Marshadow glanced in the direction Will had left, then waved its hand dismissively.
"There was really no need to make him walk that far."
It lifted a hand and traced a circle in the air. A black barrier materialized instantly, enveloping Kairos and Marshadow within a semi-transparent bubble that sealed out all outside sound.
"He can't hear us from out there now." Marshadow clapped its hands lightly and looked at Kairos. "Ask whatever you want. For the sake of that feather, I'll tell you everything I know."
Kairos nodded and got straight to the point.
"Who exactly is sealed inside? And why did Ho-Oh arrange for you to stay here?"
Marshadow floated into a more comfortable position and began slowly.
"It's a long story."
It narrowed its eyes, as if reaching back through centuries of memory.
"Before Ho-Oh disappeared, she came to me and said that deep within the core region of this Ghost World, there was an extremely important fragment of a sacred relic. She asked me to retrieve it."
"A relic fragment?" Kairos interrupted. "What relic?"
"I don't know." Marshadow shook its head. "She didn't elaborate. She only said it was something very ancient and very powerful."
"I came here as ordered. But when I arrived, I found that the fragment had already been swallowed by a gigantic creature. After it entered the creature's body, the transformation was immediate and complete,
its strength surged beyond all measure. It didn't simply grow stronger. It was fundamentally remade. Its power became something bizarre, capable of distorting space and throwing the entire Ghost World into chaos."
"At that point, I realized it had already surpassed what I could handle alone. Left unchecked, it might even break out of the Ghost World and bleed into your real world."
"Just as I was about to call for reinforcements, Ho-Oh arrived in person."
A trace of reverence entered Marshadow's voice.
"Ho-Oh fought it. That battle shook the very foundations of the Ghost World. But I could tell she wasn't in good condition."
"Her power of faith had already grown very weak. She couldn't display her true strength. Meanwhile, that creature was fueled by the relic fragment. In the end, she couldn't completely destroy it. She could only pour every last remnant of her strength into sealing it within the core region."
"After sealing it, she ordered me to remain here and stand guard while she left to recover. She told me that once she regained her strength, she would return to finish it off."
"But..." Marshadow sighed, its gaze dimming. "I've waited until today, and she still hasn't appeared. If I hadn't sensed the aura of that feather earlier, I might have begun to fear that something had happened to her. That's why I was so emotional when I saw you. I needed to know how she was."
Kairos felt as if a storm had broken loose inside his mind.
The relic fragment alone was staggering. Marshadow didn't know what it was, but anything capable of empowering a creature to fight Ho-Oh was clearly no ordinary object, possibly the key to this entire incident. And then there was Ho-Oh's condition. The power of faith, what exactly did that mean?
It took him a moment to settle his thoughts before he continued.
"You mentioned the power of faith," Kairos said. "What is that?"
Marshadow glanced at him as though the answer were obvious.
"The highest-tier legendary Pokémon have long surpassed the constraints of ordinary rules. Their power has sources. Ho-Oh's power comes from human faith, simply put, the more people believe in her and revere her, the stronger she becomes. If that faith dwindles, she loses most of her strength and might become no different from an ordinary Pokémon."
Kairos nodded slowly.
The concept wasn't unfamiliar. It mirrored the way gods in old stories were sustained by worship. But a contradiction surfaced immediately.
If Ho-Oh had been willing to help humanity, even exhausting herself to seal that creature, how could no one believe in her?
"According to every historical record I've found," Kairos said with a frown, "there's been no trace of Ho-Oh for hundreds of years. Most people don't even know such a Pokémon exists. How do you explain that?"
Marshadow froze.
It stared at him as though he had said something completely absurd.
"What do you mean no one believes in her? That's impossible!" It spun anxiously in the air. "There used to be many people who believed in Ho-Oh. Yes, the numbers declined over time, but it couldn't have reached the point where no one even knows her name. There should at least be dedicated priests and temples."
The more it spoke, the more bewildered it became.
"Are you sure you're not mistaken? Or are your history books simply wrong?"
Kairos shook his head. His memory was reliable, and the records had been unambiguous. In this world's history, Ho-Oh was an obscure name at best, faint echoes in a handful of ancient legends, with no trace of widespread worship.
A possibility surfaced in his mind, sharp and cold.
He looked up at Marshadow.
"Let me ask you something. In your world, the place you came from, how strong were the strongest humans? How many regions were there? Were other legendary Pokémon worshipped as well?"
