Equestria. Canterlot. Nightfall.
Fluttershy and everyone had rescued the ponies and Pokemon of Canterlot from the pit of fire. With Cosmos being away, they had the chance and all the time to free the Canterlot Residents as the orbs that the Pokemon were trapped in had been broken apart. The flames were put out by Water-Type attacks, putting an end to this overflowing heat that was constantly there.
"Thank you for that," Fleur-de-lis said after being freed. "It was about time...All of that dancing wasn't my best unless I put on my favourite dress. Pretend you never saw it when showing up here.2
"My hooves burn..." Minuette sat down, rocking back and forth whilst looking at her burnt hooves that have been moving on the broken ground while a constant flow of fire went on. She was immediately cooled off by water from her Simipour.
"Where do you think Palkia went?" Fluttershy wondered. "I haven't seen it for a while."
"Palkia probably followed Cosmos back to her dimension. It can move through and appear in any dimension after all." Cold Colt explained. "I'm sure Palkia's fine."
"It should be. It's one of the Creation Trio. It's stupid strong." Hollow added. Just as they were talking about Palkia, lo and behold, the Spatial Pokemon had returned. It had appeared at Canterlot once more, travelling from the Malice Dimension to here.
Everyone's attention had been geared towards the Guardian of Space as Palkia came here to do the one thing that prompted it to show up in the first place. Fix space. As the creator of space, the balance needed to be restored at once. The Spatial Pokemon looked up at the massive tear, knowing that it would take more than breathing to fix this.
Palkia teleported to the top of the tear through both spaces from both worlds, putting its claw on it. Palkia could physically interact with it much like how Cosmos managed to interact with the sky and space at the same time. The Spatial Pokemon's signature cosmic pink glow emanated as it started dragging its claw and arm across the torn skies.
By moving forward with it, Palkia could be seen repairing the damage that Cosmos had made to space. It was a beautiful sight to see and a rare one too considering an event like this is unlikely to happen unless certain circumstances lead to it.
The damage to space could be seen being reversed as if it never happened all the while a giant white and pink dragon travelled along the heavens. Despite everything that had happened, this was a calming sight to see and the best way to have everyone feel a sense of peace. And as a bonus, Cosmos was nowhere to be found.
"Wow...Oh, wait a minute." Fluttershy took a moment to stop admiring the beautiful sight of pink stardust dripping from above. "What about Princess Celestia and Princess Luna? Where are they?"
"Not sure." Moondancer shook her head. "Princess Celestia had her Celestial-Gardevoir overloaded, causing her to pass out. After that, Cosmos captured her, but we're not sure where she is. Or where Princess Luna is either."
"Dino..." Audino would sort that out. She leaned her head in the direction of the castle, focusing on the sounds coming from that spot. She was looking for something specific. A heartbeat or any other sound that could originate from either Celestia, Luna or their Pokemon. She walked over to the castle with Fluttershy following her.
Palkia was leaving Canterlot since it would have to go across the entirety of both worlds to fix this mess. It was an incident on a double planetary scale.
Near the Kingdra Durance. The path to Canterlot.
Previously arriving at the Kingdra Durance Ash had found one of Cynthia's Poke Balls. The Poke Ball that contained her Lucario. Lucario was the only Pokemon that had not been affected by Cosmos' control and it had Aura to thank for that. After that, they were leaving the Durance, heading over to Canterlot as Lucario spoke to Ash and his team along the way.
"Hmm...So you got sent all the way here." Ash sat down alongside the rest of his Pokemon, listening to what Lucario had to say about the Cosmos debacle. "And you've been trying to free Cynthia this whole time, but couldn't do it since Cosmos was keeping you away."
"Rrr." Cynthia's Lucario nodded in response.
"But. That means we've got three times the Aura to free her." Ash stood up before holding out the staff of Sir Aaron. "How about this? If you, me and my Lucario all use Aura together, we can free Cynthia. I tried, but she sent me away before I got the chance. But if we overwhelm her like this, it'll be a safe bet that we'll get Cynthia back."
"Luca!" Cynthia's Lucario and Ash's Lucario liked the sound of that. It was a good approach as Aura was perfectly effective against Cosmos to the point where she absolutely fears it.
"Great. First, I gotta check if everyone else is okay." Ash dug into his pocket, pulling out his Xtransceiver. He wanted to know the status of his friends more than anything right now. He went for the first two that he knew were available at the moment. Fluttershy and Applejack as he called them both. The device rang before showing the faces of them both.
