When the black Lugia appeared on the field, a flicker of surprise crossed Lorelei's eyes, though her expression stayed composed. This was the whole point. From the very beginning, getting Ash to bring Lugia out into the open had been the plan.
Team Galactic was the target. They were hidden well enough that the entire League had failed to find them, and as long as they stayed put, that wasn't going to change anytime soon.
If Lorelei simply showed up alone, there was a ninety percent chance they would stay exactly where they were. The remaining ten percent wasn't that they would come for her. It was that they would quietly relocate somewhere even harder to find.
But Lugia changed the equation entirely.
A black Lugia, the God of the Sea, appearing publicly at a match on the Orange Islands. That kind of news wouldn't stay contained. It would spread across the region within a day, probably beyond it. Every set of eyes, from legitimate trainers to every criminal organization with ambitions, would be drawn to it.
The allure of a Legendary was hard enough to resist. A black one with a history tied to Team Galactic was something else entirely.
Lucia Jr. had originally been their Pokémon. They had captured her, subjected her to whatever research produced her current appearance, and then lost her when Cynthia intercepted the operation.
That wasn't the kind of loss an organization like Team Galactic filed away quietly. They had a reason to come, and they knew it was likely a trap, and they would come anyway. The same logic that had pulled Cynthia into their territory was now working in reverse.
Cynthia's situation had been instructive in its own grim way. She hadn't stumbled onto Team Galactic's location through superior detective work. They had leaked it deliberately, nursing a grudge over Lucia Jr. and using it to set a trap.
Cynthia had known it and walked in anyway, because that was the kind of trainer she was. The last message she managed to send out had made that much clear. When the League reached the location she had named, the place was empty. No Team Galactic, no Cynthia, no trace of either.
That had shaken the League badly. If someone ranked second among all Champions had gone silent without even getting a follow-up message out, the list of people who could reliably go after Team Galactic grew very short very fast.
Leon was in Galar, buried under responsibilities he couldn't simply set aside, and there was no guarantee he would fare better against an organization that had neutralized Cynthia without leaving a mark.
Leaving Team Galactic alone wasn't an option either. The region fell under joint Kanto and Johto jurisdiction, and in the end, Kanto had sent Lorelei. Johto's Elite Four going in would have been pointless given what had already happened to Cynthia.
Sending a standard Elite Four member into that situation was asking them to disappear the same way. Lorelei had Champion-level strength behind her title, which put her in different territory. If Lance had been available, both of them would have come.
But Bruno had gone deep into the mountains to prepare for the Masters Eight tournament and was completely unreachable, and Agatha was now managing the Viridian Gym on top of her Elite Four duties with no room to spare.
Lorelei had been looking at going in alone until she ran into Ash on the Orange Islands.
Now the two of them were here, Lucia Jr. was out in the open, and they were prepared to stay on the island for as long as it took. Team Galactic would get the information. They would come. And this time, the trap would be pointed the other way.
That said, none of that changed the fact that there was still a battle to finish. Exhibition or not, neither of them had any intention of losing.
Lugia's black coloring was something Lorelei had known about in advance. Hearing about it and seeing it in person were different things. It didn't read like a Shiny Pokémon, not quite.
A Shiny's alternate coloring was surface level, a palette swap on the same underlying species. Lucia Jr. felt fundamentally different, the way a regional variant felt different from its base form.
The shape of its presence, its bearing, the texture of its Aura. She had never seen a standard Lugia in person, so she had no direct comparison to draw from, but the instinct was clear enough.
The other surprise was the size.
"The League's report said she was about a meter long," Lorelei said, studying Lucia Jr. with open curiosity. "She looks closer to two meters now. That's not a small jump. What have you been feeding her, Ash?"
"Mostly her own hard work," Ash said. "Some special cooking helped. She hit Elite Four level, and the growth followed the level."
That tracked. Legendary Pokémon didn't level up the way ordinary Pokémon did. They were born with stamina, stats, and lifespans that dwarfed standard species, and the difficulty of each level scaled to match.
