Chapter 441: The Pillar Family

Boom rumble rumble!

The tremendous roar was like sudden thunder, and silver light lit up half the sky.

Then the firelight of the explosion and choking black smoke surged skyward like a long dragon.

The bird Pokémon that had only just settled were startled into flight once more, scattering in all directions as they fled in panic from any possible threat.

The clamorous cries made many of the wild Pokémon fleeing the disaster lift their heads one after another.

Some were panicked, others gazed blankly toward the horizon.

Was that thunder?

When overcast skies lingered, thunder often came as company; such majestic heavenly might always left them uneasy. A few years back, a lightning strike had split a giant tree and started a mountain fire — had it not been for the nearby water source and the cool, damp weather, it might well have burned their homes to ashes.

"Luli…"

The round-bodied Marill worriedly looked toward the direction the firelight was coming from, exchanged glances with its companions, and resolved itself — deciding to run back and see what was happening.

When the time came, they'd put out the fire if they could; if they couldn't, they'd simply turn around and flee again.

The mudslide had already destroyed their home — they couldn't let a mountain fire ravage this stretch of forest as well.

And the moment the Marill moved, the other wild Pokémon reacted in turn. The timid ones stopped in place, trembling with dread, while the bolder gritted their teeth and followed along of their own accord.

Without question, this was what set Pokémon apart from most ordinary wild animals.

Just like the Pokémon in the movie "Genesect and the Legend Awakened" — the Feraligatr and others who bravely defended their home against the Genesect Army and later put out the fire.

Out in the wilds there was no lack of Pokémon like Absol, who warned of disasters, or Marill who refused to abandon their home and let it become a scorched wasteland.

Even if they lacked the great wisdom of humans, having that kind of self-awareness was already quite remarkable.

However.

When they arrived at the place where firelight surged into the sky, what they saw was a huge metal-colored mass crashed into the sand and gravel, its main body reduced to a wrecked ruin, its limbs scattered across the ground and burning.

Where the fine rain fell.

A mountain-like, colossal Steelix stood beside it, ignoring the raging flames all around, lifting its drill-shaped tail and boring it into the massive wreckage over and over — the buzzing vibration sounded exactly like a construction site.

From within came wild roars of terror and fury for no apparent reason.

A little farther off, a young human man was directing a number of Pokémon to rescue another group trapped in iron cages — and the lone-wanderer Absol that had warned them of the danger earlier was plainly among them.

Beside them, two other humans lay flat on their backs, their condition unknown.

What was going on?

The wild Pokémon that had come to put out the fire stopped in their tracks, exchanging bewildered glances, not daring to approach.

Humans fighting among themselves? Why here of all places?

"Hm? Why are wild Pokémon running back this way too?"

Baimu turned his head at Aggron's prompting, looking with some surprise at the group of wild Pokémon gazing down from the hillside. "Come back to rescue their companions?"

He turned back to look at the Pokémon that had crawled out of the cages — they seemed about to flee, but on finding not a single one of the others moving, simply stayed where they were.

"Chansey, you give them a check — if they're hurt, treat them; if not, send them on their way. Don't let them stay in a dangerous place like this."

He gave Chansey the word.

The ground where the mudslide had passed was soft and unstable — who knew when another one might come sweeping through.

"Suo-woo…"

A sound like a cat's meow rang out. Baimu followed the noise and saw an Absol limping toward him, its hind leg apparently injured, making its gait unsteady.

And more than the wound, Absol seemed to have something else urgent on its mind.

"Wooo~" The white-furred big cat kept glancing toward the direction the mudslide had swept away, then turning its gaze back to Baimu with a look of appeal.

"You want to go down there?"

After hearing Porygon-II's translation, he was at first a little puzzled; only after turning his head did he realize this coal-miner-looking white-furred big cat had a bad leg of its own, yet was still thinking of warning the wild Pokémon below to avoid disaster!

Then, knowing it couldn't run anymore itself, it wanted him to lend a hand.

What kind of disaster beast was this? It was clearly a beast of blessing, a beast of kindness. Setting aside the seeking-of-profit part, at the very least its disaster-avoiding attribute was maxed out.

"…Chansey!"

Baimu called Chansey over directly.

In his view, with an Absol in this state, the first priority was to take care of itself — that leg looked pretty badly hurt, and if it were any worse, going permanently lame wasn't out of the question—

Of course, under normal circumstances, a Pokémon that broke a leg could heal on its own without even needing to go to a Pokémon Center.

In any case, leaving the patient to a professional was never wrong.

"Happy!"

Chansey's little face grew serious; it nodded with great solemnity, completely shedding its previous soft and gentle manner and fully displaying the poise of a Pokémon nurse.

Absol looked at it and felt an inexplicable jolt — why did it feel as if it had just escaped the tiger's mouth only to fall into a "wolf's den"?

