The next morning, Alec woke up feeling invigorated. Like a sunflower opening its petals towards the light of the sun, he felt like he could fistfight a Lucario and win. Well, maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration. He’d definitely get a few good hits in, though.
As he sat up in his bedroll, he only needed a handful of blinks to acclimate himself to his surroundings. The sun, almost above the horizon, greeted him with a warm touch to overcome the wind chill. His fire had long since gone out.
Beside him, Auster perched on a log. The Dartrix’s head was bowed and tucked beneath his wings, so his beak was not visible. Maybe his likeness to nocturnal Pokemon like Noctowl contributed to his penchant for sleeping in. Or he’s just lazy, who knows?
Tricky was curled up against Alec’s leg, sleeping softly. The Shinx’s star-tipped tail wagged slowly, brushing against Alec’s shin with each swing. Every so often, he twitched and let out a quiet bark in his sleep. Alec felt a light tingle on his leg with every twitch, meaning he was discharging a bit of electricity each time.
He’s battling in his dream, Alec thought with a smile. That’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.
After a moment, Alec reclined again and supported his head with his arms. The day had just begun and he didn’t want to disturb his snoozing team. He could afford to sit back and relax for a little while.
The area around him was peaceful, like the land of Hisui itself was in a good mood, thus willing to showcase its beauty and majesty to him. Simply having a restful morning was a nice change of pace from Alec’s usual day, where he ran and explored until his feet felt like they’d been run over by a car.
Alec took a deep breath in, noting how even the air seemed to taste better. Maybe it was the pleasant morning air, or maybe it was the fallen leaves, brought down by the approaching winter. He slowly exhaled, letting his limbs hang limply.
He laid there for about fifteen more minutes, watching the wispy clouds float by. Recently, the clouds had been rather sparse, taking a backseat to the dark blue of the sky. And as Alec relaxed, he let his mind wander.
According to an old folktale he’d heard back home, the clouds were the fragments of the Forces of Nature’s former powers. Thinking back to the tale brought along pleasant memories of home. Of peaceful days and good company, where neither time nor place mattered.
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The rain came down like a blindfold, blotting out the entire horizon. Alec’s could barely see down the street, let alone to the park. He pressed his hands up against the cold glass of the front window, watching the droplets of rain race against each other to the bottom sill. A few collided and merged together, becoming heavier and falling faster. It was boring, but it was somehow entertaining at the same time. His slow breaths left a thin veil of fog on the window.
In the glass’ reflection, Alec saw his mom approaching. He slowly looked away from the intense race of water droplets and craned his neck upward to meet her eyes. She looked sad. She almost never looked sad. “I know you’re disappointed about the rain, but moping against the window’s not gonna make it clear.”
“I know,” said Alec, shrugging. “But why couldn’t Thundurus wait up, until after we left the park? I waited all day for you to get home so we could go play.”
Alec’s mom gazed out the window at nothing. The droplets blurred together as she tried to focus her eyes on something beyond the window, to no avail. “That’s not how it works, Alec,” Mom sighed. “Thundurus is so high up in the sky, he didn’t know we were planning on going outside today. Plus, the weatherman on TV would be very confused if the storm suddenly stopped and waited for you to play.”
Alec titled his head. “That’s not how it works, is it? I thought the weatherman just guesses what the clouds will do.”
“That’s right, sweetie, all we can do is guess,” Alec’s mom said, pulling over a chair and sitting down. “But sometimes, it’s fun to pretend it works the other way around. C’mere.” She patted her lap, and Alec hurried over to sit down. “You’re getting big!” Alec’s mom said with a fake grunt.
“Sure am! I ate all my Cornn and Tamato berries for dinner last night.” He looked up at her with a radiant grin, enough to brighten any shadow.
“Let me tell you a story. It’s a bit of an old one, that my mom used to tell me when it was raining.” Alec briefly gasped, then zipped his mouth shut, ready to listen. “It’s about clouds and the weather, so it’s especially appropriate for times like now.”
