Something about Kyurem felt off.

  It appeared as I expected it to—but significantly more intimidating in person, in fact. Grey scales covered its dense muscles as it slept, and ice had frozen around its head and body like armor. Kyurem’s wings resembled broken, melted-together shards of glass that stuck up out of its back, and if I had been lying down, even just three or four of me placed in a line would not match this Pokémon’s total length.

  Even just looking at it caused my heart to pound in my chest, and it was apparent that this was a true Legendary Pokémon: one of the most powerful Pokémon to exist. As Kyurem was intrinsically tied to the history of Unova, this Pokémon carried a weight to it that stemmed from both its power and past.

  But that was where its pressure stopped. This Pokémon was wrong. Something about it was broken.

  It was hollow. It wasn’t breathing. Its very presence dragged. Even just standing nearby, I was almost overwhelmed with a feeling of loss. Yet, all of that was natural to Kyurem; this Legendary Pokémon was missing something crucial to its existence, but it somehow managed to persist.

  As was its nature, Kyurem was both empty and bound. It possessed an impossible power, but due to its origin, it could never fully unleash what it once was.

  In the past, there had been a Legendary Dragon. That dragon had been split. Two beings core to its identity tore away, and everything that was left?

  Kyurem was that empty shell.

  But it was still a Legendary Pokémon. It was still a Pokémon stronger than anything else in this crater. My team needed that experience, but really, we wanted it. Every Pokémon on my team was itching to start this fight, and Liepard sent me a look.

  More of a sharp stare, really. The kind that only a cat could give. I was kind of just standing in place, taking in the entirety of this sleeping beast.

  “Y-yes. I’ll... Let’s start,” I told him.

  Forcing a grin back onto my face, I began to walk forward. Every step I took echoed around me, and I inched toward this Legendary Pokémon.

  “K-Kyurem!” I shouted, stopping a dozen yards away and trying to push back the freezing chill that caused my teeth to chatter. “W-we’re here to ch-challenge you! Give us the blessing of a fight!”

  Behind me, Liepard lowered his head, both showing respect and positioning himself for a lunge. The screen displaying Valiant’s eyes showed them as being closed, and that metal Pokémon crossed their blade over their chest.

  That was about it for what my team was doing that could be considered a form of respect. Unable to keep still, electricity sparked off of Rotom’s body as he prepared himself to move, and Metang looked like he wasn’t sure whether he wanted to flee or punch this creature across its face.

  Honestly, I don’t think he realized just how strong Kyurem would be.

  Even though the shout of my challenge had been short, the faintest wisps of my voice continued to echo around the cavern. No movement came from the Legendary Pokémon, and the entire world remained perfectly still.

  Kyurem continued to sleep.

  We waited for its approval.

  As much as we wanted to fight this thing, attacking it outright would only ever be a mistake.

  It felt as though minutes had passed even though it had only been seconds. So many nervous questions passed through my head—such as the major one: is this really how it works? Respect was crucial to properly deal with any Pokémon, and against a Legendary Pokémon, a lack of respect would be fatal. We had challenged this creature, but we had kind of marched straight into its home. Kyurem could choose to battle us, or it could choose to... “deal” with us.

  Plus, there were all of those stories about it stalking through Lacunosa’s streets.

  Staring at this hulking Legendary Pokémon, I really hoped we didn’t make a mistake.

  But several more stretched-out seconds passed within this room. And then, finally, there was a reaction.

  The Legendary Pokémon snapped open its eyes, and it let out a cavern-shaking roar.

  “HAAAHRAAN!”

  The noise was like a pressurized tank letting out a rumbling hiss.

  Though it had accepted our challenge, my Pokémon moved before Kyurem could use any attack whatsoever. I was also already running, dashing straight toward the cavern’s side. My Pokémon all lunged and split apart; against a Dragon, it made no sense to stick together and be caught by the same one move all at once.

  “Liepard, support!” I shouted as Kyurem’s heavy feet caused the world to shake as it brought itself up out of its rest. “Valiant, get in there and block its claws! Rotom, help them—weaken its attacks with your heat! And for you, Metang...”

  I then realized I hadn’t properly planned for Metang’s inclusion.

  “Crash into it whenever you can!” I ended up settling on.

