What? It seemed like I heard things just now. Say that again," Steven said, picking at his ear.
Ange smiled and said, "You heard correctly. Fleria is the leader of Team Flare."
"How can that be?" After repeatedly confirming that he had not misheard, Steven was shocked almost beyond recognition. "Fleria has status, fame, and immense wealth. Why would he form Team Flare?"
Ange shook his head. He could not explain too much, or it would sound too strange, so he only said:
"I only found out about this by chance. Whether you believe it or not is entirely up to your own judgment."
Steven pondered for a moment and said, "I will definitely investigate this thoroughly."
In truth, Steven believed Ange from the bottom of his heart. Given his understanding of Ange, Ange had no reason to lie.
Furthermore, how could someone who could give diamonds away as a gift possibly be a liar!
Ange nodded at Steven and said, "Then I'll leave the matter of the Zygarde Core to you! The safety of Zygarde affects the ecological balance of the Kalos region and even the entire world. Nothing must happen to it!"
Steven nodded solemnly. "Rest assured, I know the stakes."
After chatting with Steven a little longer, Ange hung up the phone.
By evening, when the Pokémon returned for dinner, Ange walked to the front and told everyone:
"I don't know if any of you heard about what happened this afternoon."
Hearing this, the Pokémon began to whisper among themselves. Some of them had heard about the tentacles, while others had not. Those who knew began to explain the process to their companions who did not.
For a moment, lingering fear appeared on the faces of some Pokémon.
There was actually such a terrifying thing.
Ange continued, "There's no guarantee that once those tentacles are eliminated, a second, a third, or even more won't appear. Therefore, you must be careful when working and playing."
The Pokémon nodded with solemn expressions.
"Also, the guard force needs to work a bit harder recently. You must increase patrol density. If you encounter tentacles, you must call your companions to fight together. You must never fight alone. Those things are very dangerous!"
The three Eevee who had experienced fighting the tentacles nodded in unison. They turned their heads and described the terror of the tentacles to the other companions nearby. The timid ones were already shivering with fright.
The land patrol team led by Lairon, the sky patrol team led by Talonflame, and the night patrol team led by Honchkrow all expressed with solemn expressions that they would protect the Nebel Plateau well.
After briefing them on the tentacles, Ange and his companions began to happily enjoy dinner.
From this day on, Ange and the others lived their lives as usual, while Steven secretly contacted the Kalos League and launched a special investigation into Team Flare and Fleria.
As the Champion of the Kalos League, Diantha naturally received this task as well.
She was extremely shocked that the League wanted to investigate Fleria.
She had a good relationship with Fleria. In her impression, Fleria was someone who carried justice through to the end. How could he possibly be connected to Team Flare?
However, what Diantha did not know was that it was precisely Fleria's sense of justice that dragged him into the abyss.
For a long time, Fleria had been engaged in charitable work. He had helped countless people. Poverty, disease, war... he had witnessed far too much.
And precisely because of these things, he had also seen far too much of the ugly side of human nature: jealousy, greed... and even people he had helped turning around to repay kindness with enmity.
Gradually, Fleria's mindset changed. He felt that the ugly sides of this world should not exist, and he wanted to eliminate the world's, or rather, people's ugly sides.
Team Flare was born from this.
The next afternoon, the Dragonite arrived at the Nebel Plateau as agreed. Ange began special training for them, teaching them what skills a delivery person should master.
A total of twenty Dragonite came. This number was completely sufficient to serve Munchlax Home.
Ange equipped each of them with a smartphone, and the Anni delivery app was downloaded onto the phones.
To be an excellent delivery person, one had to have a very good understanding of the city's layout, so the Dragonite needed to go to the Royal Capital frequently to familiarize themselves with it.
Although the delivery app had a positioning system that could help Dragonite accurately locate customers' residences, familiarizing themselves with the environment would allow them to achieve twice the result with half the effort.
The task of leading the Dragonite to familiarize themselves with the Royal Capital was handed to Darkrai by Ange.
Darkrai wandered through the entire Royal Capital every day, helping residents eliminate nightmares. It had long since known the streets and alleys of the Royal Capital like the back of its hand, and perhaps even Ange was not as familiar with the Royal Capital as it was.
Therefore, having it lead the Dragonite to familiarize themselves with the environment was most appropriate.
Thus, in the following days, the Dragonite spent their mornings following Darkrai to familiarize themselves with the various areas of the Royal Capital, and their afternoons following Ange to learn various knowledge.
Because of this, the residents of the Royal Capital frequently saw the figures of Dragonite flashing across the sky recently.
