Chapter 229: Ho-Oh: You Naturally Villainous, Shameless Human!!
"Wait! Ho-Oh!!"
Mammon registered the retreat and moved to stop it.
"Human. Save it. My mind is made up."
Ho-Oh turned just enough to keep Mammon in view, wings held in a posture that communicated extreme wariness.
"I specifically told you last time not to call me for things like this again."
The legendary bird was genuinely aggrieved. The Shiny Mega Rayquaza incident had been — a lot. She'd gotten through it, and yes, there had been a certain satisfaction in the outcome, but she hadn't agreed to that satisfaction enough to repeat the experience.
She'd said "you'd better actually need me" on the way here. She had meant that as a threshold requirement. Not as an invitation to this.
How does this person keep doing this? Last time: a Shiny Mega Rayquaza. This time: Kyurem with three dragons' worth of power inside it. What kind of human managed to escalate this consistently?
"Last time I told you not to call me to fight the black Shiny Rayquaza again. But this time the Shiny Rayquaza is on our side." Mammon spread his hands in a gesture of complete innocence.
"Don't play word games with me!! You manipulative human!!"
Ho-Oh's composure cracked appreciably.
"That ice dragon and the Shiny Rayquaza are not the same category of problem! That ice dragon is worse than the Shiny Rayquaza!"
She had a vivid mental image of what "helping" against Kyurem Complete would involve, and it involved her taking an extraordinary amount of punishment.
Mammon said nothing.
He released Suicune.
Suicune looked at Mammon, then looked upward, and immediately registered the familiar presence overhead. Its whole posture changed — recognition, deference, the specific quality of a Pokémon encountering something it had organized its values around.
"?" Ho-Oh felt the situation developing in a direction she hadn't anticipated, and didn't like what the feeling was telling her.
"HMMMM!!"
Suicune's cry was enthusiastic and unmistakable. It had been a while — a significant while — since it had been near Ho-Oh directly. But its feelings on the matter hadn't changed. Ho-Oh had revived it. Had given it purpose and direction after the Burned Tower. In Suicune's understanding, Ho-Oh existed somewhere above ordinary Pokémon — less a companion, more a principle made manifest.
Ho-Oh received this adoration with her characteristic poise, the elegant inclination of the head that suggested gracious acknowledgment without losing dignity.
This is exactly the problem, she thought.
"Since Ho-Oh is frightened of this opponent, I understand completely," Mammon said, with the measured tone of someone being very reasonable about a difficult situation. "Feel free to leave. Fear of something this powerful is entirely natural."
"???" Suicune turned to look at Mammon with visible confusion.
It had been around Mammon long enough to have formed opinions about him. Those opinions were generally positive. But Mammon had just described Ho-Oh as frightened and suggested she retreat, and that did not—
"HMMMM!! (Mammon!! Ho-Oh would never—!!)"
Suicune's protest was immediate and energetic.
It was not going to tolerate anyone implying that Ho-Oh was the kind of legendary that turned away from difficult opponents. That was simply factually wrong, and Suicune intended to make this clear.
"!!!"
Ho-Oh's head made a sound that wasn't a sound. Something in her processing had gone briefly loud.
"Human!! How can you be this shameless??!"
The psychic transmission was directed solely at Mammon, but the intensity behind it was considerable.
This specific person. This naturally villainous, shameless human.
He'd deployed Suicune deliberately. He'd set up a situation where if she left, she confirmed — in front of her own revived Pokémon, who had constructed their entire understanding of her around her being a being of grace and absolute capability — that she had backed down from a strong enemy.
Which was, in fact, exactly what she was doing. But she hadn't wanted Suicune to know that.
"Last time you promised to help me three times," Mammon said, with the tone of someone citing a contractual obligation. "You can't back out of that now."
"You—!! You absolutely impossible human!!"
Ho-Oh was done with pretense.
"I am one Ho-Oh. Last time you had me fight a Shiny Mega Rayquaza, and now this — this obviously aberrant ice dragon — and you think that's reasonable??"
She had a point that she felt was not being sufficiently appreciated. She was a legendary, yes. An impressive one. She could revive the dead. She had Sacred Fire. But there was a hierarchy to these things, and what Mammon was consistently asking of her was to operate well above where she sat in it.
"But you did win last time," Mammon said. "Against the Shiny Rayquaza. Undeniably."
"..."
That was true.
Technically. Under specific circumstances. With assistance. In a way that had involved her lying in a crater for an extended period healing.
But true.
"Think of it this way," Mammon continued, in the tone of someone who has realized they're winning and is going to keep talking. "That kind of achievement defines a career. How many Ho-Oh can say they've done what you've done? That's a legend worth having."
Ho-Oh's eye twitched.
He'd said something very similar before the Rayquaza incident. She remembered. She'd thought about that framing more than she'd wanted to afterward.
The worst part was that she couldn't entirely dismiss it.
Sigh.
"Fine, human." The reluctance was audible. "One more time."
She had no one to blame but herself for agreeing to the original arrangement. Even with the ability to reverse death, some decisions couldn't be undone.
