CHAPTER 316 - ASCEND, CHILDREN OF CORONET V

Drip. Drip. Drip.

When she focused on something other than her own head, Mira could hear the sounds of the fifth layer resonating in the cavernous maw below that seemed to swallow everything, even sound. She hadn't ever been interested in physics, geology, et cetera, but Coronet gave her the damn creeps, which was better than the anxiety she'd thrown to another Mira deep into the recesses of her mind. Not only was she convinced she was behind where she was supposed to be and she feared that she'd be too late to arrive to the summit, but Chase and Denzel…

It looked really, really bad. Chase might not make it through this—

"Fuck. Off," she groaned, waving her good hand in front of her face as if she was chasing a Cutiefly away.

Alakazam stared at her with worry, but she quickly added, "Not you, uh, just myself."

The psychic shook his head, but knew that today wasn't the time to scold her about her health. What Mira had had to learn the hard way lately was that if you shirked off the majority of your negative feelings into your split personalities was that they'd get loud about it. She'd tried merging them together and splitting them off again in an attempt to remove their memories, but that hadn't worked, either.

You should know, anxious Mira said, that with power comes cost. Isn't that what Grace would say? I've found that to be rather accurate with us.

Maybe you deserve it, pained Mira chimed in. The hand was tough enough, but now I'm a pair of legs—

"We have to get to the summit faster, and we won't make it in time if I have to take breaks," Mira hissed. She desperately wanted to grab all of them and throw them over the damn cliffs. She reassured Alakazam again, wondering if they'd grow more annoying the more personality they were given.

Mira hadn't gone out of the mountain when carrying Chase and Denzel out due to their wounds, since she'd been to terrified of wasting time due to it being all strange and quicker in Coronet than the outside. In fact, she hadn't even gotten close to the exit. Instead, she'd let Pauline, Emilia and a few League Trainers escort them out while she'd retraced her steps to get back to the third layer. She found that climbing Coronet again up to the point she'd been at had been like swimming with the current— quick, easy and without much protest from forces outside of her control. The fourth and the current one had been much slower, especially due to the cold, which was now thankfully gone. Porygon 2 had been useful to summon fire, but it was Alakazam and Gardevoir who had pulled their weight.

You tortured me, cold Mira hissed. There was a constant shiver in her voice, even if Regice's influence was gone. Bitch.

This time, she responded in her head. Well, we all have to do our part, don't we? And you're fine, now.

What's your part? pained Mira asked. She could almost imagine the piercing glare down the back of her head. Complaining despite being in charge?

"Planning and taking back bits of your pain," she mentally jabbed a finger in her chest, "when you ask."

Damn it.

That had been out loud again.

That's just being a normal human being. You should try it, once in a while, background processing Mira chimed in, more cheerful than the others by a mile. She was usually in charge of small talk when the group— when Mira had to think and talk about something else.

Yeah, well, I guess I forgot, Mira internally sighed.

Luckily for her, they all mostly quieted down after this, allowing her some peace and quiet once more. Denzel… while Denzel was in a terrible state and would no doubt need to stay in the hospital for Arceus knew how long, Chase had been perforated by three high-speed rocks that essentially acted as bullets, one at his lower back and two on his right leg. Images of them traveling to Sunyshore and chatting around a fire flashed in her mind, and she chased away the need to purge the sadness by giving it to someone else. She found herself staring at the lidar to check up on where she should be going to distract herself. Admittedly, this floor was the worst for this device due to the endless chasms around every island suspended in mid-air. She peered into the dim glow of the lidar screen, her eyes tracing the intricate web of digital contours that mapped the cavern around her.

With a slight pinch and zoom gesture on the screen, she expanded a particularly dense cluster of data points, situating herself around a mile away from an opening in some kind of wall— the lidar's maximum range, as it was. She was lucky to be a Shard, or she doubted Coronet would have even allowed her to even get that close to what she assumed was the path to the next layer. Her legs sped up below her without her command, and she felt anxiety about the state of her uncle. A promise was a promise, but it'd be best if she was there when they first came upon him. There could be accidents in battle, and all the Miras gave her a collective nod.

That was easier than the last one, background processing Mira said with a bit of pep.

Don't jinx it. And stop sounding so damn happy, cold Mira chastised.

Legendaries, her head felt so crowded, but for better or worse, she was stuck with these people.

Stuck with herself.

—

Peramonkoro lays in her bed, unable to move. Not even her head can be turned, and so she stares right at the lavish ceiling. Through her bed canopy, she looks at it and her lip quirks upward. Painters, summoned from the farthest reaches of her empire, had adorned the plaster with designs of her conquest of Hisui and the northern shores of Johto.

Yet her time has come to an end, and she knows it was not through natural means.