She took a deep breath. “A long time ago, back before we had cars, or telephones, or lightbulbs, there were no clouds in the sky. When it was time for rain, they simply appeared from nowhere in an instant and disappeared just as fast once they were finished raining. The great god of storms Thundurus controlled the storms, summoning bursting rainclouds with just a little flick of his claw. Back then, he was far more powerful than he is nowadays. The people feared him, ‘cause he could simply wash their crops away on a whim. Their lives were dominated by the constant fear of a sudden storm cloud forming and destroying their villages.
“As the centuries passed, the people got smarter. They found patterns in the way that the storms came, and slowly but surely learned to predict when and where Thundurus would appear next. They learned when to stay home and when to go out, when to carry an umbrella, and when to wear a raincoat.
“One day, Thundurus looked down from his perch on top of the sky and saw his storms not washing anything away. Where it traveled, the people simply moved aside or unfurled their umbrellas, without any fear. Since everyone now could predict where the clouds would go, humanity had just as much power over them as Thundurus did. His powers quickly dwindled and he was enraged at what was happening.
“With the last spark of power left in him, he laid out a thick blanket of clouds of the entire region. It rained for days, without any stopping, and everything ground to a halt, because no one would go outside and get wet. Humanity was terrified, thinking it would rain forever, but luckily the clouds faded eventually.
“That day, two lessons were learned. Humanity learned to revere Thundurus’ mighty power, and not to treat the weather like an inconvenience. A small stream of water can crack a massive boulder, and a little raincloud can change your entire day. And Thundurus learned a lesson too. Once people started to revere the rains again, his power slowly returned, but never to the strength that it had before. He learned that he needs to remind us every so often that there’s no controlling the unpredictable. And so, he decided to leave the clouds up there, as a reminder to us that we’re not the ones who can control the skies.”
Alec’s mom smiled warmly. “The end,” she said.
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Alec didn’t remember much else from that day. The centerpiece of the memory was the peace he felt, relaxing in his mom’s arms and listening to the story. Every time he delved back into the memory was like crawling under a warm blanket, where everything was quiet and peaceful. Alec slowly opened his eyes and hummed pleasantly. A content smile crept its way across his face as the wind rustled the fallen leaves and the half-bare tree branches. This was the type of mood where the smile would remain for several hours. A few rogue Flying-types sang the melody of the morning, completing the picturesque scene.
By his feet, Tricky was slowly stirring, slowly blinking his large yellow eyes. He tilted his head back and yawned widely, stretching out his paws.
“Morning,” Alec muttered, noting the dryness in his throat. He needed something to drink. Tricky unintelligibly murmured a few sounds in response. Alec groaned as he climbed out of his bedroll and stood to his feet. The leaves crinkled and crunched beneath his feet. Beside them, Auster stirred, awakened by their moving about.
As Alec - followed by Tricky - ambled over to the stream to drink, he went over his mental to-do list. Yesterday, he hadn’t had enough daylight to stop by Laventon’s lab or Colza’s shop, so he needed to do that immediately today. A glance at his satchel revealed that it was noticeably bulging from the Pokeballs it contained. But besides that, Alec had no urgent errands to run, besides returning to the mirelands to continue his work surveying.
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Dorian’s expression hardened as he saw Alec approaching the village gates. Today, his Buizels and he stood outside the gates while another guard was assigned to his usual position in the watchtower. He hadn’t been told why his position had changed, but it wasn’t his job to ask questions. A good soldier always followed his orders, and he was just that.
But today, he was also a message bearer. Being a soldier was easy; he simply had to stand at the village gate with a spear and his Buizels and fend off anyone with malicious intent. Most days, there were exactly zero, but the point stood nonetheless.
The boy walked with a certain rhythm to his footsteps, and Dorian thought he heard him humming a tune as he approached. His partner Shinx was riding on his shoulder.
“Morning, Alec,” he greeted. “Got a message for you.”
“From who?” Alec cheerfully asked.
Dorian sighed. “Kamado.”
