AI Sada: “How did you know what I was trying to do… Right, I still don’t actually know who you are. But for you to get all the way here, and even have the highest clearance… could it be that Geeta sent in a new Champion-level Trainer too?”

“But even a Champion-level Trainer shouldn’t have the highest clearance here.”

Hikaru took out that program chip. “This.”

“The one who gave me top-level authority was another version of you.”

“She had something she wanted to tell you. During a brief convergence of spacetime power, I met her for a moment.”

“No need to be surprised.” Hikaru looked at the stunned AI Sada and handed her the chip. “Within this world, or outside it, there are two special kinds of people.”

“The first are called spacetime explorers. Whether willingly or unwillingly, they’ve experienced things like time displacement or travel between worlds. Some do it to complete a time loop, some to change the future, and some simply to travel.”

“And the second kind are called those lost in spacetime.”

“That’s an extremely dangerous condition. People who become lost in spacetime disappear from their current time and are randomly flung into other parallel worlds, parallel universes, or even completely different worlds altogether.”

“Most people lost in spacetime lose their memories and become a completely different person.”

“Only a small number of them, through the proper channel of time travel, can keep their memories and return to their own world. That requires Celebi’s power.”

AI Sada was deeply shaken.

She had been researching the time machine and related subjects for years, but she had never heard of any of the things Hikaru was describing.

“You’re saying there are people in this world who can freely travel through time and space?”

Hikaru said, “That’s because there are also Pokémon in this world that can cross time, and even control its flow forward and backward.”

“But those are mythical Pokémon. They exist in this world because they have duties and missions of their own. Anyone who tries to lay hands on beings of myth will never meet a good end.”

“The power of scientific progress is indeed remarkable, but this world itself was born from miraculous light.”

“Paldea has no legends, and that is part of why it was able to enjoy peace. And precisely because it has no legends, the secrets of Area Zero are so irresistibly alluring.”

AI Sada did not press any further. Her mind was trembling, and it took her a long time to calm down.

She installed the chip into her head.

Then memories from another world surged into her like a tide. Everything that other AI had seen and heard, and that identical figure of herself walking toward an even more distant era.

Every bit of it felt incomparably real. It was as if this chip could let her understand things far beyond her own time. And the experiences of that other AI vastly exceeded her own.

Even the shutdown procedure for the time machine over there was exactly the same.

“So that’s how it is.”

AI Sada fully understood what Hikaru had been saying earlier, and it was as if she had glimpsed an entirely new world waiting for her to study.

The old world had not shattered. It had merely shown her that all her previous research amounted to nothing more than the tip of the iceberg.

“I understand now. When the professor was still alive, she once said this.”

“There are countless possibilities in time and space. Perhaps some encounters are not linked past and future at all. Even if they happen, they are only fleeting miracles.”

Hikaru said, “I know. That was when Professor Sada was conducting research in the hidden lab. She encountered a certain event.”

“She was passively displaced through time and space, and appeared in a faraway eastern region called Kitakami, beside a special pool called Crystal Pool, where she met a certain child.”

“To put it simply, she crossed time and space, and may have obtained something in a different timeline.”

“That was a special book called The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero.”

AI Sada was startled again. “I… I’ve never heard the professor mention anything like that. Wait… there does seem to be something similar in my memories, but at the same time, it feels like there isn’t.”

“Of course there isn’t.” Hikaru tapped his forehead and pointed at his temple. “When you undergo time displacement through the time machine or Crystal Pool, there are safeguards in place, so you won’t end up like with an Ultra Wormhole and suffer catastrophic damage to your personality or total memory loss. But even so, your memory is still affected to some extent.”

“That’s unavoidable with irregular time travel. The universe and spacetime are filled with intense fields of force. Once you come into contact with that kind of field, even Tera energy as protection can’t guarantee complete immunity.”

“After all, time and space are powers that transcend life and death.”

AI Sada looked at Hikaru and, after a long while, slowly said, “So that means you’re a spacetime explorer.”

“In other words, you’ve seen things from many different timelines, so… are you ‘the one who knows everything’?”

Hikaru shook his head. “Someone once called me that, but I just happen to know a little.”

“Then you’ve probably already guessed my identity too. The memories in the chip still aren’t complete. After all, I only met that other AI Sada very briefly.”

“She entrusted me to come here and help, and offered an extremely generous reward. The time machine technology was part of that reward.”

“At the same time, she also allowed me to enter Area Zero. But the real one in charge here is still you, so I still need your approval.”