There is a faint scent of a lavender candle emanating from her bedside table, as is custom to put when someone is on their deathbed. Her two Pokemon lament at her side, Garchomp and Goodra. They aren't ready to see her go, even at the age of sixty. Goodra can barely even stare at her, often retreating parts of her body into her enormous shell. They know something is wrong, yet she has instructed them to safeguard the Empire after her passing instead of lashing out. Her generals stand around her, having turned her bedroom into a den of Ekans, and she knows the one who poisoned her is present. She hopes— truly hopes that the Empire stays together and passes onto her son, but she knows Attuy is a weak man who cannot lead.

It is her fault. Through her paranoia, she did not teach him to lead out of fear of a coup, and yet here she was anyway.

"Empress," a general speaks. "It appears the prince has run off and escaped the capital. He cannot be found."

Her eye twitches. Did these bastards have him killed? Had whatever poison not taken away her voice, she would have been able to remedy this!

"Prince Kuttuy can therefore no longer ascend to the throne. So we ask," she says, spear against the ground, "that you designate a new heir among everyone in this room."

Pera internally laughs.

They did not want someone to succeed her.

They knew no answer would come, and so they would carve the Empire apart for themselves.

"Empress?" the general asked again.

She can only muster a long, hoarse breath. Chatter begins around her bed, yet she knows it's all make-believe. She cannot even communicate with her Pokemon any longer to tell them to rip these people to shreds.

This was how it ended, then. Her wish to create an Empire that would last onto eternity had been lost to the vultures.

Her eyes close, and she pictures Eme and Atreus.

The only people she had ever truly loved, her son included.

One, she had had killed. The other was nowhere to be found.

Empress Peramonkoro, first and last of her dynasty, dies on that bed.

Chase stirred from the depths of unconsciousness, and instantly felt like something was wrong, faster even than the pain shooting down every inch of his body. The sterile scent of antiseptic assaulted his senses, mingling with the distant hum of machinery. Blinking against the harsh glare of overhead lights, he found himself enveloped in a sterile cocoon of white, surrounded by the hurried shuffling of medical professionals clad in scrubs. Instantly, he wanted to get out of here, but he couldn't.

He couldn't move.

Something's wrong with Cece. That dream, if you could even call it that, meant something. Chase could feel it in his bones.

His mind groggily pieced together the fragments of memory as the faint voices of doctors reached his ears. The fight with that bitch Mars— the burning pain in his back that still remained and subsumed everything else, and the fact that the world was still in fucking danger. He tried to talk, but he could only slur his words. Had he been drugged? The doctors buzzed around him like concerned Combee, their voices a distant murmur as they exchanged urgent instructions and assessments. Their faces were a blur of concentration and concern, their eyes fixed on monitors displaying vital signs, their hands moving with practiced precision as they tended to his injuries.

Then, memories of Abomasnow hit him at full force. Shit, shit, shit! He so desperately wanted to talk to these fucking doctors, but instead, he saw them prick his leg with a needle he couldn't feel and he grew drowsy again.

Damn it all was his last thought as he fell asleep.

—

I could walk, now.

Maylene wouldn't let me, though, and neither would Honey, so I was still propped up on his back as I'd been for the last few hours. There were no more complaints from me, especially knowing that we'd just be slowed down if I was walking in this sand, or dirt, or whatever it was. The entire sixth layer was blanketed in a layer of silver, grainy particles that smelled a bit sweet when I'd grabbed some and put it next to my nose. It was familiar, yet so far away from anything I'd ever smelled in the first place that if it had to be compared with anything, I'd never find the words to describe it.

My gloves were golden under the light emanating from the sky— and it did look like the sky. Unlike the previous floor, you'd find no darkened, claustrophobic walls closing in and looming in the dark. The transition from that to this, to quite literally drowning in this golden gloom had been difficult on my eyes. Even through my mask, I had to squint in order for my eyes not to hurt. Honey's tough fur bristled against my thick, mountaineering coat with every step he buried in the sand, but I still found myself laying my head against his shoulder, not to sleep, but just to close my Arceus damned eyes. Even after I'd slept after being knocked out due to the cold, there was simply no way to ignore the exhaustion creeping up on me. It was both physical, but also mental.

I jolted awake at the beat of a drum above us, and caught a hint of a curled green tail slipping behind a tree high above the golden branches.

Maylene had freaked out the first time one of those had played, but we were both in agreement that they had us feel at peace, though hers had more of a nostalgic element to it while mine was fresh and new.

"...ace. Grace."

I blinked at turned to my companion. She was wearing a mask of her own now, and had a thin, long and metallic bottle of compressed oxygen strapped around her shoulder in-between her back and the backpack she still carried. The gauge read sixty-percent, so she still had well over half of it remaining. When we'd first gotten to this layer, Maylene had struggled to walk straight and had began to feel lightheaded, so we'd had no choice but to share since she was convinced that she had to see me through all of it, even if we'd agreed she would get back down at some point. She'd said how she was good at controlling her breathing, and now I believed we'd have enough to make it, though we might need to recall Honey on the next layer, given that even he was starting to struggle a little bit.

I bit down on an apology and inclined my head instead. My right ear… I'd say it was working half as well as it had before Exploud had screamed, and my left was just a lost cause. "Yeah?"