  As my Pokémon moved to encircle Kyurem, the Legendary Pokémon let out another roar, and streams of frost blasted out in every direction. This cavern might as well have been an extension of its own body with how it rumbled alongside its movements, but not a single pebble of ice or stone fell; this was Kyurem’s lair. It would not have created a den if fighting in it was going to be a problem.

  Valiant tried to block the frost that washed out of the Legendary Pokémon, but their blade became coated in icicles that streamed backwards. Liepard was able to jump and dive through the worst of it, and though frost formed on Rotom’s body, the warmth of his oven stopped the chill from consuming him.

  Metang, however, had prepared no such defense, but his Steel-type helped him move. A spiral of motion from his arms saw him shatter the thin layer that grew across his limbs.

  “Metang!” I shouted, gathering his attention. I found a frozen rock to hide behind, and my coat helped to ward off the worst of the cold. “Help Valiant!”

  The floating Pokémon seemed surprised to receive a new order so soon, but even just the past few days of working with me meant he was willing to move.

  Especially now, when Metang was here and fighting against what was essentially a minor god.

  Who cared about that Metagross anymore?

  Against Kyurem, Metang was properly ready to fight.

  But he didn’t attack. Rather, Metang charged Valiant to slam into the blade-wielder’s back. He used no move; he simply rushed forward, and that basic impact was enough to snap Valiant’s weapon free from where it had frozen into their arm.

  Here and now, there was no time for any other supporting moves; my Pokémon were only trying to recover after taking this Legendary Pokémon’s roar. Valiant wasted no time to flash forward, putting their full speed to use, and they twirled their polearm in both hands to build momentum and swing it down to land an explosive, strike-based Dazzling Gleam straight into Kyurem’s side.

  Metang followed them, sliding through the air to flank Kyurem opposite to Valiant. As he slid, he used that momentum to slice the Legendary Pokémon with claws glowing with Steel. The Metal Claw attack carved channels into Kyurem’s ice, dealing super effective damage, and that hardening Steel-type energy strengthened Metang to further increase the power of any future attacks.

  That combination of strikes would have been devastating against anything else, but the only result here was that the surface layer of ice on Kyurem’s body cracked. The Legendary dragon itself didn’t even blink at that incoming damage—I wasn’t even sure if it had felt it.

  Once more, Kyurem just roared, frost pulsing out in every direction. With Valiant and Metang right there, they were poised to take the worst of it, but Rotom reacted, opening his oven door to explode with heat.

  That attempt barely helped.

  Once again, frost covered Valiant’s attempt to block, leaving icicles on their crystal polearm, and Metang looked to be almost completely frozen over. However, both coverings of ice dripped away thanks to Rotom’s Overheat minimizing just how much frost could stick to their forms. The only problem was that both my Pokémon had taken the full damage, and one of Metang’s arms remained frozen solid.

  Thankfully, Liepard remained completely safe thanks to how he kept to the back. He jumped between boulders and newly-formed icicle stalagmites, using them as cover to get as close as he could.

  The three Pokémon in the center of this den continued to unleash their moves, but the only thing getting damaged was the ice Kyurem used as armor.

  Realizing that Liepard was our key to having a true effect here, I didn’t hesitate to call for a move that was essentially his species’s specialty.

  “Liepard!” I shouted, my voice echoing across the room. “Use Foul Play!”

  The Legendary Pokémon’s empty eyes watched my three Pokémon lay into it, and Liepard took full advantage of that distraction. The feline was already prepared and filled with Dark-type energy, so, running forward, he purposefully slid across the ground to pass beneath Kyurem’s legs and land an intentionally-placed slash to the back of the Pokémon’s heels.

  He wanted the dragon to trip.

  Foul Play was not just any Dark-type move; it was a move that specifically used a Pokémon’s strength against them. Here, Liepard himself didn’t need to be powerful to deal damage; he could use the strength of his opponent to have it deal damage to itself.

  As he came out the other side and returned to his feet, darting away from the front of Kyurem, the Legendary Pokémon found its own weight had betrayed it, and it entered a sudden fall.

  Immediately, Valiant struck down at where Kyurem had collapsed, their blade aiming at where the Legendary Pokémon’s head had hit the earth. On Kyurem’s opposite side, Metang didn’t hesitate to use his singular, free arm to land another Metal Claw. A distance away from Kyurem's face, heat washed out of Rotom in an attempt to weaken the ice that protected this Legendary Pokémon, and Liepard returned to circling around, already trying to reposition himself for another slide-and-slash.