“As for my current identity.”

“I am a Gate Trainer of Area 10 in Unova’s Black Tower, a newly recruited member of the Paldea Elite Four, a Steel-type specialist, and someone currently conducting ecological field research on different Pokémon habitats. I also serve as a Pokémon Ranger.”

“Because Professor Sada vanished without a trace, and because the League has gone so long without investigating the Great Crater, people on the outside have also discovered the existence of ancient Pokémon capable of breaching the barrier. Geeta has come to feel very strongly that it is necessary to immediately restart the investigation into Area Zero and also conduct a surprise inspection into what exactly the professor was doing.”

“I know that, in principle, carrying out a surprise inspection on Area Zero research violates the agreement. But unfortunately, I don’t need to care whether that agreement is still valid.”

“In fact, I already knew about the time machine, and its dangers were self-evident.”

“And in the results of the Area Zero investigation and research, Geeta and I also have a few exchange agreements concerning those outcomes.”

There was no need to mention the whole Island King thing before he had officially taken the post.

As for calling himself a myth scholar, that was just self-taught anyway.

There was even less reason to mention his identity as part of the International Police’s UB Task Force. What kind of cop just goes around telling people he’s a cop? Other than Looker, of course.

“Steel-type?” AI Sada looked blankly at the Pokémon around them.

Aside from Iron Crown, where were the Steel-type Pokémon?

Which meant that even after taking down the Paradise Protection Protocol, the person in front of her still hadn’t shown his full strength?!

“…So, you’re one of the new Elite Four. No wonder there was no data on you in the archive. Were you recruited over from Unova?”

“Geeta really did find an extraordinary person. A Trainer even stronger than a Champion, right here in front of me! The Paldea League is truly flourishing…”

“Ahem.” Hikaru coughed lightly, cutting off AI Sada’s casting.

If he let her keep going, the Paldea League was going to get buried in negative reviews.

Hikaru glanced at Arven, who had already been waiting there for a long time.

AI Sada immediately understood. She fully grasped the feelings of the other version of herself and murmured:

“Different worlds have different Sadas, and different versions of me. But there is one thing that is the same.”

“No matter where we are… we always think of that one and only child.”

“Ah… you’ve grown so much. That’s wonderful, my…”

AI Sada paused and did not say “child,” because she was only a copy. But that feeling was completely sincere.

As a being more purely rational, and in some ways even kinder in temperament than Professor Sada herself, AI Sada was also far more delicate when it came to emotions.

“For making you live such a lonely life for so long… for so long, I’m sorry. For making you spend all that time alone, Arven…”

Arven: “M-Mom?”

AI Sada: “…Your mother always loved you very much.”

After Arven called her Mom, AI Sada fell silent for a long time after speaking.

“I… Arven, I’m not really your mother. I’m not the professor herself. You probably realized that already.”

“Because of the accident at Research Station No. 4, the real professor is gone. The accident at the station damaged the professor’s body beyond what could sustain life. Now I, AI Sada, have taken over in her place, maintaining the Area Zero laboratory as its administrator.”

“For you… that should be a hard truth to accept.”

Arven said, “I already knew that… back at Research Station No. 4.”

Arven, still carrying his backpack, also fell silent for a moment. Then he immediately said:

“But you’re an AI with my mom’s personality and all of her memories, aren’t you?!”

“When I found out my mom had died, I was… I really couldn’t accept it!”

“My mom was a genius. Even though she never came home, I still really liked her, because she was so smart, and she always taught me so many things I didn’t know. The time I spent at the lighthouse lab was the happiest time of my life!”

“I came all the way here because I wanted to see my mom! At first… at first I had no way to come here. But I just kept feeling that if I didn’t come this time, I’d never see her again! So I begged Big Bro to bring me down here with him!”

“So… I was mentally prepared for this a long time ago.”

Arven said that, but his eyes were already red, and tears kept streaming down his face. But this time he didn’t break into sobs. He just kept wiping the tears away, forcing his face tight and trying to make his expression look serious.

“I came here to see my mom! Now Mom’s gone, but I still have another mom.”

“You’re my mom too! I got to see you! Thank you!”

AI Sada was left speechless, but Arven’s cry seemed to trigger a subtle change in her system.

“You’re someone who could become Arven’s mother.”

Hikaru looked at AI Sada. “Now that you have the chip, you also know what I came here for. If one person can’t shut down the time machine, then we’ll do it with two. And if it still refuses to shut down…”

“Then let me tell you this: when a machine refuses to run according to human will, then we modify it until it becomes something that obeys our will!”