I motioned at Maylene to step to Honey's right so I could hear her better and buried the annoyance rising within me. This was even worse than when Sunshine had damaged my hearing, and at least it had slowly healed over time.

The Gym Leader took another one of her deep, slow breaths, and I knew she wouldn't take another for the next one to two minutes. "You okay?"

"Huh? Oh, sure, I guess. As okay as I can be." Honey patted me on the arm with his hand and I quietly thanked him. "Why?"

"Just making sure." I didn't miss how loudly she was speaking so I could hear, even as a naturally loud speaker. "It's important to… uh, check in once in a while, and I can't really see your face behind this," she made a circular motion around her head, "mask. I'm worried about you. We haven't taken a break since you collapsed—"

Another beat of a drum, high in the trees. I whispered to Honey to keep an eye above us and said that soon, Buddy would be able to take over his duties since the ghost didn't need to breathe. A single leaf fell on my shoulder, and it shivered when I grabbed it between two fingers. You could get lost in the intricacies of the leaf's structure, if you stared long enough.

I let go of the leaf. "I'm okay, Maylene. We just have to keep going; we've wasted enough time already."

While Maylene's face was hidden, I could still read her easily. Her fists clenched, her arms going flat at her sides, she looked away from me, and her walk got just a little… not quicker, but it had less of a flow to it. Like she was consciously putting one foot in front of the other instead of running on autopilot.

"You shouldn't call your recovery a waste of time," she bit back.

"That's not what I meant."

"I feel like— I feel like you think very little of yourself or your own life, and that scares me, I think. I mean, we almost died, and while I'm trying my best to keep it together you just don't care. And I know this isn't the first time it's happened to you," her next breath was a short, shaky thing, "but I think that without someone to take care of you, you'll self-destruct." Maylene looked slightly toward Electivire and sighed. "Sorry, Honey. I know first-hand how difficult it is to have these talks with a parent."

While the electric type's tails had tensed, he said nothing, not wanting to get in-between the argument. No, it wasn't an argument. I wasn't really fighting back, just letting her vent, since it seemed like she needed to and I had no idea how to response. An apology I didn't mean? A lie saying I'd do better in the future? A clap back saying that she was wrong? All of these would lead into an actual fight, so instead, I shrugged.

"It'll be better when we're out of here," I said, my shoulders falling. "These aren't really normal circumstances."

It was easy picturing her bitter smile, but a few seconds passed, and the tension left her. "I dunno," she spoke, far less aggressive than I thought she'd be. "Feels like this is just you, now, and like it'll be you even after. You can't just… come back from this and act normal again."

I clicked my tongue in frustration, though she didn't hear. "Why say this here? Why now?"

And what the hell could I even do about it? What was saying I'd never be normal again accomplish? I already knew that. I knew I wouldn't be able to look my parents in the eye after this when they'd asked what the hell had happened, or that I'd struggle to even care about things as small as badges and tournaments and battling.

I already knew.

"'Cause… you're my friend and I care about you?" She kicked some of the glimmering sand forward, and a decent amount clung to her boot. "And I wanna help you through it, if you need it. Like, you know, staying in touch even when all of this is done, because it's gonna be hard for you. And your friends too, I guess."

The if part of that statement— if we made it and the world was saved— was already implied.

The frustration bubbling in my chest, the cornered feeling that had been closing in on me flatlined and disappeared, and I just stared straight ahead. "I'll take that. Thanks."

Maylene's steps returned to normal. "Cool," she said after a short pause. "Sorry if I was too forward or something, I just don't want you to—" her head whirled to the right. "Do you hear that?"

"No," I said.

She facepalmed, but stopped short of striking her forehead. Knowing her, she'd break it on accident or something. "Shit, of course you don't. It's like… music?"

"Music? Like the drums?" My thumb pointed upward at the leaves. "Or I guess drums is the closest they come to. Or a gong."

"No, this is more intricate. It's like, a long, long tone. Almost like something's crying."

Honey nodded, saying that he was also hearing something but hadn't wanted to interrupt our conversation, thinking that it might have been part of the environment.

"Can you lead?" I asked neither in particular.

Honey nodded, beckoning Maylene to come closer, and she pulled her up on his other shoulder, as gentle as always. He'd struggle to run too fast for long because of the thin air (his lungs were the most similar to a human's in my team and not at all adapted to life this high up), but a few minutes, he could handle. After a while running around in the endless, golden forest, I started to hear the tune Maylene had talked about. A low tone that sounded like strings I recognized very well.

My heart sank.

"Lehmy," I gasped.

Every time I'd been with Lehmhart, he would play music or talk my ear off about it, so recognizing his was a very easy task. Now, I was no Cece, so if I didn't cheat with my empathy, I wasn't great at recognizing which tone meant exactly what, but it was easy to tell that this was a distress signal of some sort. Swallowing, I begged Honey to speed up. Finding them was taking far longer than I thought. Sound here tended to travel far and it had probably seemed closer than it actually was. Still, it got closer and closer until a familiar, endless and hungering howl joined his song.

