There are three things you never want to see in your save file:
A corrupted sprite model.
An NPC saying "You shouldn't be here."
And the words "Trainer Red has initiated Combat Sync."
Guess which one just appeared above my head?
Yeah. That one.
Before the End of the World (Again)
Let me set the stage for you.
We were lounging on Whirlpool Coast. The sun was shining. Tax Fraud was chasing sparkly sand crabs. Chadlax was sitting in a hot tub he refused to exit, even though he physically displaced more water than existed on the island.
Karen was stringing together seashells to make jewelry she insisted would raise friendship levels. Midnight Daddy had entered his fifth hour of meditative brooding atop a volcanic rock.
I, your humble self-insert protagonist-slash-save-file-god, was trying to drink a Pecha Berry smoothie and not panic.
Then the air pressure dropped.
Birds stopped chirping.
The sun dimmed slightly — not cloud cover, just less sun — and a wild shiny Wingull fell from the sky like it had disconnected from the server.
The ocean itself rippled unnaturally.
And then, he arrived.
Red
He didn't walk up dramatically.
He didn't leap from the heavens with an epic anime landing.
He just… was there.
One moment, I was alone.
The next, Trainer Red stood ten feet away on the sand, facing me with those void-like eyes beneath his cap. His Pikachu — level 100, battle-scarred, probably knows Thunderbolt, Iron Tail, and how to declare war on democracy — stood at his side.
I could hear boss music. My boss music. Playing from his side of the beach.
Midnight Daddy stood up slowly on his rock. His rings flared to life like bioluminescent war paint. He leapt down, landing between me and Red, utterly silent.
"Um," I said, taking a shaky step forward. "Hey. Hi. We're both save file gods, huh? That's… cool."
Red said nothing.
The wind shifted.
Karen hid behind me. Tax Fraud skittered under Chadlax's tub and chewed on a coconut like it owed her money.
Then Red lifted his hand.
And tapped his own floating system menu.
The world stuttered.
Welcome to the System Conflict Zone™
Have you ever seen a tropical island morph into a glitch arena in two seconds flat?
No?
Imagine a beach suddenly overlaying with pixel gridlines, 3D terrain tiling like a GameCube on low RAM, and giant, glowing system warnings hovering in the sky.
ARENA INSTABILITY DETECTEDDUAL SAVE FILES IN CONFLICTEMERGENCY BATTLEFIELD INITIATED
Sand became stone. Palm trees glitched into Battle Tower props. The ocean turned into data soup.
Red stood motionless, his Pikachu now sparking with intense, silent judgment.
Amber (the Poké Mart clerk who somehow keeps tagging along uninvited) teleported in with Abra, looked around, sighed, and muttered, "Well, this is gonna crash the server."
I turned to my team. "Okay, guys, I know I usually joke around, but this is the real deal. Red doesn't mess around. If we're gonna survive this, we need to bring our A-game."
Karen nodded.
Tax Fraud screeched.
Chadlax blinked and said, "I'm still in the hot tub, and I refuse to battle unless there are snacks."
"Fair."
Midnight Daddy vs. Pikachu: The First Strike
Red raised a single finger.
Pikachu vanished.
Like, just bamf, blinked out of existence. Teleported. Extreme Speed? No—too fast. Something else.
He reappeared behind Midnight Daddy, tail glowing metallic.
Iron Tail.
Midnight Daddy didn't dodge.
He caught it with his tail.
The arena trembled.
Then Midnight unleashed his full wrath: Toxic, Protect, Moonlight, Foul Play — all at once. In one glorious, swirling combo that would've made Smogon's entire ban list cry.
The glitch field reacted violently. Red didn't blink. Pikachu slid backward, scuffed but standing.
Their health bars didn't exist — because this wasn't turn-based.
This was war.
Chadlax Enters the Fray (Sort Of)
Seeing things escalate, Chadlax finally heaved himself from the hot tub (flooding half the arena in the process) and waddled forward.
Red's Venusaur appeared.
It looked like it had seen a thousand battles and buried its enemies under roots.
They stared.
Venusaur roared.
Chadlax blinked.
Then sat down.
And went to sleep.
Snorlax used Rest.
Venusaur fired a Solar Beam.
Chadlax rolled over in his sleep and absorbed it into his stomach fat like it was a slightly too-hot pizza roll.
Amber scribbled furiously in her clipboard. "That's not how physics works."
I whispered, "He's not physics. He's Chadlax."
I Try to Intervene and Break Everything
At this point, I did what any responsible game-breaking protagonist would do.
I opened the menu.
Open Pokémon StorageWithdraw Arceus
"Okay," I whispered. "Let's see if you're really unkillable, Red."
The moment I selected it, the sky tore open.
Like, ripped. Like a ZIP file unzipping reality.
WARNING: LEGENDARY SUMMON VIOLATES STABILITY PROTOCOLDO NOT—
Too late.
Arceus, in all his divine spaghetti-coded glory, descended.
Except—
Red had already summoned Mewtwo.
And then it happened:
Arceus and Mewtwo locked eyes.
And the world paused.
Event Triggered: Divine Showdown
The glitch arena exploded with particles and code.
Karen was casting Calm Mind and humming aggressively. Tax Fraud used Thief on Mewtwo's shadow. Midnight Daddy stood his ground as Pikachu charged another Thunderbolt with the intensity of a nuclear reactor.
Arceus and Mewtwo floated higher, sparks flaring like stars dying.
Mewtwo used PsystrikeArceus used Judgement
They collided in the sky like gods slapping each other with raw data.
A shockwave hit the island.
Everything went white.
Aftermath (I Think I'm Dead but Not Really)
I woke up face-down in sand.
Normal sand.
Blue sky.
No glitch arena.
Just… Whirlpool Coast.
Amber was fanning herself with a magazine. Karen was brushing her fur. Chadlax had returned to the hot tub.
I sat up.
"…what happened?"
Amber looked at me over her shades. "Your attempt to out-Red Red caused a rollback."
"A what?"
"The system couldn't handle two divine entities clashing. So it crashed and reloaded to a stable state."
I blinked. "So… no Red?"
"No Red," she confirmed. "Not for now."
I looked around.
Midnight Daddy was back on his rock, tail flicking calmly. He looked… smug.
I exhaled. "Well. Guess I win by technicality."
Amber shrugged. "Or you lose by crashing the world. Either way, congrats."
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