-Pokémon Realm, Ransei Region, Illusio, Top Tier of Cerebrum City, western side, near the teleporter to the Castle of Illusion, Shanty-
Dolly be out cold in Dodo’s back, but she be protected from being attacked as she be taking control of Pom.
Shine’s group already be losing three of the Claydols they came with from a heavy mass of attacks crisscrossing through the area. The ambush units of Baltoy and Claydol were also being taken out, but it was being far too late for Gilgamesh’s forces to rebuild anything resembling a strong defensive line after Shine’s plan be disrupting it so badly.
There were still hundreds of Pokémon fighting everywhere, but without the Sigilyph performing aerial artillery bombardments, Gilgamesh’s forces be on a back hoof.
I slashed out the cane scythe cutting an attack coming at me out of the air, then be darting forward to take down a Drowzee that tried to put me to sleep. My blood be too boiling to be sleeping in the middle of all of this! Quetal soon took down a Drowzee that be sneaking up on me with flying kick and two quick slashes of his claws.
“Do you think Pom will be being okay?” I be worried about it because Dolly said Pom was being attacked and needed her.
“Who knows at this rate! We can’t exactly battle our way back across the battlefield at the moment, but Kenshin is clearing a path directly to us while Sanosuke and Kaoru are picking apart their forces in the north and south.” Quetal be looking up as two members of the Skitty Squad dropped down among a unit of Golducks and quickly be wiping them out. “More help is on the way, we just need to hold out until it arrive.”
It was around that point that some of the Natu and Xatu showed up and started to launch attacks from above, there weren’t many of them four Natu and a single unit of six Xatu. They still came to the most contested area of the battlefield to assist us, they are really being brave if the rest of them are too injured to be fighting.
“Whoo, this is getting painful, so when can I use my vacation hours again? Right now seems like a good time to fly off to a nice warm beach somewhere!” Apparently the joker Natu still be in fighting condition much to the chagrin of one of the Xatu, who I be recognizing as the one that briefed everyone on the aerial assault mission.
“Can it Heckler and watch your backside, we’re surrounded out here and we’re to continue relieving our friendly units!” Xatu Yelled as he fired blades of wind into a crowd.
“I don’t care if he jokes, any help we can get is good help at this point!” Dazzle shouted as she ducked several crisscrossing beams of Psychic and lashed out with a whip of fire.
As I be taking down a Mr. Mime trying to rush me with a slash before they could be getting up a barrier, I be taking scope of my surroundings quickly.
Lit be blasting an entire unit with electric webs, he be fine if need a rest soon.
Lucha Mundo was putting up quite a fight despite the opponents having the advantage, his wrestling moves were wrecking the less physically capable Pokémon he could get his wings on as he grappled them and threw them or slammed them into other opponents with gleaming wings of steel acting as a protective shield against any attacks that struck him.
Quetal be having my back and when he wasn’t attacking at close range, he was firing his Swift attacks at a distance to be harrying them.
“Where is Frizzle being right now?” I asked as I ducked under a stabbing spear and managed to get a slash of my scythe by the pig, with the two black pearls on its head and the one in its belly, before it can raise its shield. Didn’t know what it is being called yet.
“She’s on a very special assignment!” Answered Shine as she ducked into the shadows and popped back up throwing a vicious uppercut that launched one of the shield wielding pigs away, she must be noticing that my cutting arcs be having problems going through their shields.
“I, Favela, didn’t think you were telling the truth about Pom being magnetized to trouble this badly Shanty!” Favela was having some problems with an Exeggcutor, she not be having a good time here and she be meeting many beings that are resilient to her attacks or were dangerous for her to fight alone.
“If it be coming to Pom, I don’t think I could be telling tall tales about all the weird situations she’s been getting us out of!” I quickly defeated the armed pig I was dealing with. First by doing a twirling clockwise swing that brought me around to be planting my cane scythe sharply into its back after it recklessly charged forward. After I be pulling my cane scythe free, I be slamming them across the back of the head with the butt of my cane. “Heads up, take these with your vines!”
Since Favela be having so much trouble, I be quickly hooking the dropped spear and launched it towards Favela, I then be following that up with hooking and launching the shield in her direction as well.
Favela jumped back from almost getting stomped on by the living palm tree. She turned and caught the spear with her right vine and the shield in her left, she quickly brought the shield around and blocked the kick from the tree and the follow up blast of psychic energy. Both of said attacks be sending a growling Favela sliding backwards, she lunged forward and quickly stabbed the spear into the Exeggcutor’s chest and pulled it out.
The Exeggcutor howled in pain and stumbled back into a Hyper Beam from one of the remaining three nearby Claydol. Two other Hyper Beams be ramming into other Exeggcutor trying to encroach on us.
