Chapter 294: If Only We Could Do It All Again
The moment Will pushed open the pine wood door...
He expected the damp smell of mildew mixed with beeswax to hit his face.
After all, he hadn't been back in so long.
But it wasn't like that.
The house was filled with a fresh scent.
Someone had obviously cleaned it.
Very carefully, very diligently.
He walked to the small room where he had lived for decades.
It was still filled with many cute plush dolls, just like before.
Will's gaze shifted gently.
Finally resting on the old woman on the bed.
The 87-year-old Lorelei was already gray-haired, bearing no resemblance to her youthful, energetic self.
But then...
Wasn't he the same?
Although his body was still strong and vigorous, his soul had nothing to do with youth.
"Lorelei, why did you come back?"
Will approached.
He reached out and stroked Lorelei's withered white hair.
Perhaps...
In the eyes of many, the current Lorelei was a highly respected elder.
But to Will, she was still the child of this family.
Likewise.
Will might be the only one left in this world who still treated Lorelei like a child.
"Piplup..."
Lorelei quietly opened her eyes, her gaze drifting to Will, and said weakly, "Welcome back..."
"...I'm back."
Will's nose tingled, and he couldn't help looking away.
"Piplup..."
"Hm?"
"I regret it."
"What?"
"I shouldn't have gotten married."
Tears flowed down Lorelei's wrinkled face.
"Did Wallace treat you badly?"
Will reached out and held Lorelei's hand.
"He was good. But that wasn't the life I wanted."
Lorelei shook her head gently.
Will fell silent.
"I wanted to travel with Piplup."
"I wanted to make Mom and Dad angry with Piplup."
"I wanted to go back to that arena with Piplup."
Lorelei murmured softly, her cloudy eyes staring at the white ceiling, seemingly lost in memories.
It turned out they had both become insects trapped in the amber of time.
Those mornings waking up early for training, the grass flattened by their own feet, the sunsets they watched together on the beach... they were all just yellowed slices of memory now.
"So old, and still a crybaby."
Will wiped the tears from Lorelei's face and grinned.
"Piplup."
"Hm?"
"I'm leaving soon."
"...Mm."
Will nodded gently.
He could feel it.
"Take me out to soak up the sun. My little granddaughter says I smell, and she doesn't like me hugging her."
Lorelei raised her hand weakly, grabbing onto Will.
In her heart, a feeling of inferiority arose.
This was something the old Will had never sensed from her.
Did the proud and confident Lorelei now feel inferior?
"You smell nice."
Will picked Lorelei up in his arms and walked outside.
"Really?"
"Do you think there's anyone in this world who knows your scent better than me?"
Will chuckled and shook his head.
He had been hugged by Lorelei for over twenty years.
How could he not know what Lorelei's embrace smelled like?
"Hehe..."
Lorelei chuckled softly, rubbing her head against Will's chest.
"Piplup~ You smell like the sun."
"Not seawater?"
"No."
Lorelei shook her head firmly.
"Really?"
Will gave her a skeptical look.
"Is there anyone in this world who knows Piplup's scent better than me?"
Lorelei smiled.
She had hugged Will for over twenty years.
How could she not know what her little penguin smelled like?
They went all the way to the beach.
Lorelei smelled the sea breeze, basked in the sun, and quietly fell asleep in Will's arms.
Will looked down at her.
Then turned to look at the Tree of Beginning crystal by the roadside.
Day after day passed.
Lorelei's breathing grew weaker.
These days.
Lorelei stayed with Will constantly.
She didn't tell Will about her life in Hoenn anymore.
She just repeated the stories of their past adventures together, over and over again.
Lorelei would always say...
If she could do it all again, what she would do differently.
Mostly choices different from her youth.
Every time, Will couldn't help but shake his head.
Even if she could do it all again...
Lorelei at that age would still make the choices fitting for that age.
He knew her too well.
At the same time...
Will learned about their past companions from Lorelei.
Lapras had her own pod and was now the matriarch of a Lapras group.
Cloyster stayed at Wallace's estate and had her own children.
Froslass returned to the Alabaster Icelands in Sinnoh and became a legend of a snowy mountain.
Everyone had a new life.
Now...
Beside Lorelei, only Will remained.
Half a month later.
On a sunny afternoon.
"Piplup..."
Lorelei reached out and tugged Will's tail by the bed.
"What now?"
Will put on a helpless expression.
"I haven't seen you cry in a long time. Cry for me."
"Idiot, I'm the God of the Ocean. How can I cry just like that?"
"Tch. When you were little, you cried to Mom and Carmela every day."
Lorelei pouted, dissatisfied.
