CH100 (714), Hyakki Yagyo (2)

It was unbelievable how swiftly things went from 0 to 1000 because there was no mistaking that shit had hit the fan. How else would one describe what I was witnessing right now? The moment the energy film vanished, three Pokemon stormed through the portal aiming straight for Dusknoir, and a literal army of ghosts began to pour out of the circle/gate moments after their arrival.

It was clear that the purpose of the initial three Pokemon was to tie up Dusknoir to allow their army to pass through unhindered, and as one would expect from a trio that had to face a Stage 7/palladium Pokemon, their strength was rather impressive as well, even if they were "only" at the (high) platinum stage.

Even more interesting than their strength was the fact that I did not recognize one of Dusknoir's three opponents. The ghost looked like a knight in purple armor wielding two purple blades, though it seemed like those blades were fused to its arms. Honesty, whatever this ghost knight was, it looked really cool, and it stood out from other Pokemon quite a bit. Had I not seen it with my own eyes and someone in my old world had shown me a picture of it I would have thought it was a Navi from one of the Mega Man games I used to play or maybe a Digimon.

Still, there was one working together with an Aegislash (Shield Forme) and an Aegislash (Blade Forme) against Dusknoir right in front of me, so I had to believe it even if I didn't want to. I was curious what the species was called but there was no way I would dare try to observe it in the current situation since doing so was guaranteed to get noticed, and me getting noticed right now was the last thing I wanted to happen. 

However, one thing was certain, I definitely wanted one for myself, and while I seriously doubted I could get the leader, I was luckily seeing more than one of them among the army that had stormed out of the gate, though due to the sheer number of Pokemon that were currently fighting everywhere, I was having a hard time determining who was releasing which undulations.

I could freely admit that I tensed up somewhat fiercely when such a large number of ghosts began to pour out of the gate since I was worried that they would stumble upon us if they began to spread around the chamber. No matter how large the chamber was, and it was very very large, a chaotic fight involving so many ghosts could easily end up with us getting revealed. Thankfully, that did not happen. 

While the bosses were fighting in the center, the ghost army split up and attacked the 12 defending groups. The fact that they were specifically targeting those 12 points instead of spreading out or even leaving the chamber indicated that those 12 points/areas had been chosen for a reason, though that should have been obvious, and I did not think that it was hard to link that with the existence of the seal. 

Regardless of whether the seal was targeting the gate or sealing some Pokemon/being, the army's goal seemed to be to destroy the seal or at least take control of the 12 points to potentially take control of the seal. I personally was starting to believe that there was in fact something sealed here and I was not referring to the gate. This group was way too organized to be a group that wanted to simply enter our world, and I was starting to suspect that the invading army was aiming to release their leader, who was sealed here.

My reason was simple, and maybe it was too simple, but sometimes simple was simply better. The trio leading the army appeared to be the strongest of them, so unless they had a leader on the spirit world side of the portal who was hanging back and simply watching everything for some reason instead of fighting Dusknoir, which would have allowed the trio to battle Dusknoir's minion instead, it made more sense that they were trying to break out their real leader. 

While I had no idea if they were "bad guys" or not, I knew that they counted as an invading force and that Dusknoir's group was theoretically defending our world, so I was definitely cheering for team Dusknoir, even if I was doing so silently. Besides, there had to be a reason for whatever was sealed here to be sealed in the first place, and I would rather believe that it was done for the good of our world than believe that some innocent had been sealed for some nefarious purpose.

Still, I noticed that I had started digressing again, so I decided that it was enough with the assumptions. After confirming that there seemed to be no risk of us being discovered for now, I focused on the boss fight taking place, and I had to say that it was incredible that a battle of this caliber was being limited to such a small area. I mean, their battlefield had to have a radius of at least a hundred meters or so, but 30 or so thousand m² was still small compared to their prowess. 

I knew that attacks of Pokemon of their caliber had the potential to affect/destroy really huge areas; Not to mention that their battles tended to be fast-paced and their speeds rather quick which meant that their fights automatically tended to involve large areas. While I could understand the reason Dusknoir did not want something like that to happen since he lived here, the same was not true for the trio he was fighting against. 

In fact, I'd even say that it might help them if destruction was what they were trying to achieve. Since they were not doing it, I could only assume that they couldn't do it, which was unlikely, or that the seal could not be opened through force, or at least force alone. Whether the seal could be destroyed by them was another question, but regardless of the reason, it was a fact that the boss battle was being contained to the area around the gate. This supported my earlier idea that they had to gain control of those 12 points whether they wanted to or not.