Dodo slid in front of me protectively and used his metal wings to be deflecting an attack away, Dolly would be fine in his back and I hoped she was doing a good job in heling Pom. They were probably being more okay than we currently were.
“Hah!” Charjabug?! He slammed into a pig armed with a sword and shield with his body was glowing with energy to shock them down.
“Solar Beam!” Shouted Cleffa as she brought her little limbs forward and fired a powerful beam that was far larger than her body. She be joining the Claydol, apparently they be coming out of the same hole that be getting Shine’s group here. “Have any of you seen Canard?”
-Rebel backlines, the continued fight, Inky Due (Enkidu the god-chaining Psychic Ponyta) vs. anyone nearby that is willing to fight this absurdly strong monster.
When the fight was last left off, Shedinja was taken out, Fleer and several of the Ponyta Prowlers were captured and the fight was not looking too hot even as Dolly joins it using Pom’s body dealing some physical damage due to her unique abilities. Cotton apparently thinks she know something about the chains and how to deal with Inky Due, she bades Abby the Absol to use her stronger attack on a single link in the chain and Dolly to prepare to dig in as well while thinking of a gambit to personally put herself in danger.
Nobody knows what Zoroark, the head of the newly established Dark Types mercenaries that joined the rebels, is up to. His attempts at stealth attacks having already failed several times along with his incredible illusions to hide his presence.
Dolly shifted Pom’s body into a bipedal stance and the wool around Pom’s left leg started to churn until it built up into a big swirling and tightening thick spring like cylinder.
Abby started charging up the blade horn coming from the side of her head for an attack and as they took time to prepare themselves to start assaulting the hostages were being slowly and painfully injured by the chains entrapping them.
Cotton started them off by tossing out a veritable hailstorm of feathers formed from Dark Type energy. Abby followed it up with a forward lunged narrowed eyes and Dolly stayed where she was to fire off a large Thousand Spears using the uncoiling wool on Pom’s left leg.
Inky responded by taking out the feathers, the chain of wind surrounding her suddenly winked out of existence upon contact with the powerful jet of air fired off from Pom’s left leg.
Cotton was already charging forward regardless of how unsafe it was to do so with Inky surrounded by several chains and firing feathers at Inky.
Abby, with narrowed eyes, lunged at a blazing speed to swing her head about and the glowing edge of her head blade, covered in dark energy, struck the golden chain. She struck a single link in the defending golden chain with full force using the Dark Type move called Night Slash, which was just adding a type of energy into a powerful cutting attack.
The single link in the chain that was struck had the blade tear more than halfway into it and within seconds of trying to use the chain defensively, the chain above the damage link broke apart and left Inky’s control allowing her to take a face full of feathers.
Lumber Spry clamped onto the other chains using Psychic, to prevent them from capturing her friend and this let Dolly spring up. Striking a powerful left uppercut to the jaw that rocked Inky in the chains holding her up, Dolly landed and skipped Pom’s body backwards quickly.
Cotton took to flying and flinging feathers at Inky and then she, for some reason landed, and grabbed onto the bit of golden chain near where it was torn off and quickly looked at Abby who was helping Lumber Spry hold the numerous chains off from capturing her.
“Absol if you have a normal type attack, use them on the golden chains even if you don’t know what element they are otherwise! Fire on clearly fire chains, wind on wind… AGH?!” Cotton had already said too much and Inky didn’t like that the Murkrow had confided some secrets about her chains, Cotton was suddenly wrapped up harshly by a fire chain and it quickly got around her beak.
The Confide Cotton used before capture had weakened Inky’s fire chain that had entrapped her. She was also using her feather dance to build a barrier of loose feathers between her body and the flaming chain that now entrapped her and was hurting her beak as it clamped down on it.
Inky was quite upset that Cotton was able to figure out the secret of the golden chains, however her explanation of that secret confused everyone else still trying to fight her.
“Use Normal type on the golden chains?” Abby asked, she took note of the chain holding onto Fleer was a golden one. She switched from charging a Night Slash, to charging Slash a Normal Type move similar to Night Slash in effect of giving the blade a charged edge made of a particular energy type.
A Ponyta Prowler held by a wind chain suddenly had Dolly’s eye, she was preparing to use Aerora to cast it defensively spell on everyone, including those trapped by the chains holding them so that Lumber Spry wouldn’t need to use more energy keeping them healed.
Zoroark was nearby and he was glancing at the fire chains with interest, he decided that stealth wasn’t going to happen and he had a fire move, one of the few Fire Type moves a Zoroark could actually learn.
