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"Did Little Lugia just move?!"
"No, she seems to be sleeping soundly, doesn't she?"
"I think I saw her eyelid twitch too."
"Pika Pika~"
As the group exchanged words, Little Lugia's eyes trembled slightly again. This time, all three clearly saw it.
"She really seems to be waking up. Ash, is your treatment effective that quickly? She hasn't even been asleep for thirty minutes in total," Brock said, looking surprised.
"I just helped remove the power of death from Little Lugia's body. As for injuries, Little Lugia had none. How quickly she wakes up depends on when her spirit recovers. But this recovery speed is indeed very fast, as expected of a Legendary Pokémon," even Ash himself exclaimed about Little Lugia's recovery speed.
Little Lugia's recovery was somewhat related to him, but not significantly. After all, Little Lugia didn't actually have any physical injuries. The reason she was in so much pain before was entirely due to the torment of the Dark-type power within her, and the conflict between her Psychic and Dark types.
After completely absorbing the Dark-type, Lugia's body not only fully recovered but also leveled up. This was because the quality of the Dark-type power within Little Lugia was far superior to her own power.
It could basically be confirmed that this power belonged to Yveltal, and specifically, the Yveltal with a divine position.
Aside from her power, it's hard to imagine what other power could allow a first-tier Legendary Pokémon like Lugia to improve so much in one go, and even max out her ability values.
However, physical improvement is one thing; Little Lugia's primary injury was spiritual. How quickly she recovers still depends on Little Lugia herself.
Yet now, after only a short while, Little Lugia has already woken up. This recovery ability... truly worthy of a Legendary Pokémon!
Under everyone's gaze, Little Lugia opened her eyes, revealing scarlet pupils.
Originally, Lugia's eyes had black pupils and white sclera, no different from normal human eyes. But now, with her changed type, Lugia's sclera had turned scarlet, which, combined with her black exterior, looked somewhat eerie even though she appeared young.
She was somewhat cute when her eyes were closed, but once she opened them, her entire demeanor changed.
However, the newly awakened Lugia, upon seeing the three people and one Pokémon in front of her, was so startled that she spread her wings and moved several meters backward, pressing herself against the house wall.
"Uh... Brock, you scared Little Lugia!"
"Don't be ridiculous, why couldn't it be you who scared Little Lugia?!" Brock wanted to roll his eyes at Ash, but his eyes couldn't perform that action.
But it didn't hinder Brock's strong disdain for Ash. Everyone was looking at Lugia together, so why was he the one who scared her?
"Alright, alright, stop arguing. Hello, Little Lugia, nice to meet you. We mean no harm," Misty said, helplessly stopping their quarrel, then extended her fair hands in a gesture of surrender, indicating she had nothing in her hands and no ill intentions.
Facing Misty's goodwill, Little Lugia seemed to snap out of her newly awakened state. She rotated her eyes, observing everything around her little by little.
A very normal house, humans who didn't seem hostile, a very weak yellow rodent, and a Pokémon that looked similar to a cat.
Upon seeing Mewtwo, Little Lugia's body trembled involuntarily. Her intuition told her that this seemingly small, slender Pokémon was actually the most terrifying presence here.
However, the other party was not emitting hostility towards her.
Seeing this, Little Lugia's restless heart finally calmed down a little. The people present all seemed to be emitting friendly emotions towards her.
And the young man in the very center... "Wooo~" Did you save me?
Little Lugia called out softly. Only Ash could understand what Little Lugia said. He nodded and smiled, "Yes, I helped you, Little Lugia. From today on, you'll stay with me temporarily. After the competition ends, I'll send you home, okay?"
Little Lugia tilted her head, seemingly not understanding what Ash meant by 'competition,' but she did understand the words 'go home.'
Out of gratitude for Ash's rescue and the good feelings she sensed from him, Little Lugia hesitated for a moment, then nodded, indicating she would stay with Ash for now, mainly because she had nowhere else to go.
Moreover, the previous capture had cast a considerable shadow on her young mind. Now, even if she were to go alone, she wouldn't dare.
After agreeing to Ash's request, Little Lugia subconsciously glanced at her body, then her face showed a look of horror. She quickly found a mirror to look into, and within ten seconds, her dark little face was filled with a mournful expression.
"Wuu~ Wuwuwu!!!" What happened to my body Why did it become like this!
Looking at the mournful Little Lugia, Ash and the others exchanged glances, scratching their cheeks. Even without Ash translating, they knew what Little Lugia was saying.
She clearly couldn't accept the fact that she had turned completely black, but this was unavoidable. At that time, the Dark-type power had almost completely squeezed out the Psychic-type, and it fully permeated Little Lugia's body.
And the color of her feathers also turned completely black due to the Dark-type energy. From that moment on, unless Psychic-type power surpassing the Dark-type power within her was infused into her body, she would not be able to revert to her original type and skin color.
Mewtwo could actually try, but with Little Lugia's body, it would be almost impossible to withstand two God Domain Level powers clashing inside her. Even if she did endure it, the cost would be immense.