Marshadow didn't understand why he was asking, but answered honestly.
"The strongest humans? Some probably reached a level comparable to legendary-tier Pokémon, though certainly not on Ho-Oh's level. Around my level, roughly speaking." It held up three fingers.
"As for regions, nine, of course. Isn't that common knowledge? And yes, other legendary Pokémon are worshipped as well. Lugia, Kyogre, many of them have devoted followers. That's part of why Ho-Oh's faith declined so quickly. People's devotion is divided, after all."
Nine regions.
The pieces clicked into place all at once.
In this world, only five major regions were widely known. Humanity's peak combat strength was formidable, but nowhere near legendary-tier. Most legendary Pokémon lived in complete seclusion, with no organized worship to speak of. And the history Marshadow described bore no resemblance to anything on record.
Ho-Oh's feather existed here, yet Ho-Oh herself had vanished centuries ago. Marshadow's memories conflicted entirely with recorded history. Even basic geography didn't align.
There was only one explanation.
Marshadow and Ho-Oh were not Pokémon of this world. They had come from a parallel world.
That would explain Ho-Oh's sudden disappearance, why no one knew of her existence. She had likely been injured, or crossed worlds by accident, and stripped of her faith, her strength had collapsed. She had spent what little remained sealing that creature within this world's Ghost World. Marshadow must have crossed later, searching for her.
The thought made Kairos's scalp prickle.
He didn't know much about parallel worlds. It was only through the interdimensional communicator that he'd even learned the concept existed. But this much was clear: whether or not a mission appeared, this was something he had to get involved in.
"What's the current condition of the one sealed inside?" he asked. "How much time do we have?"
Marshadow steadied itself and pressed a finger to its chin.
"The seal is weakening. Its strength is recovering at a terrifying rate. If my senses are correct, about two weeks. After that, the seal will shatter completely, and it will resurface in the Ghost World."
Two weeks. That matched the system countdown exactly. The mission's time limit wasn't arbitrary, it was anchored to the seal's collapse.
"The seal has been loosening for a while," Marshadow continued. "You humans just can't perceive it. Those black mists you've been seeing, that's the source. Power leaking from it. What you've been calling the Ghost Tide."
Everything clicked. That was the origin of the Ghost Tide. He had sensed something wrong with that black mist from the beginning. It wasn't ordinary Ghost-type energy, and it wasn't a natural phenomenon. It was the sealed creature's leaked power bleeding outward. No wonder Will had said the mist was thickening and couldn't be dispersed. The source itself was the problem.
Still, a new question rose to the surface.
If the creature was this powerful, what about Ho-Oh? Would she return to face her old enemy?
Marshadow's expression dimmed at the mention of her name.
"She was supposed to. That was always the plan, once she recovered, she would return and eliminate it completely. But I've lost contact with her for a long time now." It paused. "At this point, she probably won't appear. We'll have to find a solution ourselves."
That wasn't good news.
"So what do we do?" Kairos pressed. "If we can't defeat it and Ho-Oh isn't coming back, is there another option? We can't simply wait for the seal to break."
Marshadow spread its hands.
"To be honest, no. Its strength is too terrifying. It fused with the relic fragment and has been absorbing Ghost World energy for centuries. I can't defeat it. Neither can you humans. Even that man from earlier would be nothing more than a casualty." It paused. "However, while we can't eliminate it, we might be able to slow the rate at which the seal breaks. If we can buy enough time, perhaps a turning point will come."
Delay.
Kairos stroked his chin. It wasn't a permanent solution, but it was a foothold.
Just then, a familiar electronic chime rang through his mind.
A system notification appeared.
He focused on the golden text floating in his vision:
[Ding! Key story node detected. New mission triggered!]
[Mission Objective: Help any one Legendary Pokémon obtain any amount of faith power.]
[Mission Reward: Unlock new module: "Legendary Faith."]
A new module.
His eyes sharpened. Every module unlocked so far had brought sweeping changes to his game development, some had even shaped reality directly, like the Pokédex for divine beasts or the reward-draw system. "Legendary Faith" clearly connected to legendary Pokémon in some meaningful way.
But he forced himself to stay grounded.
Even if the module unlocked immediately, that was a future problem. The threat inside the Ghost World was real, and it would break free in two weeks. A mysterious new module alone wasn't going to resolve the immediate crisis.
He turned his focus back to the mission itself.
Strengthen the Ghost World faction, or grow strong enough himself to resolve the problem directly.
Neither was going to be easy.