Alec’s eyes darkened. Dorian could only purse his lips in a sympathetic smile. He hated doing things like that.
Eventually, Alec seemed to steady himself. “What does he want?”
“He didn’t say. He never says. He just wants you to meet him in his office as soon as you can,” Dorian continued. “Though, he didn’t seem too angry.”
Alec muttered something under his breath, too faint for Dorian to hear. “Thanks,” he eventually said in a carefully neutral tone. As he passed through the village gate, his footsteps sounded noticeably heavier than before.
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Alec reached into his memory, back to all his previous crossings with Kamado. As he examined them, a pattern emerged: None of them had gone well.
There was when he arrived at the village and recruited him into the Corps, where he’d accused Alec of being a Zoroark and threatened to throw him out of the village. And there was when Kamado assigned Alec the task of approaching Kleavor and attempting to quell his frenzy. That one spoke for itself. Alec spat on the dirt, to rid his mouth of the rotten taste forming in it. From his perch on his shoulder, Tricky whimpered inquisitively.
“It’s alright, it’s probably something minor,” Alec justified. Tricky seemed unconvinced, but he didn’t press. Maybe today, Kamado would be in a good mood.
As Alec climbed the steps before the town hall, waving a greeting to Beauregard and Beauticia along the way, he opened Tricky’s Pokeball to recall him. The last thing he wanted now was to step a foot out of line and give Kamado any reason to be upset with him.
Just as usual, city hall was abuzz with life as the townspeople milled from room to room. A few doors were closed as seminars and meetings took place behind their doors. Alec thought he caught a few key phrases from the bag-packing class and was tempted to press his ear against the door and listen in. That would delay him by a considerable amount, so he shook his head and continued up the stairs to Kamado’s office.
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Alec took a deep breath, then rapped his knuckle on the door to Kamado’s office. The dark-stained door had a thick and deep knock. Almost immediately, it forcefully swung open, revealing a blue-clad man. He was extremely tall - taller than Kamado, somehow - and very athletic-looking. He wore what seemed to be a blue version of Irida’s kimono, though his version of it seemed far more rugged and masculine despite only differing in color. His hair was completely black, darker than Akari’s, but it seemed to glint blue in the light.
His dark brown eyes bore into Alec for an instant, until understanding dawned on him and he grabbed Alec by the arm and pulled him into the office. Shocked, he yelped at being pulled off balance so suddenly and quickly tugged his arm back.
“Sorry,” the man said, wide-eyed. “We can’t waste time. You’re Alec, right?”
Alec nodded for lack of anything to say.
“Great.” He shot a cursory glance over his shoulder, where Kamado stood before a table with maps strewn across it. “I’m a Diamond. We know about what you did with the Noble Kleavor. Last night, one of our Nobles - Lilligant, the Lady of the Ridge - attacked her Warden. No one can get close enough to her domain to figure out why. Can you help-”
“Adaman,” Kamada snapped. “We talked about this. Don’t overwhelm the boy.” His expression was unreadable, but his hands were clenched into fists. “The situation is under control, for now. We can afford to take things a little slowly.”
Adaman seemed to shrink for a moment under Kamado’s glare before turning back to Alec with a hint of shame behind his brown eyes. “Sorry,” he said to Alec. “Let me introduce myself, properly this time. My name is Adaman the Great Chief of the Diamond Clan, but that’s a mouthful, so you can just call me Adaman.” He held out a hand for Alec to shake, which Alec hesitantly took.
“What’s happening with your Noble?” Alec fearfully asked, resting his hands in the pocket of his hoodie. Out of view, he fidgeted with his hands, clasping and unclasping his fingers in an attempt to quell his nerves. Worry began to take over, like overgrown plants destroying a decades-old house, and his hands began to twitch and shiver.