"Ash! Oh, glad to see you're okay." A relieved Fluttershy said as she was currently inside Canterlot Castle. "Where are you?"
"I'm at Kingdra Durance. Got sent all the way here. I just wanted to know if you guys were going okay right now."
"Never better. Right now, Palkia's fixing space." Applejack answered.
"Palkia's here?!" Ash gasped once the Spatial Pokemon had been brought up. "Awesome!"
"We saw it appear here at Canterlot. After that, it went off to deal with Cosmos and came back later to fix the damage she did to the sky. It's a pretty sight if you can see it."
"Uhh..." Ash looked up at the sky, wondering if he could possibly spot Palkia. The Spatial Pokemon hadn't arrived at this spot just. "Nah. Not yet. But if it battled Cosmos...then Cynthia-" Entering the call and cutting Ash's sentence off was none other than Twilight. She had joined the call. "Twilight?"
"Sorry to interrupt, but has anyone seen the massive rip in the sky?" Twilight immediately jumped to the tear.
"We sure have. I think everyone has by now." Applejack replied. "But ya'll don't have to worry about it being there forever."
"We don't?" Twilight, along with Pinkie Pie, Spike and Starlight who had come into frame had pulled back. "I don't know about that...This is space we're talking about."
"Palkia's sorting that out," Fluttershy added. "A lot has happened. Too much, actually."
"Let's catch up with what we've all done. Right now, We're off to find Rainbow Dash and Rarity next and after that, we'll try and reach Absol," said Twilight.
"Palkia's repairing space but we don't know where Cosmos is right now." Fluttershy was next. "We're looking for Princess Celestia and Princess Luna at the moment. But we can't find them. They're not in the castle."
"I found Cynthia's Lucario. The only one of Cynthia's Pokemon who wasn't taken over." Ash filled them in on what he had done so far. "That's all from me. I'm heading back to Canterlot now."
"I'll meet up with you, Twilight," Fluttershy added. "I also have to find Valerie for Sylveon, Spritzee and Mawile."
"We all know what we're doing then. So, let's all meet up at Canterlot together, okay?" Twilight asked her friends. They all nodded in unison as they promised to meet up at that same spot. All of them hung up on each other with two groups heading to one place.
Out in the mountains.
Cosmos had retreated, fleeing to another mountainside within the magical land of Equestria. Her defeat by the claws of Palkia left her weaker than ever. Three Andalusian Stars that she retrieved had been destroyed by Palkia. Only one of them was kept safe as she managed to escape from Palkia with the little time she had left.
The weakened Spirit of Malice was crawling towards a cave, seeking shelter. Palkia may be able to move through space and visit other dimensions but a cave certainly wasn't a dimension. But it was a part of space much like everything else in existence. Cosmos needed to find some way to stay safe as she was still on the ground.
"Discord...if you're coming for me...help me!" Cosmos cried out, entering the cave. She grabbed some of the pebbles within the cave, crushing them with what little magic she had left. She thought of everyone who had gotten in her way in this entire event.
Ash. Absol. Pallet Town. Ponyville Residents. Canterlot Residents. The Pokemon From PokePark. Celestial-Gardevoir. Palkia and more across the Pokemon World and this world. All of them played their part in preventing her revival. Every moment was crucial and stuck to Cosmos like a sore thumb.
Absol was the first to give her a hard time, defeating her at Frenzy Forest. Despite having the numbers advantage and Cynthia's Pokemon, Absol's years of being in the wild and adaptability granted him victory over Cosmos.
Fluttershy was the first one to discover that Fairy Magic could affect Chaos Magic, much like how Aura affected it. She was the first to make Cosmos feel an unpleasant feeling as Fairy Magic was the perfect antithesis to what she was all about. Fluttershy managed to make Cosmos flee with great success.
Celestia and Passion with the combined might of Celestial-Gardevoir were a match for her, using the beautiful Fairy Magic as well to damage her. Cosmos' defeat would've been assured there had it not been for Lucien and Sienna exposing the one weakness of Celestial-Gardevoir. Overtaxing her body limit which caused the fused entity to pass out along with Celestia and Passion.
Ponyville's Residents may have been taken over by Cosmos', but all it took was synchronized teamwork among good friends and a sudden betrayal. The Pokemon from PokePark matched the numbers that Cosmos racked up as well as the Pokemon from PokePark.