Lumber Spry was quite angry with Inky, but she was keeping her head and noting which chain was which.
The weakness of Inky’s golden god binding chains was Normal Type attacks, attacks that were using mundane energy and the mundane was a huge weakness to Inky’s special chains that could hit with any effect of the elements she had available. Most Pokémon trended towards elemental types and would have had much more trouble fighting her, but a Normal Type Pokémon like Geoff, that was her anathema.
The reason why Cotton figured it out is because she managed to touch a portion of the cut gold chain and got a feel for the energy before Inky could grow the chain back out or pull it back in, she probably should have pulled it back in as Cotton had blown the lid on a powerful secret.
Inky idly wondered how Cotton would know of such a weakness or even have seen divinely powered magic before this point, she started lashing out a variety of chains at the nearby opponents.
There was also another factor to Inky’s chains she didn’t want Cotton talking about, for one she was saving it as a surprise after Imprison stopped her from using the move Psychic… it didn’t stop her from actually using psychic chains as she could derive energy from Healing Wish to create more psychic chains. She’s rather not blow the energy on that or the secret unless it was an emergency.
Everyone started moving at once, including Inky.
“Aerora!” Wind burst to surround everyone, even those trapped in the chains suddenly found the pressure lightened as wind barriers erupted around everyone except Inky catching her off guard.
Zoroark let lose a blast of flames through his mouth that destroyed the chain holding Cotton. The chain made of wind that were holding an unconscious Ponyta Prowler suddenly dropped them as Aerora barrier tore through it instantly and Lumber Spry immediately charged forward to collect them and move them out of the area, Inky was too busy to stop what was once her old unit comrade.
The golden chain holding Fleer was cut away upon the Slash from Abby going through it.
Fleer immediately flipped and pushed off the ground upon landing, to slam her head into Inky’s throat staggering her in the air slightly.
Abby followed up by slashing through the golden chains holding Inky up and she slapped against the ground on her four hooves.
Inky had tried to go for Zoroark, but he hadn’t being going for a close range attack, only closing in close enough to breathe fire using the move Flamethrower. Then the wind powered barrier popped up and really pressured Inky as it knocked back any chains attacking and wiped out the wind chains made of flying type energy immediately.
It was at this point that Inky revealed she could still generate psychic chains without the move Psychic, which was still in lock-down. Inky did so by wrapping psychic chain around her waist and lifting herself off the ground to avoid Abby coming in for another attack.
Inky proceeded to send Fleer sprawling away with harsh slap of a psychic energy chain that destroyed the wind barrier protecting hher, then struck down at Abby with a flaming chain to the side of her head the blade wasn’t on before she could evade. Another wind barrier was broken as Abby went skidding away on her side.
Instead of sending a chain at Pom’s body, Inky instead used Mystical Fire to breathe a wall of controlled flames to surround herself and get in Dolly’s way to prevent her from taking either of the attacks for them and tried to corral her into being slowly grappled with a chain.
Dolly quickly launched herself away using Pom’s leaping ability to avoid a chain that was about to wrap around Pom’s right hind leg and drag her to the ground.
While Inky was retaliating, Lumber Spry had managed to rescue two of her friends in the Ponyta Prowlers unit and turned to fire a Psychic attack off as the Mystical fire. Zoroark tried to use Flamethrower on Inky, but the wall of flames she had created blocked the attack by absorbing.
Inky ducked the blast of energy and lashed out for Lumber with a golden chain making her back away as the roaring mystical flames prevented anyone from attacking from underneath Inky.
Cotton came diving in from above and planted all of her talons into Inky’s back drawing blood and then wrapped her wings around Inky’s throat in an attempt to choke her, only it took a moment for Cotton to realize that there was a major problem with this plan.
The problem being that Cotton couldn’t actually choke out Inky, because she didn’t breathe and had stopped doing so the moment the Murkrow’s wings wrapped around her throat. In the second it took to find out Inky didn’t have to breathe, something was revealed to Cotton.
“So sorry you had to find out this way, but your technique is not going to work on me.” Inky smiled a bit and was talking quite clearly despite having wings tightly pressed into her throat.
“Wha… everybody she’s..!” Cotton didn’t manage to get the revelation out as she was quickly shredded with multiple lacerations from multiple rapidly generated wind chains that sent her flying, her last act was sending a spray of feathers that latched onto Inky’s body.
“That’s enough out of you.” Inky stated coldly, Cotton had been quite a thorn and she just bloodied the bird badly.
Cotton’s body was sent flopping and rolling along the ground it left splattered patches of red as she did so, she eventually came to a stop and was not moving at all. Blood started to pool beneath her rather still form.
“Cotton!” As the known medic of the Ponyta Prowlers, Lumber Spry immediately went to check on her.
