Giratina governed the Reverse World and antimatter. It had no real connection to the Ghost World or the cycle of reincarnation, as far as Lucien understood. The rumors linking the two were speculation, nothing more. He set the concern aside.
The subject of the Life Solidification equipment ended there. Everyone was together, and Lucien wanted to make the most of it.
The Tree of Beginning was unusually lively that day. Calyrex was there, and Zacian and Zamazenta, and Calyrex's two horses Spectrier and Glastrier. Victini, Mew, Hoopa, Melmetal, Kyurem, Golett, Terapagos. Lucien went to the kitchen himself, with Hoopa and Victini helping, and made poffins and donuts for everyone. He brewed Calyrex a cup of black tea.
They gathered around a wooden table on the grass. Warm sunlight came through the canopy. The smell of fresh grass mixed with poffins and donuts and the clean scent of black tea, and the heaviness of the conversation they'd just had dissolved into it.
Spectrier and Glastrier stood nearby, heads down, grazing on the herbs that grew at the base of the World Tree, occasionally glancing over at the table.
Calyrex held his tea and watched the scene. The dignity he usually carried had softened, and a faint smile sat at the corner of his mouth. The warmth and noise of it was something the Crown Temple had never offered him.
Zamazenta, setting aside its usual bluntness, picked up a donut with surprising care and nibbled at it, sugar crumbs falling onto its fur. Zacian worked through a poffin, eyes moving around the table, occasionally nudging one of the smaller Pokémon.
Hoopa circled constantly, slipping donuts to Mew and poffins to Melmetal, its golden ring producing snacks from nowhere and distributing them to whoever looked like they needed something. Mew chased Hoopa through the air, playing. Victini flew beside Lucien and helped pass things around with great diligence.
Melmetal sat in the corner with a bottle of Pokéblocks, eating steadily. Kyurem had pulled back its cold aura and sat looking at the table with an expression that was, for Kyurem, something close to contentment. Terapagos sat on top of Lucien's head, gripping a Pokéblock in both small claws.
Lucien leaned back in his chair and watched all of it.
More than a thousand years of travel and battles and separations and new companions. Region after region, comrade after comrade. And now, for an afternoon, none of that mattered. They had set everything down and were simply sitting together in the sun.
This was the most precious thing he had.
The sun moved lower, stretching their shadows across the grass. The evening breeze moved through the World Tree and carried its particular scent. The sounds of the Pokémon around him, the faces he had known across centuries, the warmth of the light on all of them.
He could not think of anything better than this.
The next morning, Lucien returned to Lucien City.
He was standing outside the Pokémon Research Institute when his phone buzzed.
Colress: There's progress.
Lucien looked at the message. He had come specifically to check on Colress's work, and Colress had messaged him at the exact moment he arrived. He went inside.
The assistant met him at the entrance. "Mr. Lucien, you're here?"
"Where is Colress?"
"This way."
They walked through the facility. A biometric door opened, white and clean, the interior modern enough to feel like a different world from the street outside. Colress stood at the far end of the research room, adjusting a device that looked like a hibernation chamber, tall and precise in his white coat, blond hair pulled back. He heard them come in and turned.
"Lord Lucien, you arrived quickly."
"I was already planning to come," Lucien said.
Colress relaxed slightly.
He was fully aware of who Lucien was. The moment Lucien had first approached him with the Life Solidification project, Colress had done what intelligent people do: gathered the available information and reached the obvious conclusion. The person asking him to reverse death using technology that should not exist yet was the same person who had founded the Unova League two thousand years ago. The evidence was not subtle if you were paying attention.
Colress had kept it to himself. Until recently, that had been straightforward enough.
"There's something I need to tell you," Colress said. The assistant had left the room, and they were alone. "Your identity may have been discovered by the League. Alder, the current Champion, has been coming to the institute for several months asking about you. He seems to want to meet you in person."
Lucien's expression shifted slightly.
Colress added quickly: "I didn't say anything. The institute runs regular security checks on all research and staff, given what we're working on here. Alder is sharp, and he pieced it together on his own."
