Chapter 15: Facing Infinity!
Another week passed in which hardly anything significant happened. Marshadow and Aurora trained non-stop, knowing that they would have their next league battle the day after the raid on Epsilon. Apart from training, almost nothing happened, except for one very disturbing event. But since a bright flash of lightning had flashed through the land just minutes before, Aurora quickly calmed down and simply put the event down to a Plothole. What had happened was that there was a knock on her door, just about a minute after the Plothole, and when she opened the door, there was nobody there. Only a torn piece of paper lay on her doormat, with no sign of its sender. Confused, Aurora looked at the text to see that symbols had been cut or scratched into the paper between the dirt and the tears. She immediately recognized that it was a message written in Old Kasonian.
"Derelio yi ni danio, arna yi ni arnu. Seran dana danio yi ras tre."
The last of these words seemed distorted. Of course, Aurora immediately deciphered what the message meant.
"Body is not soul, inside is not outside. Nothing is stronger than the soul but it."
Marshadow quickly found out about the letter, of course, and both of them thought about it for a while. Because although it was fairly certain that the letter was not really addressed to Aurora, someone had nevertheless created it for someone. And why were the words not written normally? Above all, of course, what did this text mean? But without any results, Team Polarna vatra quickly discarded their thoughts.
The day that the league leadership and three trusted teams had been planning for so long soon dawned. On Thursday morning, the gates of the tower were closed, many teams stood confused in front of the entrance, where Team Fossil were already waiting, deep in conversation with Team Slash. When Polarna vatra arrived, Aurorus immediately called Aurora and Marshadow over. Shortly afterwards, Tyrantrum had a speech.
"So, you all want to go to the tower to train, we know that. You're wondering why you can't. At least I hope so, because none of you should know. Today we, us being Team Slash, Team Nordika and Team Fossil, are calling on all of you to join us in a major raid! All teams will leave the tower behind in search of Epsilon, near and far! Two teams always go together, no one leaves the earshot of others. We want to make sure that all of Epsilon's supporters hiding among us have no chance of warning their master! Epsilon cannot count on this daring action, in which the tower remains almost, but just almost, unguarded! Only Team Polarna vatra will stay behind as guards, since Aurora's fight with Epsilon makes them a safe bet in terms of trust, and both have shown the necessary strength!"
He then listed a list of teams that should go together in search of the Plot Emperor. Soon all the teams had disappeared, except for Team Slash, Team Fossil and of course Team Polarna vatra.
"Okay, you two. I'll lock the tower again as soon as you're inside, for safety reasons. You'll find food in the canteen, which will be more than enough for the day. Otherwise, just don't break anything and keep an eye on the reactor."
"One more question. I don't want to seem rude, but why wasn't Team Nordika here at all when they were entrusted?"
Tyrantrum answered Marshadow's question immediately.
"They left already. They are the strongest and most trustworthy team we have! Even if someone were to tell Epsilon, they already have had a good chance of finding him before."
Marshadow just nodded in response as Aurorus unlocked the door to the large tower.
"We'll be back at 6 p.m. Don't get too bored until then."
Around three hours later, Aurora and Marshadow were sitting on one of the training floors, Marshadow was eating, while Aurora was already resisting Aurorus' last request...
"It's so insanely boring here! I didn't think it would be this bad! Why did we agree to this? We could be hunting Epsilon right now!"
Her team partner, on the other hand, seemed much more relaxed.
"A day without much action is a good thing. And we can train undisturbed."
"But we could have helped with the search! Why do we need a guard, the tower is locked anyway! Does Aurorus really think that anyone is going to try breaking in?"
"Better safe than sorry. Come on, Aurora, let's go to floor 38 or something. Training seems even more real in a real ranked ring, don't you think?"
The Ninetales rose from the bench, missing enthusiasm.
"Fine by me. Let's go."
Following this plan, both of them trained on floor 38 for the next hour. Marshadow's plan had actually worked. Aurora's boredom seemed to have completely disappeared as she continued to fight. But Marshadow was also motivated to win the current duel.
""atch out! You're not prepared for this new technique, Aurora!"
"Oh, you think so? Then show me what you've got!"
She had barely spoken when a large, shadowy hole appeared in the middle of the arena. It almost looked like a portal.
"What is that? You weren't lying, that looks powerful!"
But when she saw Marshadow's eyes, she felt shivers.
"I am not doing that!"
Suddenly, a being emerged from the shadowy portal in the middle of the room and... looked around in confusion. Both Aurora and Marshadow recognized the Pokemon.
"Eternatus! Get out of here!"
The massive dragon was now floating in the room, towering over both of his opponents in terms of size. Only because the training floors were so huge he could fit in here.
"Marshadow and Aurora. Why are you two here? I was told no one would be present! This tower was supposed to be unguarded!"
"Was it? Who told you that?"
Eternatus lit up.
"Master Epsilon, of course. You really thought you had something with your great raid, didn't you?"
Epsilon knew about the search? But in that case it was destined to fail! Not only that, he even saw an opportunity to reach his own goals. He saw that the League tower, which held the reactor that was currently Kira Town's life insurance, was unguarded. Or at least almost.
"But your presence is irrelevant! Then I'll just take you out before I take on this city!"