Half a month flew by in the blink of an eye. As Ange's training of the Dragonite deepened day by day, the Dragonite looked increasingly steady, and Ange would sometimes even let them run errands to help him deliver items to the Royal Palace.
Ange would occasionally send surplus fish, shrimp, crabs, and vegetables from his home to Lila and Edward's small kitchen to improve their meals.
As an elder, he always had to show care for the juniors from time to time!
The ingredients grown and raised at Ange's home were of much higher quality than those outside, and both Edward and Lila loved them dearly.
There was another point: during these past fifteen days, that terrifying tentacle had never appeared a second time. The Nebel Plateau had remained calm and steady throughout, and the originally tense emotions of the Pokémon gradually relaxed.
On this morning, a Dragonite flew out from Munchlax Home, carrying a package containing breakfast for Lila and Edward.
The Dragonite flew toward the Royal Palace with practiced ease. After delivering the breakfast to Edward and Lila respectively, it flew out of the Royal Palace with equal familiarity.
The Dragonite wore a tag hanging around its neck bearing the logo of Munchlax Home. Upon seeing this tag, the guards of the Royal Palace would not stop the Dragonite, as Edward and Lila had arranged this in advance.
After delivering the items, the Dragonite hurried all the way back.
However, while passing through a small alley, it suddenly heard a cry for help.
So, it followed the sound to search for the source.
When it reached a corner of the alley, it saw an old man with a painful expression clutching his leg as he sat on the ground, looking as though he had injured his leg.
The Dragonite had a gentle personality and was helpful to others. Seeing this situation, it immediately landed from the air, intending to take this person to the hospital.
Over the past half month, with Darkrai's help, the Dragonite had become extremely familiar with every part of the Azoth Royal Capital, and naturally knew the location of the hospital.
However, the moment it landed, it saw a net spring out from both sides to trap it.
At the same time, that injured old man stood up with a smiling face, showing no trace of injury whatsoever.
He tore off the disguise on his body, revealing himself to be a youth in his twenties. The image of the old man was merely his disguise.
The youth looked at the Dragonite in the net, a brilliant smile blooming on his face. "It worked! I actually caught a Dragonite!"
As it turned out, ever since the figures of Dragonite were frequently seen flying across the skies of the Azoth Royal Capital, interested individuals had set their sights on Dragonite.
This youth was one of them.
With Dragonite being so rare and powerful, it was difficult for any Trainer not to be tempted by them.
Ever since the youth set his sights on Dragonite, he began observing their movements and eventually discovered the route this Dragonite frequently passed through.
Considering the helpful nature of Dragonite, he set this trap and waited for the Dragonite to walk right into it.
Sure enough, the Dragonite had now taken the bait!
After being trapped in the net, the Dragonite began to struggle violently. However, at that moment, bolts of electricity suddenly flashed across the net, causing the Dragonite to frown deeply.
The youth said, "Dragonite, you'd better stop struggling to save yourself the suffering. This electric net is specially made, and you won't be able to break free!"
"Roar~~" Hearing this, the Dragonite roared angrily at the youth.
The youth continued, "Dragonite, as long as you obediently become my Pokémon, I'll let you out! You won't lose out by following me, and I will definitely treat you well."
The Dragonite was already an employee of Munchlax Home; how could it possibly be willing to become someone else's Pokémon? Therefore, it once again roared angrily at the youth.
However, the moment the Dragonite made a move, electricity flashed across the net once more, causing pain to show on the Dragonite's face.
Seeing this, the youth threw his head back and laughed loudly. "Hahaha, you might as well just surrender obediently!"
However, the moment his voice fell, the Dragonite roared and tore the net into two halves.
The youth was dumbfounded.
"How... how can this be?"
This youth was simply clueless and underestimated the Dragonite far too much.
Dragonite were pseudo-legendary Pokémon, also known as late-blooming Pokémon. This meant that once they evolved into Dragonite, their level was extremely high.
The youth's special capture net might have been effective against other Pokémon, but against a powerful Dragonite, it fell far short.
At this moment, the Dragonite had already clenched its fists and was walking toward the youth with an angry expression.
The Dragonite's personality was indeed gentle, but not gentle enough to remain indifferent when someone rode roughshod over it.
At this moment, the Dragonite's heart was filled with anger.
If the person in front of it had subdued it through a normal battle, it might not have been this angry, but he had actually resorted to underhanded tactics to ambush it!
"D-... d-don't come over!"
Seeing the menacing aura of the Dragonite, the youth instinctively retreated, his voice trembling uncontrollably.