Not long after.

The white-furred big cat's premonition proved true.

"Suo-woo—"

"Happy!"

The rather pitiful cat-howl and the stern cries rose one after another, drawing sidelong glances from the surrounding wild Pokémon.

But in truth Chansey was merely bandaging and applying medicine to Absol — at most with a little extra force.

Mm.

Just a little.

"Happy!"

Chansey looked at Absol, whose eyes were brimming with tears from the pain, and when it tried to turn its head to lick its hind leg, hurriedly pressed down on its head and warned it with absolute seriousness: "Happy!"

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No licking your wounds!

Even Lei Gong couldn't do anything about that pink giant egg, let alone some mere white-faced big cat.

Absol nodded, eyes brimming with hot tears.

Now, switching tracks.

All Baimu trudged unevenly to the side of the airship wreckage, hopped to the front of the cockpit, and peered through the mud-caked gaps in the iron plating at the Pokémon Hunter boss holed up inside, still putting up a stubborn resistance.

"Hey, I'm giving you half a minute more. If you don't come out, you can stay in that turtle shell till you die."

He patted the iron plating.

As if answering his words, Steelix redoubled its efforts drilling through the steel plates, not even caring about the protective barrier flickering to life above, and charged inside with reckless abandon.

The Pokémon Hunter inside twisted his face, glaring at him with utter hatred, completely failing to notice that his own system was being silently infiltrated by a toy duck.

Collapsing the outermost protective barrier was only a matter of time.

Ten minutes earlier, Steelix had used a heavy slam to send the two pursuing Pokémon Hunters and their aircraft flying together, but failed to take them down on the first strike—only forcing them to make an emergency landing.

A closer look revealed that their small aircraft was actually enveloped in a blue membrane of light, which had somehow withstood the shockwave of the heavy slam.

You have to understand, even Team Rocket's small aircraft don't have protective membranes—truly "elite" Pokémon Hunters!

No wonder three of them dared to wander around here so brazenly.

Probably the tier just below the Sinnoh Hunter J. Worlds apart from the ragtag bunch who tried to catch Lei Gong with a crystal system earlier.

Too bad this kind of smart system is nothing but a door that can be opened at will in front of Porygon2—nowhere near as threatening as that petrification gun in Hunter J's hands.

All Baimu saw the two who'd crash-landed trying to run and was about to send Mawile out to chase them, but who would've thought Dragapult was far faster than him—it dropped its Honchkrow leader on the spot, turned invisible, and gave chase to launch an attack, taking one down without breaking a sweat before leisurely attempting to replicate the feat on the other.

Its normally aloof personality had vanished without a trace in that moment.

Seeing Dragapult so violently ferocious, his mind instinctively recalled the saying: when "enemies" meet, their eyes blaze with particular hatred.

He'd guessed before that Dragapult's hatred of humans might have something to do with poaching gangs, and now it seemed to be trending that way? If its former partner had been abducted…

He'd have to find a way to rescue them.

All Baimu pondered this in his heart, but didn't forget to go make trouble for the last man.

Only that man, realizing his two brothers probably couldn't handle All Baimu and his Pokémon, had at some unknown point burrowed back into Lin Zili and driven out the airship they'd been using to get around—

An airship with missiles, no less!

It looked about seventy percent similar to the one the thief father-daughter duo piloted in the movie "Diancie and the Cocoon of Destruction"—wonder if they came off the same factory line.

All Baimu was also startled when he spotted the missiles, but only relaxed once the guy actually fired—

These missiles flew slower than Dragapult's Dragon Darts!

Their power was also utterly incomparable to missiles from his previous life.

Steelix deflected those missiles with a single Sand Tomb protective barrier, sending them veering off to explode elsewhere—they couldn't hurt it or the All Baimu and Blissey sitting on its head at all.

Suddenly relaxing, he even had the leisure to wonder whether the missiles Yveltal had dodged packed more punch than these.

The subsequent attack flow was also very clear.

All Baimu and Steelix tangled with the airship outside, while he dispatched Porygon2 to cripple the airship's main control program; Hydreigon, after taking out the Honchkrow and Crobat, received his order to go help Dragapult, lest they capsize in a ditch.

In less than half a minute, the airship lost control and plummeted from the sky.

Thinking about it, it made sense.

How could this guy pilot such a huge airship alone without some kind of intelligent control system? Even a genius like Jello would need AI to operate a flying vessel that large.

To speed up the airship's crash, Steelix went the extra mile and whipped out an Iron Tail—but who would've thought that once the airship lost its protective barrier, the iron plating was as brittle as cardboard, and that one tail nearly sliced the airship clean in half at the middle.

Luckily the dragon bones were sturdy enough, holding firm until impact before shattering apart, which also sent the many iron cages inside tumbling out.

And after that… was the scene before him now.