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  My team didn’t let a single second pass without effort. They beat on the fallen Legendary Pokémon to try to deal the most damage they possibly could.

  “YES!” I shouted at them. “KEEP GOING! SECURE THE WIN!”

  Except, my interpretation of this situation was completely off. Kyurem had fallen, but it was now staying on the ground for a reason:

  My team and I had shown up unexpectedly. Although it had accepted our challenge, this Dragon-type was still half-asleep.

  Everyone was trying to take advantage of Kyurem’s fallen state and the easy target that was its massive body, and both of Kyurem’s eyes had closed when it hit the earth. I tried to search that motionless form for any sign of obvious damage, but doing so let me realize far too late that, at the very best, my team was only causing nicks in the Legendary Pokémon’s ice.

  Then, once again, Kyurem's eyes snapped open.

  The blast that came out of it this time around was so much worse than the last.

  A single roar left Kyurem’s throat, but calling it a mere “roar” would not have been giving the sound credit. It was a declaration, but even that was too weak a description.

  Kyurem made a demand, and the world relented.

  The ice that had left the Legendary’s body before could only be called the faint gasps of a Pokémon just beginning to move. Now, pure cold exploded off of it. It was as if a gaseous glacier was being thrown through the air.

  Every single one of my Pokémon was hit, and I had to pull myself down, tugging my coat over my head to not be chilled to the bone. Compared to every other one of Kyurem’s cries, this had to be the first move that it wasn’t holding back.

  Even as far away as he was, Liepard was sent flying into the wall, fur covered by frost, and Rotom became an oven-shaped cube of ice, blinking inside that layer of frost but unable to escape even with his heat.

  Metang was sent bouncing across the floor, sliding away from Kyurem, and even Valiant was launched far back. When I tried to push back up from where I had crouched behind the boulder, I could see that icicles had formed at perfect horizontal angles around it.

  My heart raced.

  This was the toughest opponent we’d faced yet.

  Except, as I looked around at my team, I realized most of my Pokémon were not able to move. A little voice whispered in the back of my head.

  Did we mess up by challenging a Legendary Pokémon to a fight?

  “Kyurem wasn’t this strong in the games,” I whispered to myself. “Was it always meant to be this powerful? There was a point where it was used to freeze a city, but...”

  But I thought that had only happened because Kyurem had been captured, abused, and enhanced by incredibly advanced technology.

  Here, I had truly thought my team carried a chance.

  Unfortunately, Kyurem was starting to properly wake up, and its pure yellow eyes glowed in a growing anger. All Dragon-types had a certain arrogance to them, and here, we had challenged this Pokémon, a true dragon, yet this was all we had to offer?

  Despite how we had approached it with respect, our failure to deal any significant damage was beginning to enrage this Pokémon. There was no telling what Kyurem would do from here, and it was as if my thoughts were just as frozen as the world around us. I could already see that basically every member of my team had been consumed by frost.

  All except one.

  The cracking of ice echoed out. A polearm stabbed into the floor. A pink blade pierced through the ice, and using that as support, Valiant returned to their feet, shaking ever so slightly.

  As they stood, I could see that their body had been stained blue by ice. The gaps and bends in their limbs that allowed them to move looked to be all filled with frost.

  Kyurem’s gaze turned toward Valiant, and even just that stare seemed to be enough to cause Valiant to stumble. Kyurem stood at the very top of the very top; it was an apex predator. It had no true opponents, but Valiant’s eyes blazed with a refusal to give up.

  Valiant was injured, half-frozen, and almost out of energy.

  However, this was where they thrived.

  An Iron Valiant was a Fairy and Fighting-type. They excelled in certain, specific conditions. Their stature and skill in battle combined with the advantages that their types gave them. All of that together meant they could act as an epitome of a knight.

  To an Iron Valiant, slaying a dragon was something core to their nature.

  “Valiant...” I heard myself whisper, but I shook my head before I could get lost in awe. Now wasn’t the time to get distracted; we were still in a fight.