The knot in my stomach twisted tighter as soon as I saw him. There were no signs of battle here save for a few disturbances in the sand, but he was more hurt than I'd ever seen him. One of his arms, I found lying against a tree, but there were countless parts of his chest and legs just… caved in. Dented to the point that it looked as if someone had nearly punctured some parts of his chest. The lights on his shoulders were off, and only one of his eyes remained lit.

There was a trail in the sand— he'd dragged himself toward—

My eyes were wet as soon as I saw her. "No…"

I threw myself off Honey's back and ran the rest of the way.

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No.

No, no, no, no, no! NO!

My foot caught on a tree root and I tripped right next to Cecilia, crawling in the sand until I touched her arm. There was a pungent smell of vomit and the metallic twinge of blood, but I gripped her shoulders anyway and shook her. I could see it clearly, now. The way her breathing mask was soaked with golden blood.

"Cece!" The shriek reverberated through my throat, ripping at its edges until it hurt. "Please—" a sob, then another, and more until I could barely see in front of me because of all the tears. My face collapsed onto her chest and I cried, "please don't leave me."

Don't take the light out of my life.

Who to retaliate against? Who to cut and bleed until there was nothing left of them? I bit down on my tongue and let out something akin to an enraged scream combined with words even I couldn't understand with the intent to threaten anything responsible for this, along with their entire lineage so none would follow after them.

Then—

A heartbeat.

I could barely feel it, thumping against my ear, and then her chest rising slowly but surely.

"Grace…?" She coughed and heaved for air. "Is that you?"

What?

Had she been sleeping? Or passed out?

My arms wrapped around her tightly until she groaned in pain, and I would have let go of her had she not been about to slump over. I wanted to get angry at her for not answering me when I'd called, or even shaken her at first, but instead, anxiety took hold of my vocal chords and I could only care for one thing.

"Wha— what happened?!" I begged.

Maylene spoke up— I'd nearly forgotten she was here. "Look." She pointed in the direction of the opening leading to the seventh and final layer with a trembling hand. "That's…"

Jupiter's body sat there, limp with half her face buried in the sand. She looked unwounded, though she was pale as a sheet of paper. There was a vineless Tangrowth, still standing upright but clearly dead— I made sure by flashing my empathy and nothing came up. A Skuntank and Delcatty had met the same fate, though the Delcatty didn't even seem to be wounded in any way.

"I beat her. For Justin," Cecilia croaked out. "It was—"

"Don't fucking talk!" I yelled. "You're bleeding and hurt. Is it your face? Of course it is— Are you hurt anywhere else?"

If I was taking off her breathing mask, I wanted to make sure it was correct. When she managed a weak nod, my hand hovered over her face. I was scared of seeing her hurt, which was stupid considering she already was. Maylene and Honey leaned next to me when they saw I couldn't do it. The Gym Leader grabbed one of our water flasks she'd attached to her hip while Electivire tore the mask away from her face.

Two, deep gashes had torn their way across her face. One was high up on her forehead, trailing down to above her eye, on her nose and the left corner of her lip. Dried blood had covered her right eye from the liquid constantly dripping over her face. The other cut was slightly shallower, going from the edge of her right temple and onto her right cheek. I restrained a cry, letting out a distressed groan instead, and Maylene poured the a portion of the water onto her face to wash away the blood and the vomit, after which Honey placed the mask back on to allow Cecilia to take another breath. This cycle continued four times until her face was as clean as could be and she wiped the dried bits away with a cloth and stopped the bleeding with a clean gauze. Even with the golden light, it was as if Cece's skin color had lost a bit of its usual vigor.

Maylene nearly jumped out of her skin when Cecilia opened her eyes and gave us a slow, lethargic blink.

Her irises were gone.

Just gone. Part of me considered it a trick of the light, but I knew this layer's glow didn't work that way, and I knew Cecilia wasn't blind either, given that she would occasionally turn her head Jupiter's way, as if to make sure she was truly dead and wouldn't come back to haunt her. Sometimes she'd look at Lehmhart too with a deep sadness etched onto her scarred visage.

"Can you— recall Lehmhart?" she forced out, her voice so quiet I nearly missed it.

I hurriedly nodded and grabbed the ghost type's Pokeball. I struggled to tell which one it was due to the lighting here, but I knew Cecilia wore her Pokeballs in order of which Pokemon she'd caught. The giant disappeared into his ball, and I managed to snag his arm as well. Knowing he was a construct, I had an inkling any limb issues would take longer to heal if they were lost. I'd find the other arm later. For now, Maylene handed me along gauze to press on Cecilia's face to wrap around her wounds after she'd dried her face, and I obliged, the panic from the thought of losing her now replaced by a resolve to see her through this no matter what had happened. Head wounds were difficult to bandage, it turned out, and it was awkward to avoid blocking her eyes.

