Medali’s location just happened to be the entrance and exit of Area Zero. Head due east—slightly south—and you could clearly see a winding mountain road with the naked eye.

At the very end of that road, beyond what Medali’s residents could normally see, stood a tall, man-made tunnel.

Pass through the tunnel, and you’d reach the gate facility for Area Zero. Just as Larry had said, the lock on that facility could only be opened by Professor Sada’s team—and a very small number of other people.

And now, what Larry and Hikaru were seeing was this: a massive, vicious-looking creature had forced its way out of the tunnel and was chasing down roadside Pokémon and the civilians headed toward Medali!

“That’s… crap. I messed up. I’m going to get chewed out.”

Staring at the end of the tunnel, Larry watched that bizarre creature slam down the mountain road in a “little train” rush, sending a nearby Gogoat flying. Larry’s heart went right along with it—like it had been launched into the sky.

One of the reasons he’d been assigned to the Medali Gym was to keep watch over that facility as a League employee.

But even so, Geeta hadn’t sealed the tunnel’s main doors. They’d been kept open year-round, seemingly so Professor Sada could enter and exit normally.

Yet from what Larry understood, Professor Sada hadn’t returned to the surface in quite some time. In many people’s eyes, the Area Zero gate was already half-abandoned. The researchers who used to work in the gate facility had been transferred back to the League and the academy.

“Still… the residents’ safety comes first.”

Larry stared at the rampaging monster and took out a Poké Ball. With a flash of white light, a powerful Staraptor burst out, beat its wings, and shot up into the sky!

“Brave Bird!”

Larry held nothing back—no probing, no warm-up. He opened with a high-powered STAB finisher.

Staraptor was Larry’s signature Pokémon. Whether he was running the Gym test as a Normal-type Gym Leader, or fighting as a Flying-type Elite Four member, Staraptor was always on his team.

Even though his Tera Type was Normal—and Larry himself didn’t seem interested in constantly changing his Tera setup—so his “ace” as a Flying-type Elite Four member was switched to Flamigo… Staraptor was still the Pokémon Larry handled most smoothly!

“Yeah. If you use Staraptor, you can beat that Pokémon easily.”

Hikaru watched Larry move with crisp efficiency. Even if the man still carried that permanently exhausted aura, the moment he started battling, the salaryman’s eyes sharpened without him even noticing.

“Never underestimate working adults. When a working adult gets serious, even an Area Zero monster can be humiliated!”

Larry turned back awkwardly. “N-no. Isn’t that kind of… cringe?”

Hikaru grinned. “That’s the kind of presence you’re supposed to have as an Elite Four member, though. Sure, it’s a little cringe, but if you shout it out, it startles people! In battle, that’s basically your own Intimidate!”

Larry sighed. “Yeah… I’m past the age where I intimidate people.”

Even so, the sharpness in his gaze didn’t fade. Instead, he suddenly asked:

“Do you actually know what that monster is?”

“To me, if you call it a Pokémon… it’s a little too violent, isn’t it?”

“I heard Geeta say you know a lot of mysterious things. You even have that weird nickname, ‘the one who knows everything’… but I didn’t think too hard about it before.”

Hikaru nodded. “That Pokémon… it looks kind of like Volcarona, doesn’t it?”

Larry looked toward the monster in the distance. It had been rocked by a single Brave Bird and was trembling all over now, staring fearfully at Staraptor beating its wings.

And Staraptor—this “haircut bird” with its own brand of edgy cool—let out a proud, domineering cry.

Hikaru said, “Staraptor says, ‘What kind of Area Zero Pokémon do you think you are, yapping in front of me? I’ll make you fly.'”

Larry’s Staraptor had the exact opposite personality from Larry himself.

Larry blinked. “Huh? You can understand Staraptor?”

“Right… Geeta did mention you can understand Pokémon. I remember that.”

“And you said it looks like Volcarona… I didn’t notice at first, but now that you say it, it really does.”

Larry was tasked with guarding the Area Zero gate, but that was only one part of his job as both a League employee and an Elite Four member. In practice, he was often sent on business trips elsewhere, and normally there were no “violent creatures” hanging around near the gate.

Yes—aside from those strange rumors about the desert.

“It looks like a transitional form between Larvesta and Volcarona… like some incompletely evolved Paleozoic insect. Its unspread wings resemble a moth’s wings right after emerging, before they fully open. They also look like the dorsal ‘sail’ you’d see on certain early reptiles or synapsids.”