But the four major things that truly mattered then were Ash, Lucario, Phione and Cold Colt. With Phione using Arceus' light to break the body possession of some of Ponyville's residents, Cold Colt using the connection spell to link every possessed body that Cosmos' had taken so as to have them feel the same thing at the same time and the power of Aura freeing their bodies from Cosmos made for a resounding victory against the Spirit of Malice.
Ash was also the one to nearly free Cynthia from Cosmos' control a second time. He put up a great battle against her even when super-sized for a bit. Ash and also Fluttershy proved to be the major reoccurring problems that plagued Cosmos.
And of course, there was Palkia. The Spatial Pokemon and the Guardian of Space. A dimensional battle between Palkia and Cosmos occurred with Palkia appearing as the superior force. Palkia was the one who destroyed most of her stars, leaving her in this state.
All of it had been processed through Cosmos. It was a day that she would never forget and a night that would never leave her memories. And thinking back to all of it made Cosmos realize how powerless she truly was. Not right now, but rather with everything that had happened. The bonds between the people, ponies and Pokemon were truly something grand. It reminded her of how she was defeated many years ago. For now, all Cosmos could do was lay there, vengeful at everyone who had got in her way.
However, she wouldn't be alone soon as teleporting to her position was none other than Lucien.
He appeared as a cosmic flash as Cosmos looked up to see his arrival. "No time for sulking, Cosmos. Here." Lucien had seen Cosmos' current expression before then revealing the 6 Andasulian Stars from another universe. "All 6 of them. Ripe from another universe."
"All...six...of them..." Needless to say, she was stunned, perplexed and slightly exhausted. She couldn't believe her eyes. The stars that Palkia had destroyed had shown themselves once more. She held her hands out, trying to get back up but she couldn't, thanks to the damage she had received. "And they're...from another universe."
"Uh...I went to...another universe to get these. Yeah! Looks like I'm better than my sister, right?" Lucien grinned, taking all the credit for finding these stars as he wanted to 1UP his sister.
"Oh...much better. Give them to me."
"You got it. Here you go," Lucien had then dropped all of the stars into Cosmos' hands, bringing her the best possible thing he could've given her. Not the remaining stars but newer ones that were from another universe. And most importantly, combined with the substitute star that was made by Rift Energy, Cosmos would have seven.
Once they were in her hands, Cosmos felt a spark of hope. The stars radiated around her, recognizing this magic immediately, even if it was from another universe. She combined all of the Andasulian Stars into one object. A crown. A crown fit for a tyrannical ruler as she manifested it on her head.
After that, her signature magical aura enclosed her body with Lucien backing away. The aura had dazzled with a fierce scintillation that lit up the cave and even the outside. Lucien squinted, using his cosmic power to create special glasses for his eyes. The light expanded as within it, Cosmos was getting back up.
And while getting back up, standing upright, her body started to change. It wasn't just reverting to its original form. That much was to be expected with all 6 stars brought together. Instead, she had used Cynthia's body, merging it with hers.
Lucien's jaw dropped as he saw Cosmos' original shape appear with small bits of Cynthia showing up. But Cosmos didn't stop at Cynthia. She had used the rest of Cynthia's Pokemon, merging with them. The bulk of her appearance was her shape and almost everything else.
The crown she had placed on her head was made out of Garchomp's scales as well as the arm vanbraces that she decided to give herself. Poisonous thorns stuck out of these vanbraces which came from Roserade. She gained a third eye thanks to Gastrodon's biology while Kommo-o's scales were made into armour that meshed well with Garchomp's scales, making up one-half of the vanbraces while Garchom's made up another. And finally, there was Glaceon, who had been utilized to give Cosmos sharp ice shards that were constantly floating around her with an icy breath to boot.
She had become a chimaera creature that was far more chaotic than a draconequus. As for Cynthia, her involvement in this chimaera fusion was nowhere to be found, but the body was still within Cosmos.
"Sweet Arceus above..." Lucien sat down, gazing at this monstrosity that was radiating overflowing Chaos Magic. Thanks to that substitute star being the 7th star, her magic was greater than what it was in her prime, ten-fold.
"OH YES! THIS IS MORE LIKE IT! HOW I'VE MISSED THIS!" Cosmos was satisfied. At the end of the day, she got what she wanted. Well, not all that she wanted. Her control over Equestria, this entire universe and beyond was still up in the air. Along with two more goals. Reuniting with Discord and the newest one. Revenge against those who got in her way. "THANK YOU, LUCIEN!"