Under normal circumstances, a Legendary Pokémon might take several years to advance a single minor level, particularly one of Lugia's tier.
Under Ash's care, it had taken a month. Lugia's own talent and drive accounted for part of that. The larger part was Ash himself. Without him, breaking through to Elite Four level would have taken Lucia Jr. a year at minimum, possibly two.
Team Galactic had contributed something too, in their own roundabout way. Not out of any goodwill, but the outcome remained what it was. Acknowledging that fact was one thing. Gratitude was another matter entirely.
"Elite Four level Lugia," Lorelei said quietly.
On its own, that wouldn't have concerned her much. Even a Tier 1 Legendary at Elite Four level ran into the same fundamental problem any Pokémon did when facing a full tier above it. Physical gifts alone couldn't close that gap, deity or not. Her Slowbro sat at Champion-Intermediate, the lower end of her main roster, but that was still a full major tier above where Lugia stood.
Ash, however, was not a normal variable.
She had watched his ability work across multiple different Pokémon at multiple different levels. The boost was always one full major stage, and she had yet to find the ceiling of it. If that power went to someone with bad intentions, the League would have no answer for it. The fact that it belonged to Ash was, in that sense, a significant relief.
With Aura Power behind Lugia, the jump to Champion-level was straightforward. A Champion-level Legendary Pokémon with the physical constitution that came with that lineage going up against a Champion-Intermediate Slowbro was a real fight.
"Looks like this one won't be easy either." Lorelei exhaled, her eyes sharpening. "Slowbro, Light Screen!"
She was done warming up. The Cloyster loss had come partly from facing Charizard's Mega Evolution cold, with no data to work from and no time to adjust. She wasn't going to let the same thing happen twice. Light Screen cut incoming special attack damage in half. Paired with Slowbro's natural bulk, even a Legendary's output would be manageable.
"Lugia, this is your first real battle," Ash said, his voice dropping to something quieter and more direct as his heartbeat gradually found Lugia's rhythm. The Aura between them began to pull together. "Show them what you've got."
Lugia turned her head skyward and cried out, long and clear. Her Aura surged outward without restraint and settled at Champion-level.
The bond between them had taken about ten days to reach the point where Aura fusion was possible. Now, a month in, it was second nature.
"Slowbro, Reflect."
Lorelei kept her composure entirely, letting Lugia's Aura display wash past her without reaction. Slowbro began setting up again. A second transparent wall materialized in front of it and then faded into the field, invisible but active. Both screens were up now. Whatever hit Slowbro next would hit at a fraction of its original force.
Ash recognized immediately that letting Lorelei settle further wasn't an option. "Lugia, Dark Pulse!"
Dark energy gathered in front of Lugia and launched forward in a surging black wave, slicing through the air toward Slowbro with a sound like tearing fabric.
The dual screens caught it. A barrier flared into existence in front of Slowbro, held for an instant, and then the Dark Pulse pushed through anyway, its power cut by more than half.
What remained still struck Slowbro squarely in the abdomen. The large Pokémon lurched backward two steps, its already hazy expression going even further adrift.
Dark patterns spread faintly across its pink skin. Dark type against a Psychic and Water type landed super effectively, and even with both screens absorbing most of it, the hit had landed with serious weight.
Slowbro didn't go down. Its natural bulk absorbed the blow and held.
"Good. Now, Trick Room!"
Ash felt it immediately. "Lugia, stop it!"
Too late.
Trick Room hadn't just started charging when Lorelei gave the command. It had been charging the entire time Slowbro was taking the Dark Pulse. The command was only ever the signal to release what was already built up.
Spatial distortion spread outward from Slowbro in visible ripples. A cubic shape rose from its body, expanded rapidly above the field, and then snapped outward to cover the entire arena in an instant.
The rules of the battlefield shifted. Speed now worked against the faster combatant. The offensive and defensive positions of Lugia and Slowbro had just been reversed.