The remaining Ponta Prowler still in the fight fired a Dazzling Gleam directed at Inky.
Inky immediately blocked out the flash of the attack with a wall of chains and tried to strike back with a golden chain only to have it deflected by the Ponyta whipping their front hooves into it sending it back with thunderous force using the move known as Stomp. After using that attack the Ponyta backed off a bit warily looking at Inky with worry.
Despite having Inky’s attention, Inky still dodged another large Thousand Spears from Dolly who was eyeing the situation warily.
Dolly still couldn’t leave the area or the fight, given Inky still had a hostage in the form of a Ponyta Prowler, ranged Normal Type attacks were rare and the golden chain holding the Ponyta Prowler was hard for anyone to get to with the flames underneath. Even if they could take out the chain it’d be dropping the unconscious hostage into the flames
“Is this all you really have?” Inky asked flatly as she levitated using the psychic power chain wrapping around her torso, even knowing her secrets they were down a good number of their fighters and most of them were fairly injured, as long as she had one hostage Pom’s body couldn’t flee.
“We’re not done yet!” Abby slowly got back up and did so with Fleer’s support. They both took painful whip strikes from the chains, even with the barriers taking the brunt of it. They still had plenty of fight left in them.
“Yeah, this is not looking to be in our favor guys.” As Dolly built up for another Thousands Spears using Pom’s left leg, she noted that Inky was floating above the ground no longer support by the chains. A demented grin cross Pom’s face as Dolly came up with an idea. “We still got some tricks to play though, hey dark fox guy, can you get in close after I fry her backside and add some heat to it?”
“If you can make that happen, it’d be greatly appreciated.” Zoroark stated as he glared at an unperturbed Inky hovering in the air.
“Hey abs cat you look like a leaper, free the hostage, Fleece you grab the hostage, I’ll give ink pot here a nasty combo with fox guy!” Dolly received a look from Fleer and Abby, Inky just raised a delicate brow as they all started to gather and get ready for whatever Dolly could pull.
Inky hadn’t been ready for Dolly’s most recent acquisition in magic.
“Gravity!” A grinning Dolly held out Pom’s left hoof and then curled it inward, since she was using Pom’s capacity for magic the effect was much more powerful.
A sphere of black and purple erupted around a surprised Inky and they slammed into the flame of their own Mystical fire, the recoil of her slamming against the ground harshly cause the chain holding the unconscious Ponyta Prowler to lash upwards away from the flames.
Abby immediately lashed out a slash through the chain holding the Ponyta’s hind legs and then Fleer tackled them to safety, they both landed near the Zoroark as he blasted the area with flames increasing the intensity of the heat.
After a moment, the outline of a figure stood up among the flames and started to giggle, Inky’s glowing eyes narrowed on Pom’s form. Inky started gaining some nasty burns on her body.
“Heh, for a familiar you sure are dangerous, but you kind of set yourselves up for this…” Several wind chains erupted into existence around Inky in the conflagration ravaging her and they burst outwards, sending flames exploding in all directions.
Dolly’s eyes widened and she quickly dove into a roll away from the expanding wall of flames that hit Abby, Fleer managed to out run it while carrying the Ponyta by the scruff using her momentum and the Zoroark used his own flames to protect from the expanding mass of flames that set the surrounding grass on fire.
Dolly curled up with her back to the wall of flames and fluffed out Pom’s wool, the flames blew over Pom’s body lighting it on fire. A second later Dolly flexed all the wool and the flames immediately went out.
Standing in the center of surroundings that were on fire was Inky looking slightly more amused and her injuries were minimal, Dolly was starting to wonder what it would actually take to bring her down.
“Abby!” Fleer immediately started to move the Absol away from the burning grass as quickly as she could.
“Got any other plans?” The Zoroark asked Dolly.
“Yeah, keep fighting with anything you can think of!” Dolly stated as she took aim again with Pom’s left hoof. Since she was using Pom’s rather unusual amount of magical energy. “She’ll have to go down eventually, Gravity!”
Inky gritted her teeth as the gravitational forces on her body increased to stressful levels once again and pinned her in place.
A Psychic attack from the last Ponyta Prowler rocked Inky’s body stumbling her.
Inky turned took down the other Ponyta with a chain of flames that tore into their body from the nearby burning grass and slammed them down.
A pitch black shockwave of energy struck Inky from the side disorienting her and making her miss her chain lashing out for Zoroark, Night Daze made it hard to aim after being hit with the move. Now this attack look like it did some damage as it made Inky temporarily go down onto one knee before she got back up.