But we managed, even if it was slower than we'd liked. When we were finished, it ended up wrapping around her chin and the back of her head, but vision through her eyes was unobstructed. I helped her stand upright and gave her some of my own water so she could quench her thirst, and while she winced at every motion of her face muscles and her voice was still harrowingly weak, which made it difficult to hear due to the damage to my ears, she was slightly better than she'd just been.

This was, however, just a stop-gap measure. She'd need actual medical attention sooner rather than later. Those would scar, and badly, and I had no idea what the hell was wrong with her eyes.

My hands gripped the sides of her shoulders. "Can you lean your back against a tree without my help?" I asked. Instead of an answer, I was met with a weak hug that had me melting into her arms. My fingers dug into her back. She was real. She was real, she was alive, and she was with me.

She sniffled, which came out as a distorted hiss due to her breathing mask. "I was so terrified I'd never see you again. I was thinking of you when I fell unconscious." Her tone was slow and purposeful, yet she tripped over her words and struggled to speak due to the pain. "Legends above, I'm— I'm so relieved."

"I'm here," I gently said. And so was she. "You don't need to push yourself. Rest for now."

"So… what now?" Maylene said. She was slightly shaken over having seen another dead body, but nowhere near what she'd felt before.

Part of me considered telling her to take Cecilia back with her.

That was, of course, a stupid idea. First of all, neither would agree with this, even if Cecilia was too weak to even walk, and after that conversation we'd had, Maylene would vehemently disagree.

"Before we decide anything, I need to tell you something," Cecilia said. She looked at me, her irisless eyes shining golden through her mask. "I'm barely a shard."

Maylene spoke up, "The half thing? I read that in your file—"

"No. Let me finish—" I nearly flinched at the aggressiveness in her tone; a heavy contrast with the quiet, nearly dead voice she'd been making beforehand. Cecilia stopped herself and took a deep breath in-between a 'sorry' from Maylene. "Jupiter… was strong. Stronger than I thought I'd be able to handle." A series of sickly coughs followed, and she kept going. "I had to take drastic measures. My own variant of Perish Song."

I froze. "...what?"

"I had to use it, and it killed me."

I clenched my teeth. "Are you fucking— are you fucking kidding me?!" I hissed, desperately wanting to shake. The loss of tone in her skin, her eyes, it was all because… "You killed yourself? Couldn't you have found another way?! Or ran—"

"Do not," she growled, "lecture me about risks."

We were silent for a few seconds. Rarely had she ever spoken to me this way, and even if she'd almost died, it hurt, especially knowing I had a right to be angry.

"I handled the battle wrong," she agreed, straightening her back against the tree with a pained moan. "I was too obsessed with revenge, too tunnel visioned on our oath, and by the time I realized, my only path was this."

Maylene tried, "There must have been another way—"

"Yet, you weren't there," she bit back with more venom than I'd ever heard out of her. "So how would you know?"

"Don't," I said. "She's worried for you."

Cecilia scoffed. "I barely know her—" she slid down against the bark slightly and her eyes narrowed. "Now isn't the time for this. I'm barely a shard any longer, so I don't know if I'll be enough, even with Chase."

I spared an apologetic glance at Maylene as my shoulders slumped. "You haven't seen him? I was hoping…"

"So you haven't, either?"

"No, I've just been with Maylene from the second layer," I quickly explained. "It was pretty smooth sailing until the last one. I killed Saturn there."

Cece slowly nodded. "I see. Were you hurt?"

"No— well, his Exploud gave me permanent hearing damage, but nothing serious."

Maylene mumbled something I didn't catch.

"Yes, she's correct, that is serious," Cecilia said.

When I asked her if she'd been with anyone on the way there, she answered Maeve, who she'd asked to run while she held Jupiter back because all of her Pokemon but Starmie were incapable of fighting, and while I wanted to tell her she could have kept Starmie and maybe not died and came back to life through Lehmy with means I still didn't understand, she spoke of it before I could chastise her about it, apologizing again for her being so hung up on killing she hadn't seen the obvious.

"There was also another girl. She…" my girlfriend trailed off. "She was one of Mars' grunts and has been through much."

Cecilia told us about Clara. About how Mars had called her Grace Pastel the fourth and how she'd been given scars to mirror mine. About how she seemed to despise me with every ounce of her being. Guilt ate at me, sending goosebumps through my arms and back. There had been four of these girls. Fucking four. Three had died before Clara, and it was all because of me. All because Mars had grown to be obsessed with me from the moment she'd had me in that chair in Valley Windworks. All because she'd seen the similarities between us after that as I slowly, unconsciously turned into an awful version of myself, staring down the abyss until I'd righted the ship.

My hand squeezed around my wrist.

"Don't blame yourself."

"It's not your fault."

Both girls stared at each other, yet it was Cecilia who continued. "Don't shoulder the blame for the wickedness of others," she said. "It's Mars, who Clara should be hating, not you. To her, you're just as much to blame as Mars is, but she's just a girl. I… regret the way I handled things with her. It's been eating at me since you woke me up— almost like a physical thing, deep in my heart."

