187 Strongest Enemy

An hour after midnight

The water gurgled and splashed as a massive red-blue creature leaped out of the canal near the museum. It had a long blue tail, two large red wings, four hands, two legs, two fins, and two faces.

Quite an odd creature, to be honest. Especially when its one face was of a human with an oval blood-colored gem embedded in the middle of the forehead, and the other face looked like the legendary Pokemon, Latias.

Not giving the watching ghosts a heart attack from this hideous sight that suggested a horrifying attempt at breeding humans and Pokemon, Golduck-Kai let the adult Latias slide off his back.

With the web of hair surrounding the warehouse, he couldn't have come out from the hidden entrance without alerting the 4th-floor Contestant. She might not have picked up the disturbance around the warehouse from the museum, but Kai didn't want to take chances with the Pokemon, Latias, on his back.

There was only one known way to enter the Secret Garden, through the Warehouse. The other way needed the Eon Pokemon to open a portal to that place. But unlike going in, there was a third way to go out of the garden, as revealed in the movie.

The tunnels of the canals.

They ran from the garden to the city outside.

After escaping from the Secret Garden in the movie, Latias had taken the same route to reach Ash in the Pokemon Center. Now, those tunnels were filled with water and ran deep with no opening. The Stats allowed Kai to possess greater power than an average adult Contestant, but he was still human. Golduck-Kai was another matter, though. One of the fastest swimming Pokemon, this was recorded in the Pokedex Kai had gotten from Professor Elm.

It was true.

With his webbed hands and feet, and using the long, powerful tail, Kai was like a bird in the sky.

The Dementor-Kai could fly too. Yes. But it's flying bordered "gliding" at max. It was nigh impossible for Dementor-Kai to match a flying-type Pokemon's speed. Not to mention, Dementor-Kai was limited to Kai's actual Agility.

Golduck-Kai had no such limitations. No longer was he obstructed by such constraints after diving into the waters. Depending on the activities performed underwater, he could hold his breath for hours. He could swim as fast as any Pokemon, and faster sometimes. He felt freer in the water than walking on the ground.

Kai was getting Essence-Drunk, an official term his mother had invented in his previous life to describe the uncontrolled effects after fusing with a Blood Essence.

He was aware of it, and that's why the smile of unforgettable satisfaction on his face only annoyed him more.

'I just want it to be over,' Kai thought. 'I've waited a long time to get my hands on the things that I desire.'

He looked down at Latias.

Drops of water had frozen on her body, and long trails of icicles shimmered dark blue over her feathers. All over her body, a frost was lingering like a living ghost. The Pokemon kept letting out tiny whimpering coos, trembling with every use of Soul Chill within her.

Kai wondered for how long Selene could keep it up. Now that he could feed her flesh of a legendary Pokemon, he didn't want her to die. He wanted to see what would happen if he were to stimulate those pathogens into her genome.

Will there be a fight between my Glitch's tendrils, and the yellow corruptive, patterned rings? Who would win? Can she survive that kind of change? And if she can, what will be the outcome? Questions like these hadn't stopped bubbling in his mind like boiled water. Professor Elm had fanned the flame of curiosity within him, and Kai had been adding fuel to it since then.

'But I can't harm Latias before taking out the egg,' Kai reminded himself. 'So the sooner I get my hands on the DMA, the better.'

Kai looked to his right, and some 300 meters away, he saw the museum, as dark as Dementor-Kai's tattered robes. He did not know the canal pathways for him to swim here from the Secret Garden. But he had a map that pointed to something else. Or someone.

-/Took you long enough,/- Kai said telepathically. -/Are all dead?/-

Item-M kneeled by his feet. "Yes, master," she said, her chest heaving up and down. "As you had commanded, I have taken care of the loose runts."

Kai could see no Contestants, squad members of Officer Jenny, and any other local security force. That meant she had completed the mission perfectly. Kai had even tried to give her a Side Mission for bringing him water.

'Well, I am a scientist,' Kai forced back a laugh, thinking of that. 'It's in my nature to test things out.'

As one could expect, that attempt had failed. Kai wasn't sure Chaos would accept which missions, so he had just decided to use the worst, and yet the best, method available for these situations.

Hit-and-Trial.

-/What about inside the Museum?/- Kai asked. -/Has anyone gone in or come out?/-

Item-M stood up. "No," she answered. "I sent many paper bugs and birds inside. None returned. It's those damned hairs, I know. They sense everything."

The World of Inuyasha had already interested him when Item-M had mentioned the various mind-baffling swords in that world like Bleach. Kai knew this Yura-based Contestant would be the strongest 4th-floor Contestant he would face after resurrecting.

Not because she was about to ascend to the 5th floor, as Item-M had predicted. But because her lack of a soul had nullified two of Kai's strongest weapons.

Selene and Dementor-Kai.

Selene could kill a top 4th-floor Contestant with one bite. Her Soul Neurotoxin had a potency that even Kai was used to getting drenched with sweat while milking her. Any accidental nick could become fatal.

He wasn't even sure if he could make antidote of Soul Neurotoxin, as it poisoned the soul, not flesh. That's why it was deadlier than Light Neurotoxin. Getting antibodies for an ethereal venom was already a futile task, he knew. Not to mention that making antidote was a painstaking, resource-intensive, and time-consuming process.

Time which Kai had severely lacked. Otherwise, Kai could've stored many of those by now.

Then there was the matter of the Dementor's powers. Kai had strong doubts that his Emotions Manipulation won't work on this Hair Demon. Of Body, Mind, and Soul, emotions were the product of two of them. Mind and Soul.

'At least it was like that in my previous world,' Kai thought, pressing his brows.

That left him with Koffing's blood essence, pretty much useless in Kai's opinion other than the ridiculous Ability of Filth Manipulation, and Golduck's blood essence.

'I will have to use all my power to kill her,' Kai noted, taking a deep breath. 'A little help won't make me any less shameless. Heh!'

-/I will go in alone,/- Kai told his servant. -/Take out the paper Golduck-Kai and control it from outside the museum. You just have to do one thing using it. Timing. Yes, timing will be of the essence. Listen carefully…/-

Kai's words rumbled in Item-M's mind, and her eyes widened, her lips arching up with every passing moment.

Phase 3 of the plan had just started.

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AN: Please support the work by voting PS. Following images are available on Discord

-Image of the pond within the Secret Garden

-Underwater entrance to the Canals outside