  Off to the side, Liepard had been just barely far enough away not to immediately be knocked out. Though injured, he was able to creep over and grab the frozen Rotom to begin dragging him away with a furious dash. Metang wasn’t as lucky—he was currently frozen to the floor—but he was still just conscious enough to begin using his claws to scrape away at the ice while watching the ongoing fight.

  “GO ALL OUT!” I shouted at the top of my lungs, and my cry was almost as much of a declaration as Kyurem's roar had been before. “USE ELECTRIC TERRAIN, VALIANT! GIVE IT YOUR ALL! CHARGE KYUREM, AND HIT IT WITH YOUR BEST CLOSE COMBAT!”

  Valiant’s grip on their polearm tightened. A forceful energy coursed through their body. Bringing up their blade, they stabbed it right back into the earth, and arcs of electricity leaped off that edge to spread out in all directions, properly dying the earth.

  A hum came from within Valiant; for all of their exhaustion, their Quark Drive was still able to supercharge them from inside their chest.

  Tensing and flexing, Valiant lunged to charge forward. The force of their legs behind them cracked the icy earth.

  In retaliation upon seeing that dash, Kyurem reared up, intending to use its full body weight as added force to its incoming swipe. Kyurem’s front claws might have been small, but they were no less deadly than the rest of it. Yet, as Valiant all but flew forward, their crystal blade glowed with an impossible force.

  Even if Valiant wanted to, there was no defending against Kyurem’s move. So, they gave up all and any sense of defense just so they could land this one attack.

  Within a single second, Valiant was there, and Kyurem’s claws swung down. Without any issue, they carved into Valiant’s body, but Valiant pushed through that pain, ignoring it and swinging their polearm like a baseball bat to deliver this single blow to the direct center of Kyurem’s chest.

  “GO!” I screamed.

  Valiant collapsed, but the strike had landed. A glass-like layer of ice on Kyurem’s chest broke apart and shattered, sending a fine dust down around where Valiant kneeled in pain and exposing the Legendary Pokémon’s throbbing, grey flesh.

  Kyurem’s eyes widened; though it had delivered its move, it had felt Valiant’s attack. Electricity crackled under its feet. Even with its impossible strength, the Close Combat had been a single payload of everything Valiant had. And, because it had reared back, something else happened:

  It wobbled, and a lack of balance caused Kyurem to shift on its feet.

  Valiant’s strike meant the Legendary dragon took a single step back.

  As I took in that sight, and as the rest of my team went stock-still, I couldn’t help but let out a simple laugh. Its echo made the sound quite haunting, especially since Kyurem was beginning to recover from that attack.

  “All of that,” I mumbled to myself, “and this is the first time Kyurem has been forced to move, huh?”

  It had barely even taken any damage, but at least it had been damaged, albeit slightly.

  However, Kyurem was still able to battle, and Valiant was kneeling right before it. Still reared back on its feet, Kyurem twisted its neck around to face its jaw directly down, opened its mouth, and built a certain light in its throat.

  When its attack finally came out, Valiant looked so impossibly small in comparison before being consumed by that blast.

  Liepard was barely conscious. Rotom was struggling to thaw his oven. Valiant would need days to recover. With how much ice covered him, just to move, Metang had to use his one free arm to drag himself over the floor.

  We had failed.

  We didn’t defeat Kyurem.

  All of our practice, and the only thing we’d managed to do was have Valiant force Kyurem to take a single step back.

  “We didn’t win. We didn’t knock it out,” I said as my remaining conscious Pokémon gathered around me. “We didn’t even deal any significant damage. But what we achieved? We surprised it, if only for an instant. I mean, Liepard, you made it fall. Metang, you carved through its ice. Rotom, you actually managed to weaken some of its attacks! But, most importantly, we got to experience the toughest fight of our lives. Everything will seem easy in comparison now that we have this battle at our backs.”

  I said all of that, but I was really just trying to get past how humbling this encounter had been.

  At the far end of the cavern behind us, Kyurem looked exhausted, but that wasn’t because of anything we had done. That Legendary Pokémon was far more interested in its rest than anything else, and even this barest amount of effort was enough to tire it out.