Hikaru watched the creature—shaky and barely standing after taking Brave Bird, but not yet down—and spoke to Larry.

“This is a Paradox Pokémon: Slither Wing. I know your research on these violent creatures is limited, but Paldea’s occult magazine should’ve mentioned it.”

“Its type is Bug/Fighting. It’s four-times weak to Flying. Staraptor didn’t one-shot it because it used Endure.”

“And yes—anything that has types is still a kind of Pokémon. If you decide it’s some other species just because it’s too violent, that’s completely wrong.”

“In other regions, when Kabutops and Aerodactyl were discovered and revived, they were extremely violent too. Nobody claimed they weren’t Pokémon just because of their temperament.”

Larry thought for a moment.

The situation was no longer dangerous. Slither Wing was completely suppressed by Staraptor. The civilians had been evacuated, though plenty of people were still gathered far away, watching like it was a show.

Spectating was human nature. Pokémon did it too, in their own way. That habit wasn’t going away.

Larry said, “I remember now. It was the August issue of Occulture Magazine from some year.”

“Paldea Unsolved Files No. 08: ‘The ancient Volcarona awakens.’ A mysterious creature—Slither Wing. Supposedly undeciphered, rarely sighted, shrouded in mystery.”

“Its name comes from a famous strange book—one of the mysterious creatures recorded in the Scarlet Book.”

“That magazine claimed it reported on Volcarona’s primordial form… but I can’t recall reading anything like that.”

Hikaru chuckled. “Most of what those occult magazines print is exaggerated. It’s all for clicks.”

“But one thing isn’t wrong.”

“The thing in front of us really is Slither Wing.”

With Staraptor’s final strike, the Slither Wing that had run out to cause trouble was cleanly finished off by a razor-sharp Aerial Ace!

Even if the big bug wanted to retaliate, four-times weakness to Flying meant it didn’t matter. It could stand there, bristling with rage all it wanted—its defeat was inevitable.

Hikaru said, “A two-times weakness still leaves room to fight.”

“A four-times weakness? Then it’s all about how deep your movepool is. Too bad Slither Wing’s STAB doesn’t do much to Staraptor, and it can’t learn the Rock-type move Smack Down.”

Larry said, “This is the first time a dangerous creature like this has been confirmed… getting out.”

“Since you say it’s a Pokémon, then using a Poké Ball to contain it should be the best possible solution.”

That was Larry’s on-the-spot plan. Of course, a Pokémon could leave a ball by its own will—but as long as the ball existed, at least the next time it tried something, he could recall it immediately and lock the ball away.

Unless it was strong enough to “blow up the Poké Ball” itself…

After a brief thought, Larry decided he’d use a Great Ball to restrain this violent Pokémon.

But Hikaru stopped him.

“What is it…?” Larry frowned.

Hikaru looked toward the tunnel. “It’s not over yet.”

“There are more sounds coming from inside. The thing that ran out of the Area Zero gate wasn’t the only one.”

“They’re coming out!”

“How is that possible…?”

Larry’s eyes wavered as he stared toward the end of the mountain road in disbelief.

“The Area Zero gate facility is built at the mountain’s peak. That Pokémon has wings, but it doesn’t look like it can actually fly. And Area Zero is supposed to have a barrier…”

“Barrier failure…? That can’t be. The barrier is managed by the gate facility—”

Whatever came next was something only Geeta truly knew. Larry’s confusion deepened.

“Don’t worry. I’ll handle it.”

Hikaru suspected this sudden incident had something to do with Arven. If you did the timing math, it was about right.

And Arven would be very young right now. If Scarlet/Violet-era Arven was around twelve to fourteen, then the current Arven was probably eight to ten.

Everyone knew how it worked in the Pokémon world: at ten, a kid “evolves” into being like Ash. Before ten, you were basically like Nemona—trainer-type kindergarten/elementary-schooler.

And the youngest admission age for Naranja Academy was nine.

“Still… it might be a little different from the background event in the original story.”

Hikaru thought.

In the Path of Legends storyline, Arven had mentioned sneaking into Area Zero to look for his mom or dad. He’d made it a decent way, only getting attacked by Paradox Pokémon later—crying on the phone and asking a taxi driver to come pick him up.