"I knew it!" Mammon's expression went genuinely bright. He said the next part out loud, not privately: "I had it completely wrong — Ho-Oh, you really are an extraordinary Pokémon."
"HMMM!!" Suicune's head went up immediately, vindicated and proud.
See? it communicated in posture and volume without using words. This is what I said.
Ho-Oh's laugh was not quite convincing.
"Back in your ball, Suicune," Mammon said. "We're about to start."
"HMMM! (Ho-Oh! Do your best!!)"
Suicune cheered on Ho-Oh with the energy of a dedicated supporter as it returned to its ball.
The coming fight was not appropriate viewing for Suicune.
"I'll leave this to you, Ho-Oh."
"SHRIEK~!"
Ho-Oh's wings steadied. Her eyes focused. Sacred Fire bloomed along her wings in the particular colors of that move — not just red, not orange, something in between that was uniquely its own.
(Worth noting: Mammon had already had Primal Kyogre shut down Primordial Sea. The constant heavy rain had been giving Kyurem Complete too much material to work with — water froze easily, and more available water meant stronger ice coverage. With Primordial Sea gone, the ambient weather had shifted to snow — Kyurem Complete's own influence on the atmosphere, a passive expression of how much cold it was radiating. The ruins and Victory Road nearby had begun to resemble a snowfield. Fire-type moves were at least functional now.)
"Ho-Oh — Light Screen and Reflect. Both."
Double defense, immediately. Ho-Oh's constitution was exceptional, but Kyurem Complete's raw power was exceptional in a different direction, and Ho-Oh's physical defense was not her primary strength.
Ho-Oh erected both shields simultaneously, the two layers of protection suffusing into her body.
"Good. That's all the setup you need. Go."
Ho-Oh leveled a look at Mammon that contained several things she'd decided not to say out loud. Then she went.
Sacred Fire blazed around her. The rainbow coloring at her wing-tips caught the grey light. She swept upward toward Kyurem Complete with the particular momentum of something that has committed.
Brave Bird.
Kyurem Complete had just driven back the black Rayquaza with Outrage, and was moving to press the advantage—
Something in its peripheral vision.
It turned.
A bird, closing fast. Sacred Fire wreathing it. Considerably smaller than either dragon it had been dealing with, but coming in without hesitation.
Kyurem Complete's expression communicated something in the vicinity of seriously? It roared — impatient — and the turbine lit with blue lightning.
Cross Thunder.
The ring formed. It launched.
"Wait — Ho-Oh — dodge!!" Mammon clocked the timing and called it.
Slightly too late.
BOOM.
Brave Bird and Cross Thunder connected at approximately the same point in space.
The Sacred Fire and the lightning tore at each other. Then Cross Thunder overwhelmed the Brave Bird's energy and hit Ho-Oh directly.
The defensive shields absorbed the majority of the impact.
Ho-Oh still made a sound that was not dignified and went down at an angle she had not planned, impacting the frozen ground with enough force to leave a respectable crater.
Mammon looked at the crater.
Hm.
"Ho-Oh. I'd be genuinely curious to hear your reasoning there."
He'd expected her to maneuver. He hadn't expected her to fly directly at a Cross Thunder.
From the crater: "OW. OW. OW."
Sacred Fire was already working — the passive healing activating the moment she'd taken damage. Within seconds she was stable, within a few more she'd be operational.
"I was… assessing the impact coefficient," Ho-Oh said, from the crater. "Directly. For scientific purposes."
"Right," Mammon said.
"…I misjudged."
"I can tell."
The Shiny Genesect had moved in to harass Kyurem Complete with Extreme Speed while Ho-Oh recovered — it couldn't deal meaningful damage, but it kept the ice dragon occupied and prevented it from consolidating.
Ho-Oh rose from the crater with her customary dignity, or as much of it as was available, and Sacred Fire continued to restore what Cross Thunder had taken.
"Don't do that again."
"Agreed," Ho-Oh said.
"Rayquaza — Dragon Dance. Continue from where you were."
Black Rayquaza resumed without comment, the ancient rhythm building again. The Shiny Genesect kept Kyurem Complete moving, disrupting its ability to respond to what was happening in the background.
"Human. Do I need to call my mate?"
Black Rayquaza's inquiry came during a brief pause in its Dragon Dance cycle.
"Not necessary." Mammon's hand rested lightly on Victini's small form, still sitting on his shoulder. "This isn't the original Dragon of Unova. It's just three dragons unified. We can handle it."
The difference mattered. The original Dragon of Unova had divided because it had become something the world couldn't support in its complete form — its full power wasn't something that could be contained. This was Kyurem with Zekrom and Reshiram reclaimed, which was immense, but it was still Kyurem. It had a limit.
They could work with a limit.
I'm developing a real interest in this ice dragon, Mammon thought, watching Kyurem Complete struggle against Genesect's harassment. If we pull this off — Reshiram out, Kyurem defeated — is there a path to actually catching it?
He had Reshiram. He had N with Zekrom access. Three dragons in the same organization, and the bond between them meant Kyurem Complete's formation was theoretically reproducible.
The challenge would be Kyurem's temperament. Getting it to accept capture would be a significant project.
Worth thinking about.
(End of Chapter)
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