Anyway, after watching the 3-vs-1 boss fight for a while I noted that the two sides seemed to be in a stalemate of sorts, at least for now. From what I could see, Dusknoir appeared to have a slight advantage during their confrontation despite having to face 3 Pokemon. Nonetheless, the invading trio was facing Dusknoir fearlessly and battles like this could always go either way if one side made a mistake that the other side managed to capitalize on. 

No matter how I looked at it, it did not seem like Dusknoir would be able to beat his opponents within a short amount of time, so I finally stopped focusing on the boss battle and moved my attention to the 12 battle zones that had formed. I noted that similarly to the defenders, the invaders belonged only to certain ghost species as well. Moreover, like the defenders, their prowess predominantly belonged to the dark gold stage as well, though around 30-40% of the invaders were "only" at the gold stage. 

However, that did not mean that the defenders had the advantage since the number of invaders was quite a bit higher than that of the defenders. The number of dark gold stage Pokemon was roughly equal on both sides, but the gold stage Pokemon tilted things a bit in the invader's favor, and if it had not been for the fact that the defenders had a slight advantage among the platinum-stage Pokemon compared to the invaders, things could have been bad for us.

I made a note of each ghost knight that I could see since I really wanted one and I was hoping that maybe if I was lucky enough, I could get one of them without anyone noticing due to the somewhat organized but still chaotic battles that were taking place across the 12 battlefields.

Anyway, aside from those ghost knights, the invading force consisted of some rather surprising species. The Aegislash and Doublade were still rather acceptable since two of the leaders were Aegislash, but I was a bit surprised to see Cofagrigus and Golurk among the invaders. Even more surprising was the presence of Runerigus. I would not have thought that Cofagrigus and/or Runerigus would be willing to follow the lead/orders of others, but reality was showing me that it was possible since it was happening right now. Compared to that, the presence of Polteageist and Chandelure/Lampent was less surprising.

Still, I was really grateful that only Golurk and the Chadelure line overlapped on the two sides since I would have had an even harder time keeping track of things. Currently, I was only having a problem with distinguishing friend and foe in the areas where two Golurk or Chandlure line members were facing each other. I did not want to imagine how things would have been if both sides had the exact same Pokemon. I already had a hard time keeping track of things due to the high number of Pokemon and battlefields.

Still, as things stood now, the defenders were still keeping the invaders at bay, and seeing how no new invaders were entering from the gate, it seemed like this situation would persist for some time. Now the important question was whether the gate would start to close on its own after some time or if that had to be initiated/done manually. Going by what I had learned from Duskull, with the outbreak usually lasting 1 or 2 days I would assume that the gate closed automatically.

I could also be misunderstanding things. Maybe it had to be done manually and it took 1 to 2 days because that's how long it took the defenders to beat or repel the invaders before Dusknoir could close the gate. I could freely admit that I was hoping that the closing happened automatically and I could not help but wonder if the defenders had to face an invasion during each outbreak.

While this was no doubt a very good source of experience for those involved in the battle, the thought still made me worry due to the risks involved in this. I had no idea for how long this had been going on, but who could guarantee that the defenders would be able to repel the invaders each time? What if someday in the future the invaders successfully took control of the seal?

Would they be content with returning to the Spirit World after freeing their sealed leader, or would they decide to stay around? Heck, who could guarantee that they would not set their eyes on Hoenn? Well, maybe I was overthinking things, but even if the probability of something like that happening was minuscule, did I want to risk the safety of Hoenn on it? Watching the clashes happening all around me I could not help but consider those questions and once more wonder if I should share the existence of the cave tunnel with the alliance.

I probably would not have hesitated to keep quiet if it had been just for the higher spectral energy and rare species that lived here. However, the war that was taking place right before me, and in my eyes this definitely counted as a war, made me waver. Still, I decided to push these questions to the back of my mind and worry about them after the situation had settled. For now, it was better to watch the battles without being distracted.

The minutes passed by with us (Mothra/Butterfree, Nyx/Umbreon, and me) alternatively watching the battles happening across the 12 battle zones without making any sound. I did occasionally look at the center to see how the boss battle was going, but I shifted my attention back to the battlefields each time after confirming that nothing seemed to have changed in the 3-vs-1 deadlock.

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