“That’s the issue - nobody knows,” Adaman replied. “Lilligant’s Warden, Arezu, showed up at our village last night heavily wounded, almost certainly by Lilligant. Our scouts tried reaching Brava Arena to check on Lady Lilligant, but the Pokemon in Cloudpool Ridge are all acting like Alphas, attacking anything that moves. No one can get close. We’re running out of time.” Adaman closed his eyes and whispered something under his breath, moving his lips so fast that Alec couldn’t even guess what he was saying. The only sound that came to Alec’s ears was “wshwshwsh.”
Alec winced, thinking of all the frenzied Pokemon and the rage they would be feeling. “You said all the Pokemon were acting like Alphas. Does that mean they’re territorial, too?”
“Yeah,” Adaman forced out. “They’re all fighting one another, just like Alphas would.”
For a moment, Alec wondered what might’ve caused such a strange phenomenon. The feeling was quickly overshadowed by panic, thinking of the devastation that would ensue. It occurred to him that death and destruction were happening right now, filling his mouth with the taste of bile. Normally, ecosystems hung in balance with only a handful of Alphas, but suddenly being supersaturated…
“So you want me to quell Lilligant, like I did Kleavor?” Alec immediately asked. He felt an energetic thrumming in his veins, pushing him to move as his body kicked into high gear. He suppressed the sudden urge to bounce on his heels in anticipation.
“We have no other options. If they keep it up, there’s no doubt the Pokemon will expand outward and destroy our village,” Adaman said. “Please. Lend us your time, and the Diamonds will do everything in our power to help you.”
Alec looked toward Kamado for approval. From the other side of the room, he nodded approvingly, keeping his same sharp expression.
“I’ll do it.”
“Then we gotta go,” said Adaman, immediately pushing past Alec and leaving the office. “We’ll discuss on the way to our village.”
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The Diamond clan settlement - or as they called it, Solaceon Village - was vastly different from Jubilife Village. For starters, it leaned far more tribal compared to Jubilife’s urban design. Large torches lined the streets, about as tall as the trees, and the houses looked like tents made from wood instead of fabric. There wasn’t a main street that the town was centralized around, rather there was a large brazier that functioned as the town square, with several benches carved from trees surrounding it.
The village itself had a similar wall to Jubilife’s, though it lacked watchtowers. As soon as they saw Adaman leading their pack, the two Diamond guardsmen quickly stood at attention and let them pass.
Once Alec entered the city, he immediately noticed another key difference: Pokemon freely roamed the streets. All of them accompanied people - likely their Trainers - but Alec was taken aback simply by seeing someone willing to go within thirty feet of a Pokemon that didn’t have to for their job, like a village guard.
Adaman noted his surprise and hummed. “My people are more in touch with Pokemon than yours. You’ll find that most of our people have at least one Pokemon. Where are yours, by the way?”
“Hm?” Alec hummed, tilting his head.
“The rumors all say you have two Pokemon. Where are they?”
“Oh,” Alec said in understanding. He gestured down to his belt, where his Pokeballs were clipped. “Right here,” he said. “Don’t you use Pokeballs?”
Adaman shook his head and pursed his lips. “I’d forgotten you use those devices to transport your Pokemon. No, we don’t use them, despite their time-saving potential.”
Strangely, Adaman didn’t elaborate, and Alec didn’t feel the need to press the issue. As they walked through the worn dirt roads, eroded from the grass over generations of use, Alec caught the gazes of a small handful of the passing villagers. For the few that did curiously inspect him, it was nothing more than a brief passing glance, a far better experience than virtually every single person in Jubilife staring at him as if he’d just trampled their flowerbeds. Perhaps their emphasis on time prompted them to not waste it on distractions.
“Come on, the infirmary is this way,” Adaman said, sharply turning a corner to the right. Alec had to break into a jog to keep up with the chief’s long legs, which nearly matched him two-for-one in stride size. Adaman took no notice of this, however, only occasionally glancing back at Alec to make sure he was still following.
Soon, they reached a building with a dark thatched roof, about twice the size of the rest of the regular houses. Adaman quickly pushed open the flap of Pokemon hide acting as a door, extending his hand behind him as he crossed the threshold for Alec to follow him.