"Uh...Glad to be of assistance."
"I AM NOW THE MOST POWERFUL BEING IN THE UNIVERSE! TWICE THAN WHAT I WAS BEFORE!" She continued speaking with a booming voice that was worthy f a cosmic being that had ascended. She then cleared her throat before speaking in a medium tone. "Ahem. Glad I got that out of my system. There is much work to be done. But for someone like me, not much at all."
"So, the hunt's over right?"
"It certainly is, my little Lucien." Cosmos had then grabbed Lucien, picking him with her massive claws. Lucien was downright terrified as he was vastly powerless in front of this monstrosity. "But, I wouldn't mind taking extra stars. Not just from this world, of course."
"W-What do you mean by that?" Lucien gulped as he already started putting together what Cosmos meant by that.
"I previously learned of other universes out there. And when you brought me those stars, you made me aware of more than just one me. There are other Cosmos' out there, much like myself." She cackled.
"Oh, so you're gonna work with them, right?" He grinned at the Spirit of Malice.
"Hmmm...Perhaps. I will work with them." Cosmos nodded before flaring her eyes red. "And then after that, I'll destroy them and take their stars for myself!" She revealed her true intentions. "There will be room for only one Spirit of Malice around! Plus, I do need those stars after all."
"Oh. Okay."
"Not a second more to waste. My revenge is now! Prepare yourselves, humans...ponies...Pokemon! Enough playing around! I will begin your destruction at once!" Cosmos declared her vengeance in full swing. She was going all-out in an all-out state.
Jagged Isle.
Jagged Isle. The island where Rainbow Dash and Rarity ended up at. Twilight and her friends had tracked them both down thanks to Slurpuff's powerful scent. Fluttershy, as said before, met up with Twilight once more, reuniting with some of her friends once more. She did so by using the map that was originally a trap made by Cosmos, but at the end of the day, it led her here as she could be seen taking to the skies.
"Glad you could make it on time, Fluttershy," said Twilight. "How'd you get here so soon?"
"It's not too hard to reach. It's far but I found a neat shortcut that starts at Pikachu Highlands and ends near Baltimare." Fluttershy held the map out. "Applejack and everypony else are back at Canterlot helping clean things up. But I still couldn't find the Princesses. Their scents are gone."
"We'll find them. Right now, we have the rest of our friends to get back." Twilight replied.
It led them here to the Jagged Isle. They saw the monstrous face as well when arriving here but they already knew what to expect now that they knew it was a place that Cosmos had affected with her magic. They ventured through the island without hesitation or wasting any time with Slurpuff leading the way.
They wouldn't have to struggle to find their friends. Mainly because they made it clear to them. Large jagged spikes broke through the mountains as Rainbow Dash alongside Altaria could be seen flying away from the spikes. Rarity had been carried away by Leavanny who had used String Shot to grab the fashionista. Milotic could also be seen eroding the spikes with Hydro Pump.
"There they are! Rarity! Rainbow Dash!" Twilight cried out, alerting her friends.
"Twilight! And everyone else?!" Rainbow Dash replied as she and Rarity noticed the rest of their friends. "Glad you could make it! But uh, now's not the best time!"
"There's little time! Come on, we're leaving this island!" Starlight shouted.
"We could if we would!" Rarity responded as Leavanny protected her from everything this jagged area was throwing at all of them. "But this island is completely random and hard to read!"
"Not for Eve! She can see through it!" Twilight uttered as Espeon's ability to see through illusions helped greatly through this scenario.
"And me!" Pinkie Pie raised her hoof, pointing at her eyes. "Fairy Magic right here!"
"Oh, and Pinkie Pie too," Twilight added Pinkie Pie into the conversation. "Just follow us and mainly Eve!"
"If you say so!" Rainbow Dash ducked some of the spikes which had then rotated with the elasticity of rubber. Altaria noticed this, using Ice Beam to freeze the spikes in place. After they were frozen, the spikes had dropped to the ground, shattering.
Leavanny had used String Shot in the direction of Twilight's group as Twilight held her hoof out to the string, allowing it to touch her. This helped to connect her with Leavanny as the Nurturing Pokemon had lunged herself toward the Princess of Friendship, including Rarity and Milotic, who had been touched by the string as well.