My hand found hers, and I squeezed. Even without a glove, I knew I'd find little warmth here if the temperature of her face was anything to go by.

"Thanks." I looked at Maylene. "To you both. Um, I guess we should keep going, but Honey's going to have to carry Cece. I can walk now— for real," I quickly added before Maylene could say something. "Plus, I need to stretch my legs."

The electric type gave a thumbs up and his signature smile.

"One quick thing I forgot to add," she said as Honey slowly hauled her up, this time carrying her in her arms. "I can't see color anymore and parts of my skin feel numb. Mostly extremities like my hands and feet."

Arceus. How many side effects was this thing going to have? I couldn't help but feel anxious that I was missing something. Lehmhart had obviously resurrected her, but the fact that she'd died in the first place meant that she'd ingested copious amounts of ghostly energy— more than any specialist would in their lifetimes through passively staying near their powerful ghost types.

Her snappy anger earlier came to mind as I rose back to my feet, however I knew that couldn't be it. Still, it was difficult to differentiate, sometimes. Maybe she was just that way due to just having died. We wouldn't be able to tell until we saw a League professional like Justin had seen after Solaceon.

Justin… I stared long and hard at Jupiter's corpse as we passed by to enter the final layer and allowed a slight smile to reach my lips.

It was at a great cost, and I would not call it worth it, but at least you were avenged.

"Let's go find Lehmhart's other arm," I said.

—

The seventh layer of Mount Coronet was a beautiful thing, but it was also the most unsettling to me for two main reasons. The endless field of golden grass reached up to my chest, yet it felt like a silky cover instead of prickly grass, and an enormous, golden sun shimmered high in the sky that was too bright to stare at just like the real thing. It was actually warm, here, unlike the cold I'd felt during all the previous layers. Hot enough to mistake this place like a constant, cloudless day late in the spring, meaning that I'd needed to take off my outer jacket. Sure, I was already as dirty as could be given the fact that we'd been inside a mountain for days, but I did not want to add a layer of sweat on top of that.

But the two reasons this place was unsettling for me was that it forced a strange sense of peace and belonging onto me, and that fucking sun moved erratically in the sky, too far away to potentially be sensed by my empathy. It flew without pattern, sometimes basking us in warmth that was scorching and other times keeping us relatively cold. On average, though, the temperature was like spring, as I had noted. To see such an enormous thing moving like it was alive and had a mind of its own was disconcerting, like when Melmetal had first revealed itself to be metal given life.

I glanced down at my Pokeballs, wondering how Mimi was doing.

Honey has retired in his Pokeball and had now been replaced by Buddy, yet he was not an appropriate shape to carry someone for a long period of time and was still too tired to change shape on a whim. That battle underground with Excadrill had taken a lot out of him, more than I'd thought.

So Maylene had ended up carrying Cecilia in front of her, one arm under her knees and the other under her neck. Cece wasn't very happy about it, but she couldn't exactly say anything. I could tell she was feeling like dead-weight already, though she was conflicted about it. One one hand, losing the majority of her shard meant that she'd be freed of her endless dilemma, but on the other, she'd come here to free Azelf from Galactic's clutches, and there couldn't have been a worse time for this to happen. All we could do now was hope Chase was close to the summit like we were and that he'd pull his weight soon enough. Hell, we had no idea where Mira even was, and if I'd managed to bring Maylene all the way up here, then there was a possibility that Denzel, Pauline and Emilia were coming, too.

Hell, where was Cynthia?

"So just in case we run into Mars, Cyrus or Charon, what Pokemon do you have left?" Maylene asked. She was talking to Cecilia in particular, but it'd be a good idea to take the temperature, so to speak, and see what our combined forces would look like.

I looked at Jellicent, who hastily bobbed up and down under the golden glow of the burning sun. "Buddy, Honey— though that'll have to wait until we get to Spear Pillar due to the oxygen issue." When the League had briefed us, they'd explained how no breathing apparatus would be necessary close to Arceus' throne. "Sweetheart… and I guess Angel, if we really, really need backup."

Getting him out of stasis, out of his Pokeball, would mean awful things for the prospects of regenerating his eye, though, so hopefully it wouldn't be needed.

"Talonflame is almost unharmed. Zolst can still fight, but he'll be furious at me and might not listen very well. Toxicroak can battle, too," Cecilia slowly said. It any other context, it would have been funny to see her speak in such a serious tone while she was being carried like I had been. "But I see that there are no psychics available."

"Cass got hit and has been screwed ever since. Probably will be until they get to a Center," I said.

Cecilia sighed. "Slowking… I believe he's lost too much blood. Skuntank tore through him with Night Slash."

I'd seen it. She had released him to let him know that she was alive, along with her entire team save for Lehmhart, but the moment had only lasted a few seconds at best. The psychic hadn't even been able to stand on his own two feet, so the prospect of him protecting us with barriers was gone. Hydreigon, meanwhile, had instantly wanted to lash out at her and so had been recalled instantly.

"I'll try my best to be of use," Maylene said.