“Giga Impact!” Fleer came charging at Inky with full force and power rippling off of her form, she immediately broke through all of Inky’s quickly assembled chain defenses and rammed home into Inky with thunderous force.
The trench that Inky’s body created was nothing to sneeze at, yet Inky got up and retaliated.
“Fleece move!” Dolly didn’t know what the move Giga Impact did to the user, it was a move that hit with tons of force, but the recoil left the user incapable of movement for up to over a full minute afterwards.
A golden chain pierced through Fleer’s fur and lifted her upwards dripping droplets of red as the chain became stained, the chain wrapped around her started to squeeze threatening to tear her in half.
“Thank you for becoming my hostage again, I needed another one to keep my targets body around.” Inky was actually looking a little shaken up as she stared up at Fleer, she was finally starting to run down. The number of Pokémon she had taken out thus far with only a few hits really said something about how powerful Inky Due was, because this was after Cotton had weakened her offensive capabilities… multiple times in fact and she was still this powerful.
“Gilgamesh has a real heavy hitter with this one!” Zoroark shouted as he charged forward, Inky turned his way to deal with him when she was suddenly clobbered by a harsh left hoof across the face that bowled her over towards the Zoroark who slashed through the chain.
Zoroark caught a falling Fleer with a hole in her torso and quickly retreated as Pom’s body hopped forward and lashed out with a left rear leg.
“Oof…” After the blow to her face from, Inky quickly ducked back from the hind leg lashing out and tried to bounce directly into Pom’s chest with her horn leading.
Dolly flopped backwards and then unleashed a Thousands Spear into Inky’s chest flipping Inky backwards to land roughly on her face.
“Ugh… this has suddenly become more troublesome than I previously thought.” Taking to the air again, Inky was about to use her chains to try to grab her target for a kill shot when Dolly once again hit her with magic.
“Gravity!” Once Inky slammed into the ground, Dolly followed up the attack with another. Pom really had a ridiculous capacity that Dolly was going to use. “Aerora!”
Whipping winds tore into Inky and did a moderate amount of damage, Dolly tried to figure out how to do the campfire lighting technique. Dolly failed to create a necessary spark in time for an explosion and had to hop backwards as several chains almost got a grip on both of Pom’s right legs.
The bandage wrapped front right leg was something that Dolly notably had avoided using for anything as much as she could, given the amounts of pain she could feel coming off of it.
“Fast little thing, can you please stop breathing now?” Inky said as she started walking towards Pom’s body in a limp, she fired off a Mystical Fire from her mouth and swept the flames around the both of them.
A second later rain started pouring down and put out the flames. Looking around, Inky didn’t see rain clouds aside from some small ones above them.
“Wha…” Inky was about to ask something when the sound of thunder could be heard followed by a lightning bolt sending painful energy coursing through Inky’s body, causing her pupils to shrink as her mouth opened in a wordless scream. “…”
“Shocking how easy it is to forget that I’m still around!” Ocellus shouted from on top of the cloud, it had taken her a few minutes to construct it and have it for multiple uses. She was currently in the form of a blue furred Pegasus with short pink hair.
Inky shook her head and recovered a second later, while glaring up at Ocellus. Lumber Spry was still nearby so the Imprison was in effect prevent Inky from using Psychic to pull the cloud down from above. Ocellus was out of range of Mystical fire so Inky created some swirling wind chains and launched them skyward in a flurry.
Ocellus abandoned the cloud as it was torn to shreds by the violent winds and blazed away using a quarter of Rainbow Dash’s maximum speed, which was about as fast as Ocellus could get as a pegasus which was enough for her needs at the moment.
The changeling wasn’t planning to get anywhere close to Inky whose danger seems to be deadliest when it was close up and personal.
Forming several chains of wind in the form of multiple rings, Inky sent them flying up into the air, making Ocellus and Dolly wonder what Inky was doing as they were near hitting Ocellus. It was seconds later that it became apparent when Ocellus had a problem flying in the air and started to crash towards the ground.
With a flash of flames from Ocellus and a launched chain, Inky blinked and stared at Ocellus as she oozed off and away from the chain that had pierced her current form.
Ocellus had chosen to become an animate slime blob and as soon as she was clear of the chain she turned into a dragon to spit a fireball at Inky.
“A shapeshifter… wish I was currently able to do that kind of thing right now.” Inky deflected the fireball by swirling golden chain in front of herself horizontally and glanced at Zoroark who was closing in to slash at her with his claws, which she deftly dodged as she lashed out with a golden chain that was broken by a normal type attack he quickly used. “To think that I’m limited to my chains, to be bound to this adorable form.”
Using the Bounce move, Inky backed off and started to generate some chains, she was preparing to continue the fight.