This must be the infirmary, Alec thought. It was a far cry from Joyce’s office, looking more like a combat medic’s tent than a hospital room. Several woolen cots were arranged along the far wall in an array. There were several tables with stovetops throughout, for boiling water or cooking broth for the patients. A few of the beds, about one-fifth, were occupied.
Adaman scanned the array momentarily and made a beeline for one particular bed, the only one with an awake occupant. The woman in it had short reddish-orange hair that messily hung in large tufts and wore a coat with a hood, similar to Adaman’s in color. She was propped up at an angle by a large pillow.
Immediately, Alec noticed how she looked absolutely miserable. She had heavy bags under her eyes and an immovable, defeated frown, like she was only running on five minutes worth of sleep after staying up for weeks. The sight immediately reminded him of the times he came down with the flu or some other sickness, where all he could do was sit in bed, watch TV, and feel sorry for himself.
When they entered the room, the woman - definitely the warden, Arezu, that Adaman had mentioned - slowly looked up at them through half-lidded eyes, before groaning defeatedly and wilting like a wet piece of paper. She reluctantly met Adaman’s eye contact.
She opened her mouth, but no words came out. She seemed hesitant, like she was trying to find the right words to say but nothing quite fit. This went on for several seconds, until she finally groaned in frustration.
“I’m sorry, Adaman,” she finally forced out. Silence hung in the air for a moment longer.
“Don’t worry,” Adaman reassured. “If it is Sinnoh’s will, then this time will pass, just like all the other disasters we’ve weathered.”
“But-!” Arezu countered. She abruptly cut off, crying out in pain and wincing heavily. She sat up straight in her bed and clutched her left shoulder with her right hand. She tensed the muscles on her left hand, digging he fingernails into her palm. On her exposed forearm, Alec thought he saw faint discolorations beneath her skin, running where her veins would be.
When she finally removed her hand and relaxed, Alec noticed a white bandage wrapped tightly around her arm, stained in a wide gash with a reddish-purple substance. Blood, but in combination with something else. Something painful, deadly, and unnatural.
Poison-type damage, Alec thought in horror, recognizing the distinctive fester of the pestilence. In his past life, he’d seen Poison-type attacks used in professional battles on TV, but that didn’t compare at all to one used on a human. It was like comparing Kevlar bulletproof armor to a construction worker’s reflective vest. One could take the hit and keep going, the other simply torn to shreds.
He momentarily fought back the urge to retch before tearing his eyes away from the bandage. His mouth started to water as if he was about to vomit. As a shield from the disgusting sight, he squeezed his eyes shut, hoping to save his dignity.
Arezu dismissed him entirely, speaking to an unperturbed Adaman. “Lady Lilligant’s doing,” she said with a weak nod toward her arm. Her voice started to crack as she spoke. “I don’t even know what happened. One minute, we were dancing and twirling and having fun, the next I’m in agony, like my time was up.” She closed her eyes and murmured unintelligible words, the same way Adaman had earlier. When she looked up from her prayer, she finally bothered to acknowledge Alec’s presence. “Who’s this?” she asked dismissively.
Adaman cracked a grim smile. “This is Alec. He’s, uh, probably our only shot at stopping Lilligant.” Arezu stared at him like he’d just admitted to committing murder. “You’ve heard the stories of the warrior quelling Lord Kleavor’s rampage, right? This is him.”
“Him?” Arezu asked, shocked. “How did-?”
Just as suddenly as the previous time, she clenched her teeth and clutched her arm with a groan of pain. This attack seemed to not be as intense as the previous one and it did not evoke a gut-wrenching reaction in Alec.
As soon as she recovered but before she opened her mouth to speak again, Alec interjected. “I stopped Kleavor, and I want to help Lilligant, too.”
Through her thin veil of welling tears, Arezu stared at Alec in contemplation. Did she really trust this boy to protect her Noble? She trusts Adaman, and Adaman apparently trusts him. She figured that most of the rumors about him would be false, but even then, he would have to have some respectable level of strength to face Kleavor and not be hospitalized for months, if not killed outright.
