"Wait…"
Axel raised a hand to stop Lance, signaling for his Pokémon to stop their attack as he fell into thought.
Today's developments had gone far beyond expectations. The fierce resistance he'd imagined never came, and these people even seemed inclined to surrender themselves.
And then there was Deoxys. The amount of information hidden behind that name was staggering.
As far as Axel remembered, although Deoxys was powerful, it had never done anything like attacking cities. So why had Rayquaza reacted so violently?
"What's this 'space virus' thing about?"
Rayquaza's voice carried a trace of irritation, ["Those creatures don't speak the same language as beings from the Pokémon world. Even telepathy can't establish communication."]
["When facing weaker beings, they can't even be bothered to attack. But the moment they encounter Legendary Pokémon, they go berserk."]
["Fortunately, the ones they ran into back then were me. At the time, I was being sustained by Aurient and was at my absolute peak condition. I barely managed to crush them in midair, but I ended up falling into slumber afterward."]
["If they had encountered Dialga, Palkia, or Lugia instead, the Pokémon world would've descended into chaos."]
Hearing this, Axel finally understood what was going on.
There wasn't just one Deoxys, there was an entire species of them.
And unlike the Special manga setting where Deoxys could be controlled by others, these ones resembled the movie version more closely, acting independently under no one's command.
In that case, if they encountered divine beings responsible for maintaining critical aspects of the world, and killed them… then the Pokémon world truly would face catastrophe.
As the thought crossed his mind, Axel's expression grew grave, "Lance, these Team Rocket people don't seem like they want to resist anymore. Let's head down and take a look?"
"Alright!"
The moment Lance answered, his Dragonair immediately stopped controlling the weather.
The chaos surrounding Newtwo Island gradually calmed. Only a few Magikarp, Goldeen, and other Pokémon swept up by the storm continued flopping against the ground before bouncing back toward the sea.
Right now, there were two things Axel needed to figure out first.
The first was Team Rocket's sudden change in attitude.
The shift had been far too strange and far too abrupt. Axel found it difficult to believe these people had suddenly turned over a new leaf.
The second was Deoxys's current state.
Had it still not revived after being defeated by Rayquaza, or had it already come back?
And if it had revived, was it alone, or was the entire species still around?
Both questions were critically important to the current Pokémon world.
"Who's in charge here?", Axel stopped in front of the protective barrier. Not a single Pokémon stood beside him as he calmly looked at the people inside.
"I am. Mr. Axel truly has remarkable courage. To come before us without even bringing Pokémon… no wonder the boss values you so highly."
The door to the facility opened, and an elderly bald man with a white beard slowly walked out.
He spread his arms wide, leaving his lab coat hanging open so it was obvious at a glance that he wasn't concealing any Poké Balls.
"So it's you?", Behind Axel, Lance frowned deeply, his expression gradually twisting, "Blaine, being a Gym Leader while secretly working for Team Rocket was bad enough. And now you're not even trying to hide it anymore."
Blaine let out a bitter laugh. "We're already planning to turn ourselves in, so what's the point of hiding?"
"Giovanni already said that once Axel came here, Team Rocket probably wouldn't survive this ordeal. So he simply had everyone give up resisting and surrender together."
"After all… ordinary Team Rocket members haven't committed any truly heinous crimes. Only a very small number deserve the death penalty."
He paused before sighing.
"As for me, I do owe all of you League higher-ups an apology. But the things Giovanni was researching were simply too tempting… artificial gods. What a magnificent undertaking."
Lance still refused to believe it, "That guy Giovanni would willingly surrender? I doubt it!"
After fighting Giovanni for so many years, he knew exactly what kind of person he was.
A man with an extraordinarily resilient will, someone who never admitted defeat. And setting aside the threat he posed to the League, his charisma was exceptional.
Even if someone like that suddenly made Team Rocket go straight, Lance still felt Giovanni would simply go into hiding, waiting in the shadows until the moment he could reemerge and rebuild Team Rocket from scratch.
"Believe it or not…", Blaine knew how stubborn Lance was. The man hated villains of every kind to the bone. No matter how much he explained, changing Lance's mind would be difficult.
He turned toward Axel instead.
"Sir, Boss Giovanni anticipated that you wouldn't believe this, so he asked me to pass along a message."
"He's very grateful that you helped him find Silver again. But with Team Rocket plagued by both internal and external troubles, it's not a suitable place for a young master."
"The boss has spent half his life living for his dream. He wants to spend the second half living for his son."
"If one day he feels capable of protecting Silver properly, perhaps he may return and start some other enterprise anew. But he will never lead Team Rocket again."
"Because… Young Master Silver doesn't like Team Rocket."
"Huh?", After hearing Blaine's words, Axel froze on the spot.
He knew very well that Giovanni was the kind of man willing to sacrifice everything for his son. But no matter how he thought about it, he'd never expected Silver's influence to be this overwhelming.
According to Axel's original plan, he would fight Giovanni in a decisive battle, and once Giovanni was defeated, Silver would appear and persuade him to reform.
Who would've thought Giovanni wouldn't follow the script at all?
At that moment, Lance's Rotom Phone suddenly began ringing frantically.
["Champion Lance! Miss Sabrina from Saffron City has brought people to the police station to surrender!"]
["Champion Lance! Cinnabar Volcano has suddenly announced the closure of its Gym! All the Fire-type Pokémon raised there have walked out of the mountain and are now no different from ordinary wild Pokémon!"]
["Champion Lance! Erika used a level 30 Gloom to capture Apollo and his level 60 Mega Houndoom!"]
Under the nonstop flood of reports, the arrogant expression on Lance's face vanished completely, replaced by utter confusion.
'What the hell?'
The first two were one thing, but how did Erika defeat an Elite Four-level Pokémon with a level 30 Pokémon?
Had the entire world gone insane?
The bombardment of messages continued for half an hour before Lance finally accepted one reality.
Whether Giovanni would return in the future or not, Team Rocket as it currently existed was already finished.
Aside from Lance, who was far away in Aurient, and the Three Beasts in Johto, every other major non-research member had already surrendered themselves.
As for the researchers, Giovanni had gathered every last one of them onto this island.
Looking at the complete list of those who had turned themselves in, Lance sighed helplessly.
"As expected of Giovanni… even surrendering was something he could make everyone agree to. Compared to him, my abilities as Champion are a complete joke…"
"Axel, stay here and wait for news about Deoxys. I'm going to capture the Three Beasts."
"No need."
Axel raised his phone and showed Lance the message Apollo had sent him.
[Savior-sama, we discovered that Pryce is hunting down Team Rocket members. The airborne mothership has already been handed over to the Three Beasts.]
[They should be fighting soon!]
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