Off to the side near Ocellus, Pom’s lower right eyelid twitched upward ever so slightly and there was a slight flare of her nostrils inhaling calmly and slowly. The change in Pom’s demeanor drew Ocellus’s attention to Pom and there was a subtle nod to the changeling.
Ocellus sighed in relief, knowing that the fight would soon be over if what she thought was happening was about to occur.
“Ocellus, can you and fox guy get in and attack close up, trust us.” Dolly stated while glancing at Inky as she took a few steps back.
“Right!” Ocellus shifted flew forward with claws ready to attack and Zoroark soon joined her in attack.
Zoroark was spewing flames and using his claws to deal with two types of chains and when Inky went to use wind energy in chains Dolly followed up on protecting them.
“Aero!” One of the wind barriers that formed around Zoroark made him Inky’s worst nightmare as he could break any of the chains she could summon. The large werewolf fox’s ferocity was making it quite hard for Inky to build up chains and landed quite a few devastating blows, Ocellus added onto that with a few precise claw swipes and a few hammer blows of her interlocked claws.
Lashing at Ocellus with a fire chain, which she caught on her left arm, did nothing to the changeling. Even one third immunity to lava was still translated as a high fire element resilience, if not immunity, while Ocellus was in dragon form.
Having caught the chain Ocellus used a combat ribbon technique she learned from Smolder and quickly looped the chain around Inky’s neck while pulling on it to tighten it and hold Inky in place, she wanted Inky to attack her.
A golden chain formed in the air and shot towards Ocellus who smiled, within a flash Pom’s body appeared in the path of the chain, before it could strike her a flash of anti-magic blasted outwards and Inky felt her ability to generate chains falter as all of her chains disappeared.
Inky was shocked to see how fast Dolly could move with Pom’s body, already inhaling again through her nose as Zoroark laid into her with claws and a blast of darkness from his Night Daze move.
He backed up slightly as Ocellus pummeled Inky with fireballs and a decent right hook, because she was still certainly upset about Smolder being taken by Gilgamesh. Knocking Inky on her backside was a little cathartic.
“You are still not strong enough to…” Inky started to state as she got before she was shut up by a hoof to the throat and then a kick to the belly the launched her upwards, she couldn’t even see her attacker or react to them.
Inky could only see their attack when they stretched their right hind leg to being straight high up in the air as they fell towards them, it was Pom and Inky could tell it was a combination of Pom and her familiar controlling her body in unison.
Both of them were functionally one in this moment as they brought Pom’s leg down on Inky’s skull with what should have been a bone shattering impact and created a massive crater using Inky’s body with what should have also been pure neck snapping force that was again directly applied to the top of her skull.
Inky was slightly confused by how powerful Pom still was after facing Smolder, but Gilgamesh had warned her to finish Pom off before she regained consciousness for a reason.
Inky Due could hardly react when Pom leaped above her and slammed her left hoof down onto her back and started to strike her several times with that hoof, forcing Inky to create a larger imprint in the ground and the damage she sustained was really getting to her.
“Okay… it seems that… it seems I’m finally at my limit… bravo for making it this far.” Inky finally said as she couldn’t generate chains for the time being and the last few attacks from Pom had finally drained her. “I wish there was more of you I could have taken out, but you’re proven yourself to be quite a group… now let’s see if you can still deal with Gilgamesh after this and walk away heroes in all of this. I assure you that it’s quite unlikely that you’ll stop him from becoming unbound.”
“Can you finish her off?” It was hard to tell who was talking or if Pom and Dolly were asking this at the same time, they were asking Zoroark to do it.
“Glady!” Zoroark fired another Night Daze into Inky’s body and she was knocked onto her back, even then she was still getting up from the blow. “How tough is this one Ponyta?”
“I’ve seen a terrifying Rapidash that just wouldn’t stay down… so I’m not exactly surprised.” Ocellus commented dryly, apparently ungulate Pokémon could give ponies a run for their money in being stubborn.
Even Ocellus felt that Pom and Dolly were basically acting as one being in the same body, with a third party helping them act together that wasn’t there before… it felt like… Dormarch? Ocellus was concerned because she thought he was definitively dead, yet she could feel traces of a third emotional party in the body stabilizing the other two.
“This should do it!” Zoroark started to charge another Night Daze, which should be super effective.
“Enkidu, Bounce.” Gilgamesh’s voice was heard as a portal opened up in the air above Inky who could barely stand, the portal disappeared as Pom tried to jump through it.
Enkidu did a backwards bounce to land roughly in a throne room having gone through a different portal, she sat at a grinning Gilgamesh’s side who had an oozing drip blood coming from his wounded cheek as he closed the pathway to the Castle of Illusion.
