It was a stormy night in Brockton Bay, the kind of night that seemed to mirror the turmoil within Taylor Hebert's heart. The Boat Graveyard loomed ahead, a place of desolation and decay—much like her own life had become. Bullied, betrayed, and broken, she sought solace in the shadows, away from the harshness of a world that seemed to reject her without reason.
Her thin jacket did little to shield her from the wind's biting cold. She wrapped her arms around herself, trudging through the skeletal remains of forgotten ships, each twisted hull a silent monument to the city's slow decay. A bolt of lightning tore through the sky, briefly illuminating the ruined landscape in stark relief.
Then, something impossible happened.
A golden radiance, purer than the storm's electric fury, shimmered in the air before her. It was warm, ancient, and undeniably divine. The light grew in intensity, coalescing into a shape—a being unlike anything Taylor had ever seen.
A quadrupedal figure of pristine white, its golden wheel-like structure hovering behind its body like a celestial halo. Its presence was overwhelming, filling the very air with a solemn majesty.
She barely had time to gasp before a voice echoed within her mind, vast and knowing.
"Taylor Hebert."
The sound wasn't something she heard with her ears; it resonated within her very soul. She knew, instinctively, that this being was beyond human, beyond parahuman, beyond even the Endbringers.
"I am Arceus, the creator of all Pokémon."
Taylor's breath hitched. A dozen questions battled for dominance in her mind, but before she could voice them, Arceus continued.
"You have endured much, my chosen one. The trials you have faced have not gone unnoticed. In recognition of your courage and resilience, I bestow upon you a gift—a gift that few mortals have ever received."
Warmth surged through her. It wasn't just in her body—it filled her very essence, her spirit. It was knowledge, instinct, power. She staggered as the sheer weight of it all threatened to crush her under its enormity.
Taylor's mind expanded, understanding blossoming within her like a thousand radiant stars. This wasn't just power. This was potential.
A single thought transformed her.
A ripple of energy pulsed through her body, and suddenly she was changing. Her human form dissolved into light, shifting and expanding. She felt her being grow, stretching into something greater, something cosmic.
Her new body was massive, dwarfing even the ruined ships around her. She was no longer human—she was Eternatus. No, not just Eternatus. Eternamax Eternatus.
A being of infinite energy, a living embodiment of the cosmos itself.
She felt the pulse of the universe, the shifting dance of stars and galaxies coursing through her elongated, skeletal form. A tail of pure energy trailed behind her, and her very presence warped the sky. She could see in ways she never had before—light, heat, gravity, the fabric of reality itself bending around her presence.
Instinctively, she lifted her massive, clawed arms, and power answered.
A swirling mass of Cosmic Energy coalesced at her core. Stars burned in miniature within her chest, their brilliance a fraction of her newfound might. The storm above was nothing compared to the storm within her.
Taylor roared.
The sound was not just heard—it was felt. It rippled across Brockton Bay, shattering windows miles away. And then, she released her power.
A beam of radiant destruction lanced from her form, a cataclysmic eruption of Eternabeam. It carved through the Boat Graveyard like a divine blade, disintegrating rusted metal and crumbling structures in an instant. The very ground trembled as space itself shuddered under the raw force of the attack.
When the light faded, what was left was... pristine. The decay, the ruin—gone. The land was fresh, untouched, renewed.
Taylor breathed, her vast form vibrating with lingering energy. Then, as easily as she had become Eternamax, she willed herself back. The cosmic energies shrank inward, folding neatly into her human form. She stumbled as she landed on the untouched ground, feeling the phantom hum of limitless power still coiled inside her.
She stared at her own hands, trembling. She had done that.
She wasn't just a scared, broken girl anymore.
She was more.
She was everything.
Arceus gazed upon her with knowing eyes.
"This power is yours, Taylor Hebert. You may take any form, embody any Pokémon—real or imagined. Wield their strength, their wisdom, their essence. But remember this gift is not given lightly. Your choices, your will, shall shape your destiny. What will you do with this power?"
Taylor looked at the horizon, where the first slivers of dawn pierced through the dying storm.
What would she do?
She knew the answer.
She would change Brockton Bay.
She would bring justice to those who had none.
And no one—not Emma, not the Empire, not Coil, not even the Endbringers themselves—would stop her.
The Emissary of the Stars had awoken.
And the world would never be the same.