"Through aura?" Cece curiously questioned, raising her head a smidge.

"She's got great reflexes!" I beamed. "And she's saved my life more than once. She's no psychic, but you shouldn't underestimate her capabilities dodging stuff."

Cecilia looked away, and Maylene quietly thanked me— or maybe it was my hearing playing tricks with me.

"Obviously that wouldn't be enough, but we've trained enough for our Pokemon to work together," I added. "Mars is powerful, but with our forces combined, maybe we can escape or buy enough time for reinforcements to arrive, or to free one of the Lake Guardians."

"I thought you'd want to kill her," Maylene said. "Like Saturn."

"The feeling has never been as strong as Saturn—"

"Grace tends to prioritize the people she loves over herself," Cecilia explained, her body shifting uncomfortably in Maylene's arms. "She's too selfless sometimes."

I didn't know what to say to that. "Well…"

"And she's always been like this," she kept going. "When I first met her, and I was still worrying over what my so called father," she spat, "was going to do to me, she still helped me more than any of my other friends despite the fact that we barely knew each other."

"Hmhm," Maylene half-heartedly agreed, grass britstling against her. "Uh, getting back on topic, that means we'd have an appropriate number of Pokemon to fight back, but we wouldn't be able to get through two fights."

"Especially when Mars is so strong," I agreed.

"It's all about where the others are," Cecilia hummed.

"Story-wise," I began, "it'd make sense for them to either already be there and us to barely make it to save them, or for the inverse to be true."

Cece's arms subtly moved. "Don't rely on those too much."

Maylene looked down at her. "It's gotten us up here this far without many hiccups."

"And I've gotten this far by—" she paused and cleared her throat, clearly wanting to avoid the subject. "There are different methods to climbing this place. I'm saying we shouldn't expect a miracle just because of a story."

"She's… right, I think," I said. "I'd rather not risk it and expect a miracle instead of working our asses off to pull off a win."

A win here didn't necessarily mean a victory as much as it meant getting out of a fight with Mars or Cyrus alive.

In the distance, a massive Snorlax slumbered in the grass, bigger than I'd ever seen. Larger than Craig's or Barry's, and as tall as a small building. Her snores reverberated through the layer, but it wasn't only her. A group of eight Staravia and a Staraptor were sitting on her stomach, content to just look at us pass by. I dipped my head in respect, and the Staraptor did the same. He recognized me as Shard, and would allow us to pass through. I'd noticed there were a lot more Pokemon here than on other layers. They had been more hesitant to flee despite the mountain's pleas, as if they answered to someone else. Usually, they were normal types wandering the plains. I'd seen a childless Kangaskhan make a wide berth around us, countless flying types flying in the air, keeping away from the sun, and many more.

"Well, it's not like I'm meant to be here, so I guess you two know better," Maylene agreed. "I figured we could keep relying on what got us this far."

"It was a team effort and I wouldn't be alive without you. Let's not get hung up on this stuff," I said. She sounded a little more defeated than usual, but it was probably the stress of the finality of the situation getting to her. "Charon's basically a non-factor. His Hypno's dead and the rest of his Pokemon aren't up to par. Mars is the issue, along with Cyrus." Thoughts of Clara filled my heart and I put a spring in my step. "So we plan for them as best as we can so we don't have to rely on things like Perish Song."

The held-back anger in my words was very clear. I wasn't going to let Cecilia off the hook for this any time soon.

—

As it turned out, even planning was an issue with these two.

Cecilia's wires were all crossed, and she easily found herself throwing verbal jabs at Maylene when the Gym Leader said something that, to Cecilia's credit, had been a middling or bad suggestion just because she was less experienced in these fights than we were. This was evidently awkward considering Maylene was carrying her in her arms. Not only that, but Cece was also quick to put herself down in regards to her sins and what she'd done.

"I wish I could have gone about this differently," she would say, or, "I regret the way I shouldered Lehmhart with the sole responsibility of bringing me back," or, "will Zolst ever forgive me for what I've done? For trying to leave him behind?" Then, she'd look at me and say the most heartwrenching thing. "Will you ever forgive me?"

Partly, it detracted from the actual planning (which, to be honest, hadn't gone very well, either, given the fact that all we'd have to fight Mars or Cyrus with Pokemon who ranged from tired to exhausted), but I felt like if I hadn't been there to intervene, these thoughts would have utterly consumed her very being, and the horrible pain in her face didn't help.

So I kept closer to her, making sure to give her some reassuring words while Jellicent kept watch of our surroundings. For all these final two layers had been grand, they were so simple in their design, as if they'd been a blueprint for what would come below, and then all over Earth. It'd make sense, considering Coronet was Arceus' throne and this could have been one of the first things on this planet ever made.

I gulped.

That had weight.

Yet my legs felt lighter and lighter the more we followed a Pidgeot flying high in the sky toward what felt like this floor's center. She'd caught our attention by screaming and had scared off a group of Bergmites away from us. What I'd come to understand from this layer was that everything was larger than their counterparts outside the mountain. Even Pidgeot was slightly larger than Pauline's Braviary, yet the flying type made no efforts to come and pick us up on her back.