She snorted a humorless chuckle. “Well, I suppose I won’t be much help to Lilligant in my current state,” she said. “But Lilligant is completely different than Kleavor. Everybody knows that it’s the weakest of the ten Nobles, though the Pearls are too proud to admit it. They’re equally matched in speed, but Lady Lilligant doesn’t charge around like a brute. She’s extremely agile.”
Alec frowned, thinking back to his battle with Kleavor. His main strategy revolved around taking advantage of Kleavor’s severe lack of agility to dodge his attacks. He had no idea what Lilligant even looked like - let alone how it specialized in its combat style. Strangely enough, he didn’t feel nervous about facing down Lilligant in a battle. Logically, he knew that he would be in danger, but he just lacked the fear aspect in his brain. Was he courageous or was he the biggest fool in all Hisui?
“Our options are limited,” Adaman said, crossing his arms. “We need to do something soon, or your wound may spread and force, uh, amputation.” His voice wavered as he finished the sentence, the truth slashing him across the face as he tried not to flinch. “I don’t know if we have any other options, everything considered.”
Rightfully so, Arezu still looked skeptical. Normally, she would challenge the boy to a Pokemon battle, but seeing as she could barely go a few seconds without seizing up in pain…
“There’s something else,” Adaman said, seeing how Arezu was still unconvinced. “We think that Sinnoh appeared to him.”
Silence followed. Arezu stopped in her tracks, staring at Alec with furrowed brows. Alec tried his hardest to meet her gaze with confidence, though the logical half of his mind told him that he certainly failed.
“What?" Arezu asked. “You’re joking.”
“I would never joke about something so important,” Adaman calmly replied, shaking his head slowly. “Alec, tell her your story.”
Alec took a deep breath, then recounted every major detail of his supernatural arrival to Hisui. He began with how he woke up in a dark void feeling disoriented and confused and saw a blinding light appear to him. He made sure to leave out the part of the Unown surrounding him for fear of accidentally divulging any inconsistencies in his front of memory loss. “I’ve already proven once that Sinnoh’s got my back, fighting Kleavor,” Alec said. “I don’t know if They’ll help me another time, but I’d rather go and find out than sit here and watch the Pokemon slowly die out.”
As he clarified more details, Arezu only seemed to grow more confused. She looked conflicted as the two opposing truths wrestled in her mind. Firstly, she knew that this child before her, claiming to be able to help Lilligant and to have seen Sinnoh Themself, appeared too weak to be of any help. But she also knew that her time - that she had once praised Sinnoh for giving to her in abundance - was finally running thin. His story matched up with shocking consistency with the sections she’d read of the Ancient Hero’s autobiography. She spared a glance toward Adaman from the corner of her eye and he briefly and subtly nodded, corroborating Alec’s words.
Now’s about the time for another attack from my wound, she thought in the back of her mind, almost too quiet to hear over her more prominent thoughts. But it didn’t come. Why?
She sighed slowly in resignation. “I stand corrected, I guess,” she shrugged. “Adaman, why’d you come to me if the kid already had Sinnoh’s backing? Surely you didn’t come to ask for my approval?”
“No, we didn’t,” Alec cut in. “I need to know what Lilligant’s favorite foods are. That’s how I stopped Kleavor, by throwing balms made from its favorites.”
“Medicinal leeks slathered with Dazzling Honey,” Arezu immediately said. “We have a stockpile of them in the village storehouse, so take everything you need from there.”
“Thanks,” Alec said, making a mental note. “That still leaves the issue of how I’ll get past all the crazy Pokemon at Cloudpool Ridge, though. I don’t know if I’ll be able to get past that many and still have strength left for Lilligant.”
Arezu and Adaman shared a glance for a moment. “There is a way,” Adaman said. Alec leaned forward as if to prompt him to continue. “Come,” he said, “I’ve got another Diamond for you to meet.”