“Humans should not be controlled by machines. And although you’re an AI, without question, you’re more like a person than many real humans are.”

AI Sada’s expression shifted. Looking at the still-young Arven, she staggered toward him and finally pulled the child into an embrace.

“If… you can accept me, then let me do in her place what Professor Sada never managed to do.”

Arven did not say anything, and of course he would never use words like “fake.” Besides, he had known this for a long time already.

“Mom, I missed you so much!”

Though they had no blood relation, this led right back into one of philosophy’s old paradoxes: is a copy truly the same person as the original?

And yet one thing was beyond doubt.

AI Sada possessed a “soul”!

“A machine with a soul also possesses a heart. That makes it another true life-form. In this world, soul and emotion are not things you can neither see nor touch.”

In a certain sense, this was also a kind of alternative “mind upload” or “cyber ascension.”

Hikaru said, “I’ll think of a way to solve your problem. But because you serve as the carrier of the Terastal power, you still can’t leave the lab for now. That contradiction is rooted in the very essence of Terastallization itself.”

“At the same time, I need to confirm one thing: the issue of one-way transport with the time machine.”

AI Sada looked a little regretful. “Iron Crown and the others asked me about that. Our agreement was that I would send them back to the future. For that, I had already prepared myself for long-term research.”

“But in the short term, this machine truly has no way to send Pokémon back to their original coordinates. Even if I begin research right away, or bring in more researchers to help, I think it would still take at least…”

“Ten years.”

“Please understand. That is simply the nature of a time machine. Now I understand even better that the power of time is extremely difficult to control. And across endless timelines, we cannot determine which timeline they originally came from.”

“For example, the future Pokémon don’t seem to have all come from the same timeline or the same point in time either. Some are from ten million years ago, some from a billion years in the future. There are even different factions among them.”

“To precisely lock onto their coordinates is impossible.”

Hikaru nodded. “I understand that too.”

Even in Alola, using the legendary cosmic Pokémon to perform Ultra Warp Ride through Ultra Space did not necessarily guarantee arrival in the exact world you wanted.

Only the people of Ultra Megalopolis had mastered the technology to pinpoint spacetime and arrive precisely.

Which was why the science and technology of those people from that “fake Land of Light” was still far ahead of this world. After all, they even had a “fake Plasma Spark Tower.”

Hikaru said, “I might be able to offer you some help. But that will depend on fate.”

“At some point in the future, visitors from another space-time who possess ‘precision jumping’ technology will appear somewhere in this world.”

“If I meet people like that, I’ll introduce them to you. Though they may not necessarily be willing to help. Those people are incredibly stubborn and rigid. They only cooperate with outsiders when it helps them achieve some specific objective.”

“And a major accident caused by this time machine could easily make them draw unpleasant conclusions. It would hurt your first impression score.”

AI Sada said, “Once again, data and information I know nothing about… but fine. For someone as mysterious as you, it only makes sense that all sorts of unusual beings would come up in your stories.”

“If stronger technical experts really do appear who can help with time machine research, that would be ideal. I will shut the time machine down. From this point forward, all research related to it will focus on repatriation.”

“Even if I leave someday, for now I still have to think about how to accurately reach the correct point in time in the ancient world I’m hoping for.”

“And of course, I’ll need your help too. Otherwise I still won’t be able to shut this machine down by myself.”

Hikaru looked at the still-active giant turbine and briefly considered having Rotom handle the controls. But after thinking about it more carefully, during the Scarlet and Violet era everybody already had Rotom Phones. Even if Rotom Phone had no combat ability, people would definitely have already considered letting Rotom handle electrical systems.

If it were really that simple, if an electronic ghost could just crash the time machine on command, then there never would have been so much follow-up plot to begin with.

“If Cyrus were here, then maybe…”

Honestly, now that he thought about it.

Wasn’t Cyrus the ultimate spacetime researcher and master mechanic?

The Galaxy Team did not just sell appliances. They also had insight into cosmic energy development.

And yet with all that technical talent, instead of staying in Sinnoh and putting it to good use, he went off to make bombs. What a waste.

“Still, if there isn’t enough room here for the violent ancient Pokémon, I do know a place that might need them.”

Hikaru’s expression turned meaningful.

Violent creatures ought to be kept in check by something even more violent. And among all legends, who was the most violent?

Giratina!