"This is more boring than I thought it'd be," Maylene sighed as she stared at the open skies, or at least the illusion of the sky, gilded and complete with its own clouds. It was more convincing than the previous layer. "It's like there's no more resistance left and it's just ushering us on through, now."

"Better that than whatever was going on before," I shrugged. "Here, a theory for you about stories—"

"Another?" Maylene said, laughing.

Right. They'd heard a lot of my ramblings when I launched a bunch of ideas to take down Mars.

I allowed my hand to caress the smooth grass. "I just like talking about this stuff."

"No, I mean, it's kind of funny." She adjusted her grip on Cecilia's legs and apologized for moving her too quickly. "Might as well, though. Anything will help."

"Well, won't really help, but— now that we've taken out two Commanders, I think Coronet's eyes have been opened a little." I grabbed a blade of golden grass and smelled it. Slightly sweet, but stronger than the last floor. "After dealing with Saturn, it started being neutral again, but now it's full-on helping us. I mean, it's like walking down a straight path, right? Feels easy."

Cecilia chimed in, even if she'd quieted down due to her pain. "We didn't have to solicit that Pidgeot, either." She'd known how we'd come up here largely by using wild Pokemon due to it coming up earlier in the conversation.

My fist struck my palm, though I was annoyed at the fact that I'd nearly missed her statement. "Right. So I was thinking… what if we could throw these off like Galactic?" I pointed at my face.

Our breathing masks.

Both instantly disagreed, of course, even Buddy, but it wouldn't be lethal if I was wrong right away.

"Cece, it keeps pressing up on your face and hurting you, I can tell," I worryingly said. "I'll try. At worse, I get lightheaded and my head'll spin, but you can help me if it goes wrong. We do it to eat already anyway."

"The air could be corrupted or something…"

It was already off before Maylene could finish her sentence.

I had almost forgotten the feel of the world's breath against my face. Real wind, not stale, cold and humid mountain air. I put my hood down and allowed my hair to flow freely, taking a deep breath. Being up here felt like being outside, wandering a garden in Eterna City, not like we were on the roof of the world. The constant pressure around my nose, mouth and forehead bled away and I blinked a few times when I realized this place was a lot brighter than I'd given it credit for, covering my eyes with a hand.

Warm air filled my lungs.

"See?" I smiled, running a hand through my greasy hair. "Nothing. Feels like you're down at Coronet's base on route 211."

Buddy was the first to speak, scolding me for taking such needless risks, but I just countered by saying he was just being a worry-wart.

"I'm— yeah, I'm gonna let you down," Maylene finally told Cece.

"I'll help," I quickly chimed in, running through the grass. Legends, this was so rejuvenating. Cecilia placed an arm around my shoulder and clung to me while I gently took off her mask. Bits of her gauze appeared slightly bloodied when I glanced up at her and two irisless eyes faced me. "We're gonna have to change those."

She nodded, her breathing sounding slightly raspy. There was just a hint of a gravelly whisper with each inhale and exhale. Maylene had followed suit, her short, pink hair now loose, and was already pulling out supplies from the bag. After calling out to Pidgeot to wait for us, the giant bird started circling high above with an impatient screech every minute or so.

"Also, regarding your… issue," I spoke to Cecilia. "Is it going to affect fights?"

Her nose flared, and her brows knitted together. "No. I'm not that far gone."

"I can check up on you if you want. With empathy. Not touch, but just see what makes you tick."

Mostly, I was worried that it was still taking time to settle in and that the worse was yet to come, especially given that her physical weakness had her speaking less than usual. It wasn't like her, to want to verbally jab and prod while being so mean and violent about it. It was a good thing Maylene had taken it on the chin. That girl was honestly a saint.

Her answer was slower to come than I'd expected. "I'd… I'm not ready for such a decision. I barely know how things will change after this, if there is one, but at least I'm self-aware to know I'm not acting right."

"That's okay."

Maylene brought over the first-aid kid, we replaced Cecilia's bandages with newer, tighter ones (which we got cussed at for), and we were on our way again.

The trek seemed endless, yet with the wind in my face, I found my footing easier now, and it grew purer and purer the closer we got to the enormous staircase looming in the distance. So crisp and pure it somehow tasted good. For a moment, I was just a girl strolling through the grass with her girlfriend and her friend, and I forgot myself— no, I shed the outer layers; all of that pressure built up peeled off of me like it was fucking magic.

It returned like a wispy fog clogging my brain when I placed the sole of my boot on the first set of stairs. Golden and transparent, the smoothest material I'd ever seen, whatever it was, and most importantly,

Most importantly, power reverberated with that step.

My mouth felt dry when I looked back at Maylene and Cece and I waved a goodbye to our guide Pidgeot.

Maylene jittered in place, hands tightening around Cece from anxiety. "Are you both ready?"

"Nowhere to go but up," I declared.

I took another step.

And another.

And another—