  Truthfully, this hadn’t been without risk—if we had enraged Kyurem enough, I had been a little worried that the Legendary Pokémon would start some kind of rampage (or eat us as punishment), but I had rated that risk as minor altogether. From everything I’d seen and read about Legendary Pokémon, those kinds of consequences only came from not giving the Pokémon the respect they deserved. Most of the time, Legendary Pokémon kept to themselves—they didn’t want to rampage. We weren’t trying to capture Kyurem, and we only attacked once it had accepted our challenge. Its only annoyance came from our weakness, but Valiant had saved us by delivering that final, powerful blow.

  Even though my entire team had been defeated, none of us had given up. That effort had earned us at least a modicum of respect.

  Once we left this place, I knew that no one would ever believe us about this story, but it would be a memory that’d stick with us for a long time. We had our strength, but I couldn’t let myself get cocky. Every opponent we’d faced in Unova so far had been a Normal Rank trainer. We were yet to face anyone with a greater amount of experience, nor had we faced anyone truly attempting to climb to the very top.

  Kyurem stood outside all of that. It possessed a true level of power. Even compared to trainers of the Great and Ultra Rank, Kyurem would be able to dominate any of them in a fight.

  No one we faced would be able to live up to this battle, but no one was going to make us face this same kind of defeat. Even if we fought some trainer’s impossibly strong, ace Pokémon, we would be able to look at it and not back down.

  Because that Pokémon wouldn’t be Kyurem.

  “I told you there was more than just that Metagross,” I said as Metang tried to bring himself up from the ground, but the heaviness of the ice prevented his body from entering the air. “There’s an entire world out there with Pokémon and trainers that can easily defeat it—and that includes just about everyone who has reached Master Rank. But we don’t need to use them to define where we stand. We know how strong Pokémon can be, so we’re the ones to set goals for ourselves. We’ll fight because we want to, and that means we choose how we approach things on our own. I mean, you kept facing that Metagross again and again, but now that you’ve fought Kyurem, do you really think a challenge like this would be worth repeating right now?”

  Metang’s look was flat.

  He absolutely did.

  He really wanted to have another battle against Kyurem—but he seemed to recognize that maybe he should wait until he was a bit stronger.

  “Yeah,” I said, finding myself letting out a laugh. “Once we get strong enough, it’d be pretty neat to see if this becomes a winnable battle. Except, that’s us challenging it again to see if we can win, not a battle to make Kyurem recognize our strength, yeah?”

  Silently, a certain determination burned in Metang’s eyes. He seemed to understand at least partially, now.

  But I also knew something that Metang didn’t: Kyurem was only one of many. If we tried hard enough, we could find other impossible Pokémon. Kyurem wasn’t the only Legendary opponent we could potentially hunt down and challenge to a fight.

  (Although, this was probably more than enough for now. I didn’t want to admit it out loud, but facing Kyurem had been terrifying.)

  With the battle over and some form of our desired challenge achieved, a need to leave Kyurem’s den began to properly settle in. I knew we should have walked out the second this Legendary Pokémon finished off Valiant, but there was still one other thing that I really needed to do.

  So many people wanted me to be a hero. I didn’t want to be a hero. However, I could at least recognize that there were some things yet to happen from the games. If I wanted to have the freedom to explore the world as I pleased, it’d be in both my and everyone else’s best interest for me to take at least some steps to prevent that.

  Bringing my gaze away from my team, I took a deep breath in, and I could taste the chill in the air. Once again, I took a step forward, and I approached where the Legendary Pokémon attempted to rest on the ground.

  I really hoped this wasn’t a bad idea.

  “Kyurem!” I shouted, and the Legendary Pokémon was a mountain my team and I had yet to even attempt to climb. “Thank you for the battle! We’re... never going to forget this. This was a fight that’s going to stick with us for a long time.”

  Letting out an exhale, I threw myself into a bow, bending myself into what was essentially a perfect right angle.

  No reaction came from the dragon—in its rest, it was nearly impossible to tell if it was asleep or even alive.

  Though I was definitely pushing it, I didn’t walk away just yet. Standing there, still in that bow, I took a long moment to carefully choose my next words. While fighting had been a selfish choice, I knew I needed to deliver this message. Even just a short phrase could save an entire city, and, if anything, it could result in an even larger change than just that.

  “I.... have a warning for you,” I said, speaking every word carefully and deliberately. “A... warning of a potential future. Because even as strong as you are now, no defense is impenetrable. Both Liepard and Valiant proved that.”

