The starskiff touched down cleanly within the outer perimeter of the frost gates, and Julian immediately directed Groudon to take up a stationary position just outside the secondary walls of Belobog, prioritizing the systematic restoration of the immediate regional ecosystem.
The abrupt appearance of a jagged, red tectonic behemoth triggered an instantaneous panic through the streets of the city.
Thankfully, Bronya stepped onto the primary balcony before the alarms could escalate, using the public broadcast arrays to deliver a clear breakdown of the tactical situation. Once the citizens understood that this ancient sovereign was manually clearing the thousand-year frost to restore their atmosphere, the public anxiety dropped to absolute zero. In fact, a few eccentric local civilian factions went so far as to catalog Groudon as a literal earth deity, organizing small outdoor gatherings along the lower walls to offer prayers of gratitude.
Back inside the heart of the capital, Bronya's first official act as the acting leader was to command the royal kitchens to prepare a grand, uninhibited banquet to entertain their saviors. Simultaneously, she issued a classified brief to the parliament members detailing Cocolia's passing, altering a few minor details regarding the Stellaron's manipulation to preserve political stability.
The moment the trays hit the tables, March 7th and Stelle descended upon the spread like a two-woman storm. March 7th managed to maintain a shred of maidenly reserve, keeping her elbows off the wood and ensuring her hair didn't drop into the sauce as she filled her plate.
Stelle, however, carried zero systemic limits. Her cheeks were perpetually puffed out like a pair of overstuffed winter storage bags as she continuously shoveled large cuts of meat into her mouth, looking exactly like a classic starving ghost reborn into a world of luxury, completely abandoning any concept of visual decorum.
Yanqing, sitting adjacent to Julian at the director's invitation, took a small, disciplined sampling of the local starches but refrained from filling his plate. Having fully digested the brutal resource metrics the citizens had survived for a thousand years, his internal code made it feel unseemly to indulge in a massive feast. As for the rest of the table, he lacked the authority to restrict their behavior, focusing strictly on managing his own conduct.
Dan Heng, after methodically arranging a precise selection of grains and roasted vegetables onto his tray, retreated to a quiet, isolated corner of the hall to take his dinner in peace, far removed from the noise of the main table.
Himeko, meanwhile, had completely bypassed the main course, her attention entirely captured by a colorful row of vintage local spirits. She had already summoned the head chef to her seat, eagerly inquiring about the precise fermentation metrics and the unique frost-resistant grains used in the distillation process, looking thoroughly enchanted by the chemistry of the planet.
"Himeko," Julian noted, finding a quiet gap in the operations loop. He walked over to her station, balancing a small plate in his hand. "Why didn't Uncle Yang join the shuttle crew down to the floor?"
"Welt?" Himeko chuckled, setting down her glass with a warm smile. "He explicitly stated that compared to navigating the small talk of a high-society banquet, his schedule preserved far more critical business to clear. The exact second our boots touched the landing pad, he path-marked his path straight toward Everwinter Hill to examine the deactivated mechanical engines. He didn't even look back at the city gates."
Right... the man simply couldn't resist the chance to inspect a giant, skyscraper-sized robot up close, Julian thought, shaking his head with a wave of pure amusement.
He had originally hoped to utilize the dinner hours to lock down a deep, historical conversation with the veteran regarding his true origin world—the complex framework of the Honkai Impact 3rd universe. During their earlier travels through the space station, Julian had dropped a few casual probes into their conversations, and Welt had shared a fascinating array of historical fables and personal memories from his younger days.
Citing that the world design sounded "phenomenally engaging for a global media market," Julian had openly proposed the concept of adapting Welt's life history into a massive standalone title, asking the veteran scholar if he would be willing to organize his personal memories into a clean, sequential narrative script. Once the text files were locked down, Arceus Studio could manually render the entire epic into a high-end game client.
The absolute crown jewel of the Honkai franchise lay entirely within its brutal, emotionally devastating plot structure. Julian hadn't initialized development on that specific line during his early days because his baseline memories regarding the exact script lines had grown incredibly blurry over the years, leaving him with nothing more than a few iconic, high-impact cinematic frames anchored in his thoughts.