Dragapult and Hydreigon had worked together to catch the last man and then vanished; amid all the chaos, All Baimu had no idea where it went, but figured it must be nearby.

According to Hydreigon, this guy had almost flipped the tables—high level he might be, but too straightforward, no match for the cunning tricks of Pokémon Hunters.

Fortunately it had followed along and covered Dragapult's back.

Half a minute later.

The Pokémon Hunter boss obediently crawled out of the cockpit. Though hatred still lurked in his gaze, fear clearly outweighed it.

They'd been pulling jobs all over for so long—when had He Ceng ever run into a ruthless character like All Baimu?

He said to have the Pokémon beat people up and they really beat them within an inch of their lives, as if he wasn't worried about killing them at all. Even Officer Jenny might not be that ruthless!

Not to mention the way Steelix had been drilling into the cockpit with its tail just now—his two brothers were lying on the ground, their fates unknown!

Honestly.

This viciousness reminded him of a certain small town in a remote, desolate region…

While the Hunter boss was thinking, a question suddenly came from beside him.

"Did you cause the mudslide?"

"Yes, ah—no!"

The Hunter boss's expression changed, and he hurriedly waved his hands in denial.

All Baimu looked at him, thought it over, then summoned the Milotic that had sent a group of wild Pokémon into a daze. "Come on, use Hypnosis to pry his mouth open."

"Milo!"

Milotic nodded, blue light flashing from its eyes.

"No! Wait!" The Hunter boss frantically tried to dodge, but before he could even turn his head, Steelix had already grabbed him up with its tail.

The thick tail knot covered most of his body, leaving only his head exposed to Milotic's Hypnosis waves.

Three minutes later.

All Baimu had pried every piece of intelligence he wanted to know out of the Hunter boss's mouth.

Just as he'd suspected, this mudslide was no natural disaster—it was a man-made one caused by these three guys planting explosives. Unfortunately, Absol had only predicted the danger's arrival, not that the disaster was human-caused.

The funny thing is, these three guys actually came for the ancient tomb — having learned from somewhere that a legendary Pokémon slumbered here, they planned to blast open the ancient tomb located in the mountains to capture the Registeel inside.

Only, before catching Registeel, they first rounded up a wave of wild Pokémon that were fleeing.

Absol also happened to run into them and was unfortunately captured.

"Using bombs to blow open the door… only these guys could come up with that."

Baimu clicked his tongue inwardly, thinking that if the ancient tomb didn't have some protective measures, it really might not hold up against repeated bomb attacks.

However…

Is there still a Registeel in the ancient tomb?

He did remember that the Registeel from the divine era had never mentioned its origins — it might well be the one from this ancient tomb.

Of course, it might also not be.

After all, for Pokémon like the Three Legendary Titans, the anime clearly shows there being multiples — not to mention the three guarding the World Tree at the beginning of the world in the movie, but later on in the journey a trainer called A-Jian also had a complete set of the Three Legendary Titans, plain as day.

Made it look like some wholesale operation.

Honestly, Baimu was quite interested in the Legendary Titans, no less interested than in Lei Gong, and among the many Titans, his favorites were actually the Dragon Titan Regidrago and the Electric Titan Regieleki, both introduced in Sword and Shield.

The reason was none other than—

They're strong!

These two Titans released later — one had speed so fast it caused bugs in the game, the other had the exclusive move Dragon Energy, nicknamed "Dragon Spray."

If he got the chance, he would definitely go to Wang Guan Snowfields to look for them and try to capture the two.

Though he'd be a bit unfair to Xiaomao.

Suddenly.

"Beep beep— beep beep—"

A piercing siren wailed, followed by the whir-whir-whir-whir of helicopter rotors.

Baimu raised his head, and was a little surprised to see Officer Jenny poking her head out of the cabin door — why had she arrived so fast today?

Usually, in a remote place like this, you basically couldn't expect her for several hours.

"The ancient tomb…"

He turned his head, only to find that at some unknown point the ancient tomb had already been buried — the burier, Aggron, was calmly clapping its claws, shaking off the damp sand and gravel clinging to them.

"Ha, burying it is useless too, you know."

Baimu looked at it with a mixture of relief and helplessness — the latter had probably noticed his strong interest in the Legendary Titans, and so didn't want to expose them to outsiders.

But when Officer Jenny interrogates these Pokémon hunters later, won't everything that should be exposed end up exposed anyway?

Hmm…

Actually, he could quietly have a word with her and ask her not to casually let it slip.

A legendary Pokémon slumbering on Route 120 — that would surely draw a flood of trainers intruding; the soil around here had already been loosened by the Pokémon hunters' bombs, and besides being dangerous, it would disturb the wild Pokémon in the area.

Officer Jenny should presumably understand.

Jenny and Joy are the most humane bunch in the entire Pokémon anime.