/Music: Pokémon Rejuvenation - Xen Grunt Battle Theme/
A battle cry rang out as shadowy orbs began to circle Eternatus. What was happening here was not what Aurora had hoped for this day. And in those seconds the true meaning of things dawned on her: She and Marshadow now had to defeat Eternatus by themselves. They were the only thing that stood between Epsilon and the destruction of Kira Town.
But Aurora almost dared to get her hopes up. Eternatus was part of the Plot Elite, thus higher ranked than Marshadow, yet they still somewhat coexisted on eye-leel. That must mean that they both had similar powers, right? The shadow in question jumped out of the ground next to her at that moment, as if he could read her thoughts.
"Do your best, Aurora! Eternatus might very well be Epsilon's strongest warrior!"
"Thanks, Marshadow, I was just about to get my hopes up!"
Despite her cynical comment, she was focused enough to dodge the first of Eternatus' orbs.
"Watch out for his poison attacks! And try to use your ice moves!"
"Poison attacks? That asshole is a poison type?"
"And a dragon, yes!"
"Fuck me in particular I guess."
With the conversation now over, Aurora jumped over Eternatus with a huge leap, on the one hand to confuse him, and on the other to put distance between herself and Marshadow and thus not offer an easy target. However, the Dragon King showed that even a division gave him the space he needed, as a magic flame emanated from him as a kind of shock wave and spread throughout the room. Aurora just managed to create an ice wall in front of her, which melted away, but at least reduced the force with which Aurora herself was hit.
Marshadow had disappeared into the shadows on the other side of the battlefield and thus escaped. Orbs formed again, but this time they glowed in different colors. When Aurora saw this, she had an idea. Purple, red, light blue, pink, dark blue and yellow orbs were floating there. All of these were colors that represented different types of Pokemon. And that's exactly why she shot an ice beam, which Eternatus tried to dodge. However, he realized too late that he didn't even need to dodge, as the attack wasn't aimed at him. Instead, it hit a pink orb, which burst into bright light and wounded its summoner.
"I knew it! Marshadow, aim for the purple, pink or light blue orbs! They are Pokemon types, these three cause enormous damage to Eternatus himself!"
Angry that his combat system had been seen through so easily, a light shone around Endynalos.
"Recover? Really?"
"You two are nuisances! Get out of my way!"
A portal appeared on the ceiling, similar to the one that had brought the dragon here in the first place. He immediately climbed up.
"He wants to get to the top! Aurora, after him!"
Without hesitation, Marshadow also jumped into the portal and Aurora followed immediately. They quickly found themselves on floor 39.
"You really want to keep following me? Is this city so important to you? Well, then it is your own fault that I have to destroy you!"
With a loud roar, more orbs appeared around Eternatus. But unlike before, they were all gray in color.
"What good is your knowledge now when your vision is impared?"
A look around the room showed Aurora that Eternatus' statement was to be taken much more literally than she had first thought. Apart from the glowing red dragon itself, everything had lost its color and only shone in different shades of gray. Endynalos immediately created a protective shield and fired more attacks at Aurora and Marshadow. In the hope of hitting the right orbs, Aurora simply attacked some of them. But what she had not expected was that the explosion of her orb did not harm Endynalos. On the contrary. He seemed to recover.
"Healing orbs! Who is in power now?"
After a Flamethrower, that grazed Marshadow as both members of the team had expected it to go after Aurora, all the orbs shot out. There were many more than the last time, so Aurora was unable to dodge the second to last one. It exploded in a wall of flames and hit her critically. With her luck, it had of course been a fire orb. She could not avoid the last attack either, due to the recoil of this first attack. But against all expectations, her muscles relaxed when hit.
"He's also shooting healing orbs at us, Marshadow! If we figure out how to tell them apart, we can use that for our advantage!"
Several rocks missed the Ninetales by just centimeters.
"But you won't find out! You're like all mortals! If you can't rely on your vision, then you are useless!"
Even though it hurt to admit it, Aurora saw the truth in his words. In a fight in which colors were supposed to be her weapon, she could hardly manage without them. But unlike her, Marshadow already seemed to have an idea of what they could do now. And it was only through his sudden attack that she noticed the crystal hanging from the ceiling. Marshadow's blow caused cracks to sprout through the piece until it shattered. And suddenly all the colors returned.
"Killjoy! But you still won't win!"
For just a moment the fight returned to normal. Both parties had an open exchange of blows, attack against attack. And it quickly became clear that in such an exchange of blows, Team Polarna vatra could definitely have a chance! Eternatus was powerful, but he was also large and sluggish, which made it much harder for him to avoid attacks. After a few minutes, the familiar orbs returned. Between the familiar colors, orange orbs were now floating, obviously those that were intended for healing. But these were not what Aurora and Marshadow were targeting.
However, they were now whirling wildly around Endynalos, unlike before, where they stood very still. Blizzard was the answer to this. Aurora had counted four healing orbs, but seven that would effectively wound Endynalos. So the trade would be well worth it. And a whole barricade of energy now hit Endynalos. With a loud scream, he fell to the ground.
"Did we do it?"
But another red light around Eternatus dampened their joy. This time it lasted much longer, Aurora suspected that this time, Eternatus had to use recover twice. Another portal appeared in the ceiling, which the enemy entered and Team Polarna vatra followed...