"Heh. Do you know why I was able to find you?" Kael asked.
And without giving Giratina time to respond, he continued himself: "In the ancient temple of the Sinnoh region, there are legends about Dialga, the dragon of time, and Palkia, the dragon of space. And if my family calls itself the family that dominates Dragon-type Pokémon, how could we not also possess some legends about the legendary dragons?"
"Dragon of the underworld... that was the first title my Drako family gave you. In truth, you are not only the dragon of the underworld; you also have names such as the dragon of destruction or the dragon of antimatter. It's just that the title dragon of the underworld was the one most accepted by people and the one that spread the most."
"So, by digging through the ancient texts of my family and reviewing countless documents, I finally found a way to approach you."
Kael slowly exhaled. He was about to recount everything he had done over the years and the origin of it all, things he had kept buried in his heart for decades. Now that he was speaking them aloud, he felt as if his entire body had become lighter.
"But merely being able to approach you was not enough. As a first-tier legendary Pokémon, and moreover the master of the Distortion World, an ordinary Poké Ball would be completely incapable of capturing you."
"Even a Master Ball, created with the most valuable materials and the most advanced technology, would be unable to contain your power. Over time, you would still be able to break the restriction of the Poké Ball, and the first person to suffer the consequences would be precisely the one who captured you."
"Furthermore, you are closely connected to the Distortion World. As long as the Distortion World is not destroyed, you cannot die; and if the Distortion World disappears, you will fall together with it. It was a dead end. Back then, I reviewed all possible information, even the League's database, and searched every conceivable method, but there was still no solution."
"So at that moment, I began to think about giving up."
Through the special barrier created by the Aether Foundation, Kael looked at the council elder, who had already regained his composure outside, and could not help but slightly curl the corner of his lips.
"But just when I was truly about to give up, one person appeared before my eyes. And that person was the then-president of the Pokémon League, the council elder!"
"By chance, I learned from him that the most powerful Poké Ball in the entire Pokémon world had always been stored inside the League headquarters. It was a Poké Ball created by the creator god Arceus himself. It could be said to be the true origin of all Poké Balls, so the council elder called it... the Origin Ball!"
Origin Ball!
In other words, that whitish Poké Ball that Kael was holding in his hands at this very moment!
Only, no one had imagined that all of this information would ultimately have come from the mouth of the council elder himself.
Upon hearing Kael's words, even someone as composed as the council elder let out a bitter smile.
At that time, he had regarded both Kael and Giovanni as the future of the entire Pokémon League, so when Kael asked whether there existed in this world a Poké Ball capable of capturing so-called first-tier legendary Pokémon, he told him about the existence of the Origin Ball.
The council elder truly possessed certain special abilities and could foresee certain extraordinary matters in advance, so in his eyes, Kael — being from the Drako family, deeply connected to the League — was someone even more trustworthy than Giovanni.
But he had never imagined that the Kael of that time had already set his sights on Giratina, the dragon of the underworld, when his strength had barely reached the Elite Four level.
What kind of monstrous ambition must a person possess to, while being so far from their objective in terms of strength, wish to challenge a Legendary Pokémon on an entirely different level?
"Old man, do you remember that question Giovanni and I asked you back then?" Kael suddenly asked, seemingly out of nowhere.
Upon hearing that, the council elder frowned. Giovanni and Kael had asked him countless questions in the past; how could he possibly remember all of them at once?
"How can a Pokémon ignore the limitations of its own aptitude and potential, and raise its strength to the Champion level and even beyond the Champion level?"
The council elder did not speak, but Giovanni, who stood to one side, calmly answered. Although Kael had not specified which question it was, Giovanni knew with absolute certainty that it was that one.
Kael nodded.
"Do you remember what you said back then?"
"There are no perfect people, nor are there perfect Pokémon. If even among human beings there are differences in talent and potential, why would there not be such differences among Pokémon?"
"There is no such thing as absolute equality. Just as among people, some are born as the eldest son of the head of a great family, while others are born as simple commoners. Both are human, yet there has never been one hundred percent fairness."
The words of the council elder were not incorrect. After all, they were an obvious truth. If everything was the result of genetic combinations, then it was completely normal for certain defects or limits to exist; the only difference was how great those limits were.
"But then you added one more sentence," Kael said, fixing his gaze on the council elder. "Unless we are talking about first-tier legendary Pokémon."
At that moment, the council elder's expression became especially complicated.
He had never imagined that a sentence he had spoken almost casually back then would ultimately have such an enormous impact on those two individuals.
Giovanni, after failing to obtain Mew, pushed genetics to the extreme and ultimately created Mewtwo, a being comparable to a first-tier legendary Pokémon.
And Kael, unwilling to fall behind, had from that moment set his sights on the legendary dragon of the underworld: Giratina!
Below, Cain listened to all of this in complete astonishment. The more he heard, the more it seemed to him that the true culprit behind everything was the council elder himself. For a moment, he almost thought: could the real mastermind behind all of this actually be him?
Of course, that was still a ridiculous idea. It was practically impossible. After all, the council elder remained one of the three individuals with the highest status in the entire Pokémon world.
(End of chapter)