But from what Geeta and the others said in canon, they seemed completely unaware Arven had ever snuck into Area Zero. They only commented on the “Path of Legends” incident afterward.

In other words… the only ones injured that time were Arven himself and Mabosstiff, and it didn’t cause a huge commotion.

“Is it because Area Zero’s situation has changed, so the background event changed too?”

That was the butterfly effect—pull one thread, and everything moved.

Still, Slither Wing might be able to bully Mabosstiff, but in front of Larry—who excelled at Flying—it wasn’t much of a threat.

Besides, Slither Wing’s habitat in Area Zero really was the upper layer. It lived mixed in with plenty of ordinary Pokémon. Once you finished the Path of Legends and reentered Area Zero, you could see Roaring Moon and Slither Wing right there in the starting area of the upper layer.

“CHIIII-CHIIII-CHOOO!”

A flood of cries burst from the tunnel. Huge wings beating, bodies covered in white fur—Slither Wings surged out of the mountaintop tunnel all at once!

They spotted their defeated kin, and their fury boiled over. Staring at Staraptor in the sky, the Slither Wings violently shook the sail-like back-wings on their bodies!

A savage current of air began to swell, and the weather around Medali shifted dramatically.

“Dark clouds… gale-force wind… that’s—” Larry threw his briefcase behind him for protection. Watching the weather change caused by those Slither Wings’ wingbeats, he instantly recognized the move. As someone who used Flying-types himself, it was painfully familiar.

“It’s Hurricane,” Hikaru said, watching the storm take shape. “Looks like this is how they climbed up from the Area Zero gate.”

“The wings on their backs can’t let them fly normally, but there’s one special thing about them: they can learn a lot of ‘wind’ moves.”

“Heat Wave, Hurricane, Gust, Whirlwind… When these Pokémon climb sheer cliffs, they just gather power and unleash a storm to push themselves higher!”

“We can’t let them keep building that storm. I need to take them out quickly—” Larry started reaching for another Poké Ball, but Hikaru waved him off.

“No need to make this complicated. Armarouge—counting on you!”

Sure, against Slither Wing, sending out Volcarona would’ve been a fun contrast, since it was the “original” to the Paradox… and with Volcarona’s strength, one Heat Wave would probably turn the entire Hurricane scene into something like “Fire Style: Explosive Gale Dance,” then roast a bunch of giant moths.

But Armarouge’s “wide-area firepower” wasn’t bad at all!

Armarouge swung his golden spear in a brutal arc!

Amid the violent storm’s shifting currents, a flashing radiance punched through the Hurricane’s obstruction, dragging the dim world back into brilliance.

“Psychic Terrain—Domain Expansion!”

Pokémon on the ground would not be hit by priority moves, and Psychic-type moves would be greatly boosted!

The intense light tore through the wind, turning the storm into sky-illuminating brilliance. The rays exploded outward like a rain of arrows, and the Slither Wings stared down at their own feet in panic!

That fierce light condensed into a beam that surged straight into the heavens!

“Expanding Force!”

Psychic power struck the opponents. On Psychic Terrain, if the user was grounded, the move’s target changed—becoming all opposing Pokémon it could hit.

A full-field blast of light.

And its power increased by another fifty percent.

On top of that, Psychic Terrain itself gave a thirty percent boost!

That was exactly why, in Scarlet/Violet-era competitive battles, Armarouge could keep “setting up, then setting up again, then again—until the final dance!”

If he Terastallized into Psychic, the STAB multiplier became two times. Even with Psychic being a sometimes awkward attacking type, the raw force would reach a level that standard battles could barely imagine.

Boom!

After the light beam erupted, the Hurricane phenomenon the Slither Wings had caused collapsed as well. One after another, they were blasted out, tumbling down from the mountain tunnel like boulders rolling off a cliff—until they piled up into a little “mountain of the defeated.”

Armarouge dismissed the glow from his spear. The Falinks started cheering like a rowdy squad of mascots, shouting and hollering.

But Hikaru kept his gaze fixed on the mountaintop.

Larry’s expression had already changed completely.

“I heard you’re a Steel-type specialist, but that move just now… that was Psychic-type, wasn’t it? I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve got some unique understanding of Psychic too…? Or is it that Geeta forced you to change your style as well, so you’re ‘stuck’ using Steel?”