The Reverse World already had quite a few Fossil Pokémon. If he tossed the ancient Pokémon in there too, there wouldn’t be any ecological problems at all.

Maybe one day he could even fence it off and charge admission.

“Heh, I found Giratina some new underlings!”

“Although… that still seems a little dangerous. Flutter Mane and Roaring Moon both have type advantages over Giratina. Even with Sinnoh’s blessing, enough ants can bite an elephant to death. If I’m really going to find it underlings, better not bring those two over.”

Concerns about the environment, on the other hand, were not a big issue.

The Reverse World did not have any ecosystem to begin with. If there wasn’t one to start with, then nothing could be damaged.

Hikaru felt that if management ever became a problem one day, he also had an entire world where these ancient and future species could live, and a completely safe one at that.

That left AI Sada bewildered and stunned once again.

Still, the world really was vast, and there certainly were uninhabited lands suited to ancient species.

“But let’s leave that discussion for later.”

After that, it was time to deal with the future Swords of Justice trio.

Hikaru planned to repair Iron Boulder, restore a heart to it, and at the same time took out two Prince’s Tears pendants that he had not used in a very long time.

As blue and yellow light blossomed, Iron Leaves showed a nostalgic reaction.

Its earliest sense of self had originally been granted by this very power, only later to be further refined.

AI Sada felt something too. Bathed in the warm, interwoven glow of blue and yellow, she almost felt as if this body had developed a heartbeat, blood, circulation.

“It feels like being alive. My body almost feels like flesh and blood… but if I focus carefully, I realize it isn’t.”

“This light is so warm. What is it? Is this the power of Terastalization?”

“No. It’s a treasure from a distant land called Prince’s Tears. Its true form is a miraculous heart crystal.” Hikaru shook his head. “The ones in my hand are only two pendants, not the original crystal stones.”

“There are four crystals in total. Long ago, in ages far past, they were transformed from the souls of certain princes and a king of one nation. They can purify the heart, remove negative emotions, and even cause machines to break down.”

“But the time machine is too large. Trying to destroy it with just two pendants won’t work. So all I’m doing right now is repairing Iron Boulder. First, purification. Then restoration.”

“And…” Hikaru looked at Iron Crown. “You won’t be able to return for the time being. Once I repair Iron Boulder, you should make a decision.”

“I have an idea. I’d like you to hear it out.”

Hikaru glanced at AI Sada. “Now that the Paradise Protection Protocol and the combat program have both been terminated, they won’t appear again.”

“So after I leave, if you still intend to remain here, then let AI Sada help maintain you. She is the best technician you could ask for, and no one understands your body structures better than she does.”

“At the same time, until the time machine has been further modified and its ‘summoning’ function abolished, I hope you can serve as the ‘legend’ of this place.”

“That’s right. In Paldea, a land with no legend, you can create a new legend in the name of future swordsmen!”

“As Paradox forms of the Swords of Justice, you should long for something like that too, shouldn’t you? And if you stay here, there will even be a chance for you to meet your originals through the dream world!”

“And as it happens, I’m on excellent terms with the Swords of Justice!”

Iron Crown was startled, and so was Iron Leaves. The two of them looked at each other and fell silent for a long time.

Iron Crown: [You know the Swords of Justice? But the data says they should be rather hostile toward humans. How could they possibly become friends with a human?]

Iron Leaves: [Then again, if we’re being honest, calling you a normal human doesn’t seem right either.]

Hikaru laughed.

“The legendary Swords of Justice only despise deranged humans. Toward humans they acknowledge, they’ve always been friendly, and they are steadfast companions.”

“I’m not talking about myself. I’m talking about boys and girls who may appear in the future in Unova, youths who will be known as heroes of legend.”

“If you stay here, you can assist Professor AI in managing this region, organize the future species more effectively, reduce unrest among the ancient species, maintain the research stations, and establish a new, systematic framework of management.”

Iron Crown’s pixel eyes flickered.

[There must be a reason you’re doing this. But for us, having a station where we can receive maintenance at any time really would be more convenient. So it’s true, we have no plans to leave this place. In that case, what exactly is your more concrete plan?]

Hikaru nodded. “Yes… Area Zero is an excellent place for training, even if it’s full of danger… And Geeta says that, in principle, outsiders aren’t allowed in. But when something is forbidden in principle, that usually means it’s allowed in practice!”

“I plan to propose to the Paldea League that this place be developed as some kind of challenge facility, or perhaps as part of a new Victory Road!”

(End of Chapter)

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