The granular details of the text lines and the precise pacing of the intermediate chapters were far too hazy to replicate manually; after all, the legacy game's text streams were notoriously long and complex, and he had skipped massive chunks of the dialogue during his late-night sessions back in school. Even if his teenage self had read every single file line, lacking a perfect photographic memory meant the data would have naturally dissolved across a decade of life.
But the Herrscher of Reason was a completely different story. That man's cognitive database and structural recall capacity were no joke.
At the time of the pitch, Welt had quietly answered that he would take a few weeks to review the creative implications of the contract, and Julian was more than happy to let the project breathe. It was simply a creative whim; he wanted to see if he could use his studio's resources to build the client purely so he could play the version himself and potentially unlock those terrifying gravity-bending powers within his active summon pools. And even if the veteran ultimately declined the deal, the studio's Pokémon franchise was already powerful enough to clear any security threat in the star-lanes.
The Global Broadcast
Once the formal dishes were cleared, the Pioneers huddled tightly around a single couch, their faces illuminated by the bright blue glow of their handheld visors. Julian, leading Yanqing by the arm, walked over to their couch out of sheer creative curiosity.
"What target is your squad currently tracking on the network?"
"Eh? Julian, how can your office be blind to the radar?" March 7th gasped, swinging her head back to look at him with wide, disbelieving eyes. "Today marks the absolute launch hour for the opening week of the grand Contest qualifiers!"
"Oh? Has the timer already run down to zero?" Julian blinked, rubbing his chin. "My schedule has been so completely overrun with taming energy currents over the last forty-eight hours that the commercial timeline completely slipped my mind."
He had briefly checked the calendar while his ship was in warp, but the high-stakes logistics of sealing the planet's core had entirely overwritten his administrative memory slots.
Observing that a half-dozen people were awkwardly tilting their heads to catch a glimpse of March's tiny screen, and noting that the frozen palace preserved zero advanced holographic projection hardware in the parlor, Julian gave his hand a casual wave. Drawing upon his internal psychic reserves, he captured the visual feed from March's phone and projected a massive, crystal-clear floating screen right in the center of the grand hall.
"Is this a live broadcast of a high-society performance?"
Bronya, Seele, Gepard, Serval, and Natasha, alongside a dozen senior administrative officers from both the Overworld and Underworld, gathered around the display the second the massive screen illuminated the masonry. Observing the grand, colorful lights dancing across the screen and watching the experienced interstellar travelers settle into their seats with intense focus, Bronya immediately guessed the nature of the feed.
"This is the official Pokémon Contest," March 7th explained eagerly, turning around to address the local leaders. "It's a bit of a shame that our coordinates prevent us from sitting in the physical stadium seats, but gathering around a global broadcast like this delivers a wonderful atmosphere anyway!"
She spent the next ten minutes breaking down the core terminology for the local audience, explaining the mechanics of pocket monsters, the social status of a trainer, the historical records of the Master Tournament, the specialized discipline of a Coordinator, and the creative rules governing a style match.
The moment the local officers parsed the detail that the massive red tectonic giant currently heating their city walls belonged to the exact same classification of creatures featured on the screen, their intellectual interest spiked to maximum parameters. The entire local government pulled up chairs, settling down to watch the show. Seeing their enthusiasm, Julian expanded the dimensions of the projection until the display filled the entire far wall.
"Good morning, good afternoon, and a splendid evening to our billions of active trainers tuning in across the star-lanes! Welcome to the live debut of the weekly Pokémon Contest qualifiers! Tonight, our sixteen verified elite candidates will lock horns to secure their entry ticket to the glorious Universe Grandeur Celebration stage!"
A burst of familiar, high-energy narration echoed through the hall's sound space. It was the galaxy's favorite commentator, Owlbert, anchoring the center desk. Julian raised an eyebrow in silent surprise; he had handed the operational logistics of the broadcast entirely to Cai Xing's department, never expecting her to successfully contract the IPC's premier host for a minor weekly show.