Rainbow Dash, Castform and Altaria merely used their flight to fly to their friends. Once they were close, Espeon was the one to guide them, running ahead of the group. The island suddenly opened up, revealing a mouth and fangs. It was indeed the face of a monster for a reason.
It was a monster. Similar to the Isle Monsters up at Pegalysium. The mouth opened up, trying to swallow the others while they were running and flying as fast as they could.
Mew would be the one to carry them back home via the body of Kyogre. He had turned into the Sea Basin Pokemon, being the best Pokemon to travel from the sea. The island summoned multiple gargantuan jagged mountains that were revealed to be claws and arms instead. The appearance of this island made more sense now.
Twilight and Starlight worked together to blow these claws away, shooting out a synchronized magical beam. The beam broke through the claws, shattering them as they crumbled. Milotic eroded them once more with Hydro Pump while Mew helped out with Aura Sphere.
The monster could be heard roaring as it was sentient. This entire time, Rainbow Dash and Rarity were being attacked by a sentient island for hours straight. The monster had failed to devour them as soon as they showed up so now was the best time for a final attempt to do so.
However, thanks to Mew, that did not happen. Mew had used the powerful body of Kyogre to immediately jump into the air and crash back into the sea. He made a massive splash that rushed over to the island, but it would also crash onto Twilight and her friends. Thankfully, she could make a barrier that could protect her friends.
The island could not.
Thus, the massive splash of water had crashed onto the island, entering its mouth which was an entire chasm. This perplexed the monster greatly as Twilight and everyone got on the back of Kyogre, beating out the monster in this short race.
"Go, go, go!" Twilight aimed her hoof to the north. Mew was already on it. It was a good thing that Kyogre was fast despite its large body. Mainly thanks to the sea. Mew zoomed through the surface of the water with Kyogre's body as everyone else hung on to either the back of Kyogre or each other.
The monster was too late to do anything. It tried summoning its claws again, only for its prey to be too far away to even grab them. It had failed to devour the group.
Meanwhile, the group had managed to reunite most of their friends once more. The two locations that were meant to be traps had been escaped from with swimming success. They all cheered after succeeding in evading this chaotic island.
"That's two." Twilight laughed. "Everything's coming up just fine here."
"Yeah but...we were stuck there for hours." Rainbow Dash sighed. "No fair. What did we miss out on?"
"Explaining it all is going to get tiring but...it's best you get caught up to speed, anyway." Twilight shrugged.
"We tried calling you earlier about this island but our Xtransceivers were not responding at all." Rarity spoke. "Why is that?"
"It's probably the Chaos Magic around that island. It didn't work with Spike and Starlight when we went to the other island." The Princess of Friendship explained. "Looks like we know that Chaos Magic can mess with Xtransceiver communication. But either way, it's still a useful tool, isn't it?"
"So, what about the stars then?" Rainbow Dash asked. "We got sent places t find them, right?"
"We did." Twilight took out the map that Cosmos gave her. "But not the right places. Those islands and everything else on this map were nothing but traps. It was to distract us so that Cosmos would find the stars herself. That's all thanks to Lucien and Sienna."
"Oh, those two?" Rainbow Dash then scratched her mane. "They're involved?"
"They know about the original timeline, so it stands to reason that they'd know where the Andasulian Stars are. Luckily, we had help and managed to catch up with her. Well, Absol did. I hope he's okay out there..." Twilight's mood then changed, still missing Absol. It had been almost an entire day without seeing him.
"I WOULDN'T START MISSING HIM SO SOON, MY LITTLE PONY!" A response had come through. The response belonged t a vice that no one wanted to hear. All of Twilight's friends had their bodies tremble before then looking up at the sky. Lo and behold, the draconequus of the hour was present.
Rather, nigh-omnipresent. When looking up at the sky, they saw the head of Cosmos. The true form of Cosmos, that is. And when her head appeared, she was massive. So massive that she blended in with the clouds, even blocking some of them off as her horrific serpentine eyes had locked onto the merry band of ponies, Pokemon and a dragon.
"Cosmos!" Twilight stood up as Cosmos had found them. But that was not difficult at all. This was because Cosmos' massive size allowed her to be seemingly everywhere. And she certainly had the power to do so now thanks to Lucien but mainly Colress.
With her power back in its prime and even beyond that, Cosmos already showed off the kind of power she could now display. Vengeance against those who had got in her way was imminent and she was going to do it with the utmost malice in her heart. The big confrontation against the Spirit of Malice had arrived once more as the journey continues.
Chapter 794 End.