Hikaru said, “…No, it’s not that. It’s normal to be particularly good at a few moves outside your usual type, right?”

Don’t project your suffering onto me!

“…You’re still watching the tunnel,” Larry said, dragging the topic away from the misery of “management” and back to the problem at hand. “Is there more in there?”

If you focused on what was right in front of you, you didn’t have to think about the depressing stuff.

That was also Larry’s trick for keeping his mental state stable at work.

You couldn’t say he loved his job.

You could only say he got by, step by step, following procedure.

“Yeah,” Hikaru said. “There’s more. Something that followed the Slither Wings up.”

“And that cry… it sounds like an old friend!”

Hikaru heard a rough, grating “sha-sha-sha” kind of shout.

And the newcomers bursting out of the tunnel were unleashing overlapping complaints and roars.

Sandy Shocks!

“Yo! Flintstones!”

“It’s Sandy Shocks—Electric/Ground!”

But these Sandy Shocks didn’t look like the ones Hikaru had seen before. They were furious, like they were about to start a full-on “clash of clans”!

The Sandy Shocks “chieftain” leading them seemed especially unhappy. It was shiny—its usual steel-silver looked aged and worn, and the white magnets had turned black, making it look even more aggressive.

And it was huge.

Hikaru said, “So it’s an ancient tribal chief… but even ancient guys have to follow modern rules in the modern world.”

“Once you enter society, your own rules don’t work anymore, right, Larry-san?”

Hearing Hikaru’s jab, Larry tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“How do you know I’ve said something like that before?”

Leaving aside the fact that Hikaru had roasted him so cleanly he couldn’t even respond—Electric/Ground was also a serious threat to Flying-types.

It resisted Flying twice over, and it could suppress Flying Pokémon with Electric moves. Staraptor had been about to go on the offensive, but one Thunderbolt from the chieftain nearly knocked Staraptor out of the sky!

Right as lightning split the heavens—

The Dive Ball in Hikaru’s hand jolted hard.

He heard the voice of a Pokémon calling for help.

A hero couldn’t ignore that.

“No—don’t come out yet. Charge up inside the ball. A Poké Ball doesn’t stop you from using your power. You can store energy inside, then the instant you come out, release it all at once.”

“And thus…”

“The true Ocean Ranger makes his entrance!”

Hikaru tightened his grip on the Dive Ball—and it suddenly burst with light.

“E-HERO! I activate the Spell Card—Hero Arrives!”

A sturdy blue body erupted from the ball, completing the “all-purpose transformation” in one burst!

“Charging inside the ball is an amazing technique. If you use it well, the Pokémon best suited for this tactic practically announces itself!”

That’s right—Palafin, the one who didn’t need the “return to the ball” step.

Originally, this trick was a tactic used in Pokémon Adventures, in the match between Giovanni and Red. In theory, anyone could learn it. It was simply an on-the-fly battle technique.

What mattered was timing the release perfectly—and choosing the right move to increase your odds of landing it.

And of course, outside formal matches—in wild battles—

Charging inside the ball was one of the strongest methods you could use.

Just like right now.

“MAN~!!!”

The hero arrives!

Palafin became a streak of light. Its glove launched forward like a missile, and one punch sent the Sandy Shocks chieftain flying!

Jet Punch—Palafin’s signature move. Base power 60, superior to the universal priority move Aqua Jet’s base power 40. With the noble gift of STAB, Jet Punch effectively hit like a 90-power strike!

And if you stacked it with something like Mystic Water…

A priority move with nearly 100 effective power was absolutely no joke!

With one punch, the chieftain was launched away. Sandy Shocks—two-times weak to Water—was driven into the far mountain road in a crashing slam, kicking up a huge cloud of dust!

And after watching Armarouge erase multiple enemies in one Psychic Terrain-fueled Expanding Force, Palafin’s spirit shook with excitement. It was inspired—fired up to the core!

This was how a hero should arrive.

And I… I was going to become a hero that strong too!

Palafin’s hands gathered a massive surge of Water energy, and it blasted forward like a Kamehameha. The power spread in midair, becoming a roaring wave that swept down the mountain road!

Surf—an enormous tidal attack that hit all Pokémon around the user!

“Man!”

A successful man! An invincible man! No more failure. No more hesitation!

As Palafin struck a pose, Hikaru added one final line:

“Uh…”

“All evil shall be brought to justice!”

(End of Chapter)

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