Next came the rapid-fire introductory reels for the sixteen competitors. The bracket contained exactly sixteen profiles without a single extra seed, proving the massive player base maintained total, absolute faith in the automated screening algorithm's fairness.
"Wow! Look at the screen! Guinaifen cleared the queue! She actually made the top sixteen!" March 7th cheered, pointing a finger at the display.
She couldn't hide a wave of genuine marvel at the street performer's sheer versatility. Given how terrifyingly sharp Guinaifen's micro-management forms had been during the Master Tournament—earning her a permanent spot among the Elite Four—March had assumed the girl's heart was entirely anchored to competitive league combat. Seeing her effortlessly adjust her style to clear the brutal aesthetic metrics of a Contest track was an incredible surprise.
"Is that specific traveler a significant threat profile within your league?" Seele asked, leaning forward against her scythe.
March 7th immediately broke down Guinaifen's historical record, mapping her achievements against the scale of the Master Tournament she had described earlier. Hearing that the young girl had manually fought her way into the top five rankings among a literal sea of billions of active cosmic players, the local Belobog fighters let out a collective murmur of profound astonishment.
Julian himself was remarkably curious to see how the performer had configured her routine to bypass the strict baseline logic of the automated filters. And his interest only deepened when the subsequent profile cards revealed that Sushang—the proud owner of the 'Big Pillow Li' title—had also successfully punched her ticket into the live bracket, leaving him thoroughly entertained by the upcoming matchups.
"Before our competitors take the stage, let us review the structural rules and operational procedures governing tonight's broadcast!" Owlbert announced, his digital pointer highlighting the overlay.
"The regional qualifiers, alongside the grand finals at the Celebration, are split into two distinct operational brackets: the Performance Judging phase and the Contest Battle phase!"
"During the Performance Judging turn, a trainer is permitted to deploy a maximum of three Pokémon to showcase their creative synergy through a rigid, one-minute visual routine. Once the timer runs out, our specialized panel will record their scores based on visual flair, type harmony, and execution. The top eight profiles clearing this phase will advance straight into the secondary bracket: the Contest Battle!"
"The Contest Battles will randomly configure the field into either a single or double-combat format. Within these matches, trainers must ensure their companions maintain their aesthetic appeal while executing their moves, transforming standard offensive templates into dazzling, elegant spectacles!"
"Every single stylized maneuver completed by a companion will harvest a specific margin of Charm Points for their corner, and successfully downing an opponent's asset will secure a massive point bonus. The exact frame a trainer's roster hits total defeat, or when the five-minute match timer reaches absolute zero, the system will tally the accounts. The corner preserving the higher volume of Charm Points claims the victory!"
"However, trainers must tread with extreme caution! If a companion is cleanly struck by an opponent's offensive move without a stylish counter, or if a manual coordination error causes a routine to stumble, the system will violently deduct Charm Points from your ledger. Precision is absolutely paramount!"
"Finally, let us welcome our distinguished panel of five central judges: four legendary directors commanding the animation and art departments at Arceus Studio, alongside our master producer's chief general manager—Madame Cai Xing!"
The second the cameras panned across the judges' desk, though the wider galactic audience didn't recognize the private staff faces on sight, it didn't stop a massive wave of text cheers from flooding the live chat boxes.
In the estimation of the global consumer base, the adorable visual models and cool physical traits of the creatures they loved were entirely born from the exhausting labor of those exact art directors.
Julian, however, sat completely speechless in his corner. It appeared Cai Xing had thoroughly let her hair down after leaving the Xianzhou, going so far as to claim a central seat on a live broadcast panel.
He recalled their very first meeting back in the Sky-Faring Commission, remembering how intensely cautious and formal she had been, refusing to sign off on a single line of data without running a full consultation loop through his desk first. But observing her confident, relaxed posture on the screen now, he smiled gently. It was a wonderful development; his personal management forms were remarkably hands-off anyway, and he was more than happy to let his general manager take the spotlight while he remained the silent owner of the empire.
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