-Castle of Illusion, Throne Room, Gilgamesh-
“Report.” I wonder how well Enkidu did.
“… I took out a good number of extras, but they didn’t have the strength to be heroes of legend except maybe Cotton who could pass for an assassin class all her own if she were better informed about my uniqueness. As you could see, the one called Pom is still among the living and she is quite the Beast you say she is.” A mild concern Enkidu. Kenshin wouldn’t be able to bring nearly as many forces against me as he would like now as quite a number of them were already exhausted. They would only be able to send a small group in after me anyway. “I am ready to sacrifice myself for you, my truest friend.”
“You don’t have to, but I’m okay if you still want to do so of your own free will... if it becomes necessary as you see fit.” I gently caressed a battered Enkidu’s face and she smiled at me.
-Rebel Backline, two hours before noon, fifteen minutes later, Pom-
Okay, so a number of things happened, we just had the Ponyta Prowlers devastated by their previous leader who was outed as a traitor and spy, Shedinja is out, Fleer and Abby are out, Zoroark and Lumber are some of the only healthy ones still up. Everything was a mess... what else was new for me?
Zoroark immediately set out to make sure the Dark Types were doing okay in the field with Kaoru's side of the battlefield. I could feel he was of the honorable sort and like any other canid or canine, there was something about me that he obviously liked in a friendly manner.
I just recovered from having a psychotic break… well… ‘recover’ is too strong a word for it and the air quotes could be heard in my mind with Dolly immediately applying them to the thought of me actually taking the time to 'recover'. I haven’t recovered from it, healed or any number of things close to dealing with my mental issues or my current health.
Like usual, I started to move forward, with a limp as my right leg was magically dead and I thankfully knew it was temporary.
A golden glow started to slide up my left hoof and I quickly quashed the Chrysomallus power with every fiber of my being and felt Dolly helping me with it. It had gotten worse as it had infected another part of my body, at least it’s just my left hoof now… goodness knows what’ll happen when it starts infecting my torso and I start fully becoming what I’m trying to vehemently repress.
I was trying to ignore the damage to my front right leg, my head was killing me and I was still healthy, comparatively the people who kept me alive when Inky Due came to kill me weren’t. I owed them all my life and then some for all this trouble of being a targeted individual, Gilgamesh still plans to see if I can rise to the occasion as a hero… well I wasn’t about to disappoint him in rising up.
Still seriously didn't want to be a hero, because being heroic hurts a lot in a variety of ways. Also I didn't want to continuously think up cheesy puns to fruitlessly spout while being in constant pain.
Dolly had yet to leave my mind and was watching me carefully with worry about my mental state and was especially worried that the golden glow hard started to spread to my front left leg. I couldn’t come up with a convincing lie to make her leave me alone. A lie wouldn't even work as Dolly could see my mind quite clearly.
At least Dolly wouldn’t leave me to myself until I made it across the battlefield to where Dodo, Shanty and the rest of the Pokémon Companions were holding out. Kenshin was quickly approaching the portal according to the nearby Kirlia in the rebel’s backline camp, Kaoru and Sanosuke were being held up in the south and north sides of Cerebrum City respectively.
“Pom, you can’t honestly be thinking about going after Gilgamesh in your state. Your right leg is messed up in more ways than one…” Ocellus trailed off. Ocellus, I love you because you’re my charge, but in this case… I wasn’t going to deny that I’m still up for bringing down Gilgamesh. “You need more rest.”
“I’ll rest when I’m dead or knocked out, I’m basically quite fatalistic at this point.” Concerning my worsening condition of becoming a full blown Chrysomallus, fatal was the word for it when it got around to fully encompassing me. “Dolly knows what I’m going through, misery loves company and Dolly is good company to try and cheer me up in my misery. I’m not alone, I’m aware I’m not alone and I can do well enough when it comes to facing Gilgamesh with one bum leg.”
“That leg is more than a bum Pom, that it can read as healthy on a magical scan of it is ludicrous when it bleeds as soon as I remove the bandages from a portion of it! I shouldn't even be able to get a false positive from it with the scanning spell, that's not functionally possible in the spell to begin with! At least… at least let me wrap it with fresh bandages.” Ocellus wouldn’t follow me to the fight with Gilgamesh, she had Smolder’s health to worry about and our dragon needed a fresh infusion of gems and jewels after being forced into a greed growth state. Ocellus would know more about Smolder’s health than I would, but I’m fairly sure Smolder would be fine. Reviver Seeds, rare as they are, don’t work halfway after all.
I let Ocellus tend to my leg and I told Dolly to get back to helping Shanty and the others, she refused on the principle that she was more worried about my current state than that of her own sleeping body. Now that was alarming, but at least Dolly’s body was safely ensconced in Dodo’s literal back seat.