She slowly turned her head to look at the sun outside the window and took a deep breath.
"Piplup..."
"Hm?"
"I'm hungry. Go buy me something to eat."
"Mm."
Will stood up quietly, not asking what she wanted to eat.
He turned and walked toward the door.
"Piplup... remember to come home before dinner..."
Lorelei watched Will's back, pressing her lips together.
"...I know."
"Have a safe trip..."
Her voice was full of reluctance and longing.
"I'm off."
Will walked out of the house slowly.
Outside the door.
He looked at the sky and whispered softly:
"Please, Cresselia."
"Mm."
An ethereal voice echoed in his ears, heard but unseen.
"Will, are you crying?"
"No."
Inside the house.
Lorelei struggled to sit up.
She leaned against the window, watching the big penguin walk away step by step, and reached out her hand, grasping at empty air.
Tears burst from her eyes.
She lay back down weakly, hugging a Piplup plushie tightly.
This plushie...
Had been with her for over seventy years.
Until the day she married and left Four Island, it had always been by her side.
She didn't tell Will.
She had been back on Four Island for several months.
Living alone in the house was exhausting; everything was difficult.
She often felt she couldn't hold on any longer.
But...
'I want to see Piplup one more time.'
This obsession supported her until now.
She didn't want to share a single word with him about how painful the fifty-plus years without him were.
She only wanted to tell him...
How happy and joyful she was to have him by her side for this final stretch of time.
"If only we could do it all again..."
Lorelei murmured softly.
And closed her eyes completely.
Suddenly.
A noisy and familiar voice came to her ears.
"Piplup, Piplup," chattering non-stop.
Lorelei suddenly felt very angry. She sat up abruptly and opened her eyes again.
But the scene before her made her dizzy.
The room was still the room.
But...
There were far fewer dolls in the room.
Most importantly.
The Piplup plushie she had been hugging tightly was gone!
Lorelei panicked, jumped out of bed, and searched the entire room, but couldn't find it.
The noise from the back hill continued.
Lorelei got angrier the more she thought about it.
She went to the bathroom, grabbed a mop, and rushed out of the house.
She didn't even notice...
That she had suddenly become very short.
Not even half the height of the mop.
Blinded by anger, Lorelei rushed all the way to the cemetery on the back hill.
And then.
She saw a super cute little penguin in front of her grandmother's tombstone.
The silly little penguin was stealing Grandma's offerings!
Lorelei froze on the spot.
Her cloudy eyes seemed to be purified in an instant, becoming crystal clear.
She looked around blankly.
Looked at the surroundings, then at the mop in her hand.
Lorelei pursed her lips, then charged forward with the mop, shouting with a smile:
"How dare you! You hungry little thing, take this!"
"Piplup!"
Outside the dream.
Under the warm sunlight, a smile appeared on Lorelei's face.
A beautiful Dive Ball swayed in the breeze by the window.
Her story with Piplup...
Started again in the dream.
In front of a certain tombstone on the back hill.
Will stood quietly.
"I kept my promise. Thank you for letting me meet their family."
He protected Lorelei's family until the very end.
The promise he made to the tombstone back then, a man's promise, was fulfilled resoundingly.
Will.
In this life, had no family left at all.
Ten years later.
Will waited for Giratina's revenge on Dialga.
Seizing the moment the Renegade Pokémon showed its head...
Will broke into the Distortion World alone.
Another ten years passed.
Will fought endless battles with Giratina while searching for Meowscarada's traces.
Finally.
He had to face reality.
The Real World, the Spirit World, the Distortion World... Meowscarada was nowhere to be found.
Then only one possibility remained.
Meowscarada had fallen into another parallel world due to an accident.
This left Will feeling lost.
He didn't know how to travel to other parallel worlds or universes.
That was something even the Space-Time gods couldn't do.
Other worlds...
Had their own Space-Time gods.
The Arceus avatar guarding other worlds wouldn't allow Palkia and Dialga from this world to run over there.
That would definitely violate the "Rules."
Besides.
Getting the mutually antagonistic Space-Time gods to cooperate was almost impossible in itself.
Just finding them was hard enough for Will.
Let alone uniting their power to try and break the shackles of the world to open a path to a parallel world.
In the end.
Will could only pin his hopes on his cheat.
Hoping it could take him to other parallel space-times.
And in this world...
There was nothing left for Will to cling to, no one left to cherish.
He couldn't even find a meaning to keep living.
The only reason supporting him to go on was to find Meowscarada.
Even if she was dead in the end.
Will had to find out what happened during this time.
So.
This time.
He closed his eyes himself.
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