didn't even have to think about that one. "No. Despite… I never prayed to Being X for aid sincerely. I won't call out to you either."
It nodded once more. "I respect that. Still, if you change your mind, there are a few locations across the world I am sending you where you could ask… and if it is an emergency, all you need to do is cry out for help with the intention of summoning me."
"Alright," she said as the lights started to become blinding, "but I won't. Thank you, Arceus."
"Fare thee well, Tanya von Degurechaff."
-OxOxO-
Tanya couldn't help but grin. It… was lamentable, that she'd lost her second life, but in this one, Being X wouldn't be able to interfere and ruin a thing. Perhaps she'd been born into an actual family this time, instead of an orphanage?
Wait, what was that familiar sound? Was it…
Well, it hardly mattered. It was time to open her eyes and take stock of her surroundings.
She did.
SPLASH!
Choking and gasping for breath, Tanya tore at the water and desperately tried not to drown. Why the hell was she in the water? Where were her parents? Why could she swim?
Wait, she could swim?
And as she looked down at herself, and at her hands, and at the water she had landed in, and thought back to her conversation with Arceus, Tanya came to the conclusion that she had not been reincarnated, because Arceus had never mentioned the word and Tanya had just assumed that of course she'd be reincarnated, because that was what had happened last time!
Resisting the urge to cuss Arceus out for not telling her this little tidbit – this wasn't her fault – Tanya focused on not drowning as much as she could, because she'd just landed in a new world with animals that could use magic and the only thing she had were the (wet) clothes on her back.
-OxOxO-
A/N 1: And thus begins Tanya's Battle for Peace! I'm fairly sure I asked about potentially making a Pokemon crossover in the A/N of Third Time's the Charm at some point, and it has finally arrived. Thank the Patrons.
I've got a rough outline of where I want the story to head and a list of Pokemon she may or may not end up catching, along with an unnecessary amount of worldbuilding that will probably go unmentioned.
Also, fun fact: if you look at the real world locations that the regions are based on, and then calculate the number of regions our world would have if the pokemon regions were analogous, the number of regions ranges from 275 to 3,600, while the number of pokemon ranges from 30,800 to 399,000, depending on if you are using the human population or the regions area as the basis.
If you take into account some of the spinoff regions from non-mainline games, then the regions go up from 423 to 4500 while the number of Pokemon goes down from 28,000 to 303,000.
A/N 2: If you'd like to donate to support me monetarily, search for Sugarcane Soldier on the website of the Patrons.
A/N 3: Thank you to WarmasterOku, Afforess, and Blackeagle91 for supporting this story and everything else I write.