  I stiffened when Kyurem opened a single eye.

  “There are schemers out there,” I said quickly, bringing my gaze back to the ground. “Schemers that are capable of coming here just the same as I did. All I have to say is, do not underestimate them. They’re led by someone I would call truly evil, and with the technology they might have... You’ll lose yourself to them if they manage to do what they’re planning to do.”

  Every region had its own criminal organization. At least, that was true in the games. In this world, events had already occurred in the past for the various criminal organizations to try and ultimately fail at their plans, but unlike what happened in the other regions, Unova hadn’t succeeded in its defense.

  Its Pokémon League had been attacked. The criminals had escaped. They were still at large, hiding underground, biding their time until they were ready to strike next.

  I, of course, had the story of the video games to fall back on, but I had no clue if they would hold true or not. However, I could at least do this one thing.

  And if anyone wanted me to do anything else, I’d say no. Someone else could handle it—this warning was already me doing more than my part.

  As I brought myself back up, my short message given, it almost felt as though I was being stabbed by flakes of ice, and I could feel the full weight of Kyurem’s gaze. Its solid yellow eyes pierced into me, and though this Pokémon was but a shell, it was still the shell of a Pokémon that was so far above anything else that its true form could overpower even Kyurem.

  Although Kyurem stared, there was no response for a long time. I didn’t move, and it was as if this empty Pokémon was inspecting me. Every ounce of its pressure pushed against my chest.

  I did not back down; my warning was true.

  And then, eventually, finally, truly, Kyurem’s gaze fell away.

  Letting its eyes close, the Legendary Pokémon allowed me to leave.

  “Okay. Hurry up, everyone. Follow me. We’re getting out of here.”

  Speaking as fast as I could as I returned to my team, I didn’t hesitate to walk away, rushing straight out of Kyurem’s cave.

  When we left the Legendary Pokémon’s twisted spire, a rumble came from behind us. Like vicious tendrils creeping out of the ground, icicles stabbed through the open entrance to cover it with ice.

  This was no normal ice—this was ice made by Kyurem. Entering the mountain den would now be an impossible challenge; it had sealed itself off from the rest of the world.

  Unfortunately, there was no way to tell if my warning had worked. Kyurem could have sealed its den due to my words, or it could have just sealed its den to ensure we wouldn’t be able to bother it again.

  “Let’s leave,” I said, my entire body exhausted and my voice feeling hoarse. “Let’s get out of this crater and back to some more classic training, huh? We’ve got some fights to win. Points to earn. A need to start climbing through the World Coronation Series. But maybe...”

  Valiant was unconscious in their Pokéball. The rest of my team was either horribly injured or mostly frozen.

  Kyurem had taken everything we had, but we still needed to get through the challenge of leaving the Giant Chasm itself.

  “But maybe...” I continued, letting out a sigh. “Maybe we go and find an Audino to get some healing, first.”

  This is the end of the first arc, and the end of the daily chapters. From here, chapters will be released twice a week, on Wednesdays and Fridays. We’ll be picking back up with a short interlude chapter set in the past, and then for the main story itself, expect to see a greater focus on the World Coronation Series from here.

  A few notes on Kyurem (my meta-perspective on why it behaved as it did):

  Kyurem isn’t truly alive. It’s living, breathing, and has its own free will, but the only purpose it has left is to wait. When the was torn apart due to a clash between Truth and Ideal, Kyurem was the shell that remained, and it wants to be put back together.

  It’s not interested in truly lashing out or going on a rampage. It basically doesn’t have that much motivation in the first place. According to the , it’s just waiting for someone to piece it back together with Truth or Ideal for it to reach a semblance of its original form.

  In the movies, however, (major spoiler warning for M15), we see a different aspect of Kyurem when challenges it to a battle. Battling Kyurem seems to be a regular occurrence, and though it chases Keldeo when Keldeo runs away, it’s doing so out of a need to finish the fight. When Keldeo finally fights back against it, Kyurem does back down. There’s a sense of honor there, but also arrogance. Kyurem is still a Dragon, after all.

  Pokémon mentioned in this chapter:

  Nick’s Team:

  Iron Valiant

  enormous thank you to everyone reading! Your support keeps this story going.