Lucien was quiet for a moment. Then: "I understand. Don't worry about it."
Colress's shoulders dropped. He had genuinely been concerned about that conversation.
He turned and gestured to the device behind him, moving on from the topic of Alder.
"The Life Solidification equipment is complete. Final adjustments and testing are done."
Lucien looked at it.
The device was teardrop-shaped, built around a transparent alloy core filled with intricate blue energy lines. A pale blue light floated at the base of the core, steady and quiet. Several pipes of varying sizes connected it to a rear server, the screen showing a dense display of life form data and energy parameters.
"All parameters are calibrated," Colress said. His voice carried the particular controlled excitement of someone who has finished something they consider the greatest work of their life. "The device can stably lock onto any life form, human or Pokémon. By infusing Life Energy into it, the body and consciousness can be reconstructed through reverse release."
Lucien stepped forward and looked it over carefully. "Well done."
Colress's expression shifted with visible satisfaction. Then something more serious crossed his face.
"There's one remaining issue. The device requires an enormous amount of energy to activate. Ordinary sources won't sustain it. I haven't found a suitable energy core yet."
"Don't worry about the energy," Lucien said. "I'll handle it."
He had the power of Legendary Pokémon, the fundamental energy of the Tree of Beginning, Calyrex's Power of Abundance, Kyurem's strength, and Terapagos's Tera energy, along with his own near-limitless life force. Powering the device was not a problem.
Colress accepted this without further questions. He had learned not to doubt Lucien's capacity for things that should have been impossible.
The laboratory door opened.
Steady footsteps crossed the room. Colress looked up, and his expression changed.
A middle-aged man walked in. Long red hair, a coat worn with the ease of someone who has never needed to impress anyone, a face marked by time and difficulty and still sharp underneath it all. His presence filled the room before he said anything. Even without releasing any Pokémon, the air around him carried the particular weight of the Unova League Champion.
Alder.
He walked past Colress without a glance. His eyes went to Lucien and stayed there. Complex emotions moved through them: inquiry, awe, and something deeper, the kind of reflection that comes from standing in front of something you have only ever known through history books.
"It really is you," Alder said. His voice was quiet and heavy. "Unova's first king."
Lucien turned and faced him. No surprise, no unease. The same composure he had carried for two thousand years, the authority of it unchanged regardless of who was in the room.
"Alder," he said simply.
Alder smiled. "I finally see you."
He had grown up on Unova soil, shaped by stories of the founding king that had been passed down through generations. The man who had built the Unova League from nothing, ended the region's conflicts, protected its people, and then quietly stepped away from all of it, leaving only his name behind in the historical record.
Alder had revered that figure since childhood, in the way that people revere something great they believe they will never encounter directly.
He took a breath, steadying himself. The sharp, pressing energy of a Champion dropped away from him entirely, replaced by something much simpler.
He bowed slowly, the full formal bow of Unova's deepest courtesy.
"I never imagined you were still here, still protecting this land. It is truly an honor."
Lucien looked at him for a moment, genuinely unsure how to respond to that.
Colress exhaled quietly from the corner of the room. The confrontation he had been dreading for months had not materialized.
Lucien turned back to the device, his expression becoming thoughtful.
The Life Solidification technology would eventually have to be revealed to the world. For Trainers and their Pokémon, it was an obvious good: no more permanent separation, no more irreversible loss in battle. But its existence broke a boundary that the world had been organized around since the beginning. Once available, it would not stay contained.
Wealthy individuals, powerful people, anyone with the resources and the desire to avoid death would pursue it. And a world in which death was no longer the end was a fundamentally different world, with consequences that could not be fully calculated in advance.
"What's troubling you?" Colress asked, reading Lucien's expression.
Lucien explained his concern. Colress went quiet and thoughtful.
Alder considered it less carefully. "If it would cause that kind of damage to the world, then destroy the machine once your work is done. Simplest solution."
Colress looked regretful.
Lucien sighed.
"That's probably the only way," he said.
He put the question aside. "Colress, prepare the equipment and set up here for now. I'll arrange everything else."
"Yes, sir," Colress said.