The pressure emanating from the Dragonite was terrifying, and at this moment it completely lacked its previous harmless appearance.
As the Dragonite approached step by step, the youth directly pulled out a Poké Ball. With four flashes of red light, four Pokémon appeared outside, blocking the front of the Dragonite.
Among these four Pokémon, one was the Ghost and Grass-type Trevenant.
One was the Normal-type Purugly.
One was the Ice and Ground-type Mamoswines.
And another was the Fairy-type Granbull.
After the four Pokémon emerged, Mamoswines and Granbull, whose types had the type advantage over Dragonite, immediately launched an attack first.
Mamoswines used Ice Shard, creating balls of ice that smashed toward the Dragonite.
At the same time, Granbull used the Fairy-type move Play Rough to slam into the Dragonite.
However, their attacks were mere child's play in the eyes of the Dragonite.
The Dragonite used its right hand to grab the charging Granbull by the neck, and with a single Slam threw it fiercely onto the ground. Granbull instantly lost its ability to battle.
Next, the pair of cute little wings on the Dragonite's back vibrated slightly, and a tornado appeared out of thin air, instantly smashing all the ice shards created by Mamoswines into pieces.
Taking advantage of the fact that Mamoswines hadn't reacted yet, the Dragonite had already flashed to its side and smashed a Fire Punch fiercely into its forehead.
This Mamoswines' Ability was not Thick Fat, which could weaken the power of Ice and Fire-type moves. Fire-type moves had a 2x effectiveness against it.
Thus, Mamoswines collapsed to the ground amid a cry of agony.
By the time Purugly and Trevenant reacted, they hurriedly launched an attack toward the Dragonite.
Trevenant used Shadow Claw, its massive claws gleaming with a dark light.
Purugly used Body Slam, its fat body pressing down toward the Dragonite like a ball.
The Dragonite remained unruffled. First, it swept its Dragon Tail against Purugly, sending it crashing heavily into the adjacent wall.
Then, it met Trevenant with a Dragon Claw.
How could Trevenant's strength compare to the Dragonite's? The moment their claws collided, Trevenant cried out as it flew backward, crashing straight into Purugly.
Purugly wore a painful expression, its head tilting to the side as it lost consciousness.
Trevenant remained conscious thanks to Purugly serving as a cushion.
However, before it could crawl up, the Dragonite had already used Agility to arrive beside it, smashing down with another fierce Fire Punch.
Fire-type moves were super effective against the Grass-type Trevenant, so Trevenant naturally met the sole outcome of fainting.
The Dragonite originated from wild Pokémon. Every stage of growth and evolution it achieved had been forged through battle after battle in the wild.
Therefore, its battle experience was incomparably rich.
Thus, while the entire battle seemed to have lasted a long time, in reality it was all over in a flash.
When Darkrai rushed over, what it saw was a scene of four Pokémon lying sprawling on the ground, with that youth weeping floods of tears and shrinking into a corner, shivering.
Dragonite were rare Pokémon, and to ensure their safety, Ange had made special arrangements.
Apart from serving as an identity symbol, the tag hanging around the Dragonite's neck was also a special device capable of detecting the Dragonite's vital status.
Once a Dragonite was attacked, the tag would send an alarm to the terminal.
And that terminal was held in Darkrai's hands.
At the same time, the tag contained a positioning system, allowing Darkrai to rush to the Dragonite's side at the first possible moment.
Darkrai had been appointed by Ange as the exclusive guard for the Dragonite in the Royal Capital.
If it did a good job, it would receive a salary.
Darkrai loved this job dearly. All the Pokémon on the Nebel Plateau had salaries, except for it.
Now it was finally going to have a salary too!
Darkrai could travel freely through shadows, and coupled with its thorough familiarity with the Royal Capital, the speed at which it rushed over was fast enough.
But apparently, ordinary trouble could be easily handled by the Dragonite itself.
Darkrai slowly materialized from the shadows, floating beside the Dragonite.
Having just finished the battle, the Dragonite had already put away its angry expression, reverting to its usual silly and cute smile. It grinned broadly at the arriving Darkrai.
Darkrai: ...
The youth, already frightened out of his wits by the Dragonite, screamed and shrank even further into the corner upon seeing the menacing-looking Darkrai.
"D-... don't come over! Don't come over! I was wrong, I'll never dare do it again!"
As he spoke, Darkrai and the Dragonite watched as a puddle of liquid leaked from beneath him.
Darkrai wore a dark look on its face: I spit on that! With just that little bit of courage, he actually dared to come out and cause trouble!