“Also you might want to drink this before heading out, to put my mind at ease after witnessing such a horrible fight.” Espurr came up to me with a large glass of Sitrus Berry juice. I did need the energy and I slowly savored the flavor, sipping away at the drink before eating a few rations delivered via Ralts who were helping the medical crews and they were all over helping us.
Cotton, even with the help of Heal Pulse, might not even make it. Her injuries were horrific to the point that healing moves might not even save her as the point blank shredding of her body almost killed her outright. Given her critical condition and the condition of the others being cared for by the majestic medical Gardevoir moving about the backline, Lumber Spry was taken out of the fight because she had a unit that was wiped out by their previous leader and she needed to help everyone devastated by... Inky Dye or Inky Due, Enkidu?
Well whatever Inky was called, since we let her get away it was all but assured that Gilgamesh would soon unbind. It would still take a bit before there was enough energy gathered up at the Castle of Illusion.
Once I was done snacking, I picked up some extra snacks and a few flasks of Sitrus Berry juice for my friends currently fighting a hectic battle at the most contested zone on the battlefield. Loading up my satchel and giving my bell to Ocellus for safe keeping, I set out alone into the battlefield to hopefully catch up with Kenshin as he pushed forward.
The bell was a silent promise that I would absolutely come back for it.
I tried to ignore all the bodies laying about the top of Cerebrum City, Dolly whined in the back of my head and the whine was in stereo since Dormarch was also whining about the devastation that had already befallen the city. The only reason Dormarch was emotionally coherent was because Dolly was in my head.
To think the battle had been going since the sun rose this morning... things were only going to get worse from here on out, of that I am quite sure without a doubt. I was after all trying to get back something that was stolen by a godlike threat and said threat definitively was out to get me.
Well I was going to clearly return that favor.
-Origin Space, Arceus-
“Okay, now you can carry out your plan to balance things out.” I turned to Celebi and Hoopa, they both saluted me. “Just don’t go near Enkidu, they may be weakened greatly by their fight, but even one chain can defeat the both of you and kill Celebi… again... you’re quite lucky that Dialga is capable of bringing you back ‘Time’ and again.”
“I’m curious, but how can the one they are summoning fight someone of Gilgamesh’s caliber on equal ground?” Bahamut queried knowing who the two were going to redirect to help Pom and whoever was with her.
“You’d be surprised by what kind of chaos one with an inventive mind for battle can bring to the table.” Tiamat seems to enjoy the idea as she watched the screen with Shanty slashing away at various foes. “A scythe wielded with such skill… I might just throw a boon her way.”
“Aren’t you’re boons explosively dangerous?” Bluntly stated Bahamut.
“Oh, like you and your ‘rat’s tail’ quests aren’t a thing, that and breathing all over the heroes you like with the deadliest flares of magic imaginable.” One would believe that Tiamat was referencing that Bahamut had yet to do the same to Pom, of whom he did like and would like to show her how strong she was as a heroic figure, no matter how reluctant she may actually be to be seen as such even if the compulsion to throw herself at danger wasn't present.
I knew this was because he would get a face full of his own magical breath attack if he tried. Even the use of the ‘Ultima’ spell would rebound off of Pom and implode the user. The worlds that Bahamut and Tiamat were from were quite colorful and Dolly could curiously use some of the spells from them given she was tapping an outlier of power related to the systems both Tiamat and Bahamut knew relatively well.
"New report, Ifrit is rampaging in Moon Cell... still not a good thing that Ifrit now has Lu Bu's soul infused into them." Report Mew who looked a little green and terrified. "It's slowing down the invasion in Valora quite a bit, but Moon Cell is starting to try and spread their influence and will attempt to open portals in the other kingdoms soon. So far things are... contained... barely. At least Moon Cell shot themselves in the proverbial foot with Ifrit, but that's mostly Lu Bu's fault that it went berserk."
I had to trust in my children and my people to help me save them all. Even I, as mighty as I am, could not deal with Moon Cell alone... because if I were to unleash my full power I could obliterate Moon Cell, but it would also destroy this world so full of life to do so and I would only do it as a last resort.
I also spent a lot of time making a continent shaped like myself and most people have no idea how hard it is to create a monument to myself that is so large that people can't even realize it unless they were in space like Rayquaza. That or have someone point it out to them on a map made of the entire region.
"Any requests?" I finally asked of Mew.
"Icy chocolate dipped bananas!" Ah my beloved Mew, always the one with such a sweet tooth. She waggled her arms at me expectantly and was excited for me to make some for her and our outsider guests.