The Legendary Pokémon Friend in the group actually mentioned this, which dispelled Ash's idea of restoring Little Lugia's body and type. It seemed the Legendary Pokémon Friend was quite experienced, and Ash didn't have time to ask if he had a similar experience.
In short, it was basically impossible for Little Lugia to return to her original appearance.
You say to change her back after Little Lugia becomes stronger? Don't be silly. The power Little Lugia gained now is Dark-type power. When Little Lugia becomes stronger, her Dark-type will also become stronger, and as time goes on, the Dark-type power will completely transform into Little Lugia's own power and type.
So, if one wanted to change Little Lugia's type and body color later... perhaps Arceus could make it a slight possibility.
Finally, with Ash's explanation, Little Lugia reluctantly and sadly accepted this fact. It seemed she would have to return to her Clan with this appearance. She didn't know if her parents would accept this... But for Little Lugia, it wasn't all bad news; her strength had soared!
Under normal circumstances, she would have needed at least several years of growth to reach this level of power. Although Legendary Pokémon have powerful starting levels and are virtually invincible among their peers at each stage, their growth rate is also very slow.
Without external interference, it would take at least decades, or even hundreds of years, for a Legendary Pokémon to grow!
This growth refers to natural growth, with little to no training. If they trained themselves, they might be able to speed it up, but it would still take over ten years to reach Champion-level.
This is also why some Legendary Pokémon choose to ally with Trainers. In a Trainer's hands, they can improve many times faster than they would in the wild!
The prerequisite is to find a reliable and powerful Trainer... Little Lugia's progress, for her who had never encountered a Trainer, was already as fast as it could possibly be, essentially saving her several years. This was perhaps Little Lugia's only comfort.
After Lugia finally accepted the change in her body color, Ash then explained the specifics of Poké Balls, Trainers, and other aspects. Lugia's ability to comprehend was also very strong; she quickly absorbed and understood everything Ash said.
Then, she very obediently entered the Poké Ball. In her exclusive Poké Ball, the Steel Master had also incorporated a design that allowed the Pokémon inside to fully see the outside world.
Ordinary Poké Balls can also achieve this, but only if the Pokémon is powerful enough to ignore the Poké Ball's rules. The spatial rules of ordinary Poké Balls are the weakest, so even Gym Leader Level Pokémon can see the outside world from inside a Poké Ball.
As for higher levels, their strength needs to continuously rise to Elite or even Champion-level to achieve it.
Little Lugia's custom Poké Ball allowed her to observe the outside world anytime, anywhere, regardless of her strength.
For Little Lugia, even entering a Poké Ball wouldn't impose too many limitations.
However, Ash had some trouble. If Little Lugia was included, he now had eight Pokémon... If he sent one of them back, what would he do for the six-on-six battles later? He couldn't force a five-on-six, could he?
As for sending Little Lugia out to battle, such an action would be somewhat showy. Although Ash really wanted to do something like that... wouldn't that directly tell Team Galactic, and even other villainous organizations around the world, that Little Lugia was with him and to come and snatch her?
Therefore, the Pokémon slots needed careful consideration. Five-on-six... it wasn't entirely impossible. If he really felt it wasn't stable enough, then he could count Mewtwo as the sixth Pokémon.
Thinking of this, Ash no longer bothered. If someone in the competition was truly so strong as to defeat all five of his Pokémon, then that opponent would face the ultimate challenge—Mewtwo!
These are all trials, young man~
...Soon, two more days passed. This was the eighth day after the preliminaries, and the official Indigo Plateau Conference was about to begin!
The battles for the Top 32 would take two days to complete, as the official competition was unlike the preliminaries; there weren't four battlefields.
There was only one battlefield, the Indigo Stadium. All sixteen matches had to take place there, so one day wouldn't be enough.
Battles, entrance, halftime breaks, plus a lunch break... All in all, starting battles at nine in the morning, one match per hour would be good. An hour's lunch break, then until six in the evening, adding up to about eight hours.
Just enough time to complete half of the matches.
During these two days, Ash also got well acquainted with Little Lugia. He took Little Lugia to various amusement venues near the Indigo Plateau Conference. As for their appearances, Ash asked Mewtwo to distort them with Psychic power.
Under the influence of Psychic power, Ash's appearance was as ordinary as any passerby, and Little Lugia's appearance looked like a Murkrow to outsiders.
Who would have thought that the Murkrow and the ordinary young man playing around in the amusement park were actually Ash and the legendary Pokémon Lugia?
The amusement park at the Indigo Plateau Conference also had facilities specifically for Pokémon to play. The main theme of this world was Pokémon, and for businesses, doing business with Pokémon was far more profitable than with humans!
Things like haunted houses, forest explorations, berry picking, and so on... these facilities that allowed playing with Pokémon were quite expensive, but for Ash, anything that could be solved with money was not a problem.
He didn't even know how much money he had in his card now.
And Little Lugia's feelings for Ash also rapidly warmed up during these two days. She already had a good impression of Ash, after all, Ash had saved her life. Spending these few days with Ash, she grew even fonder of him.
Whether it was the play experience, the daily care for her emotions, or even the food, it was all unprecedentedly good. When had she ever eaten such delicious food in her Clan?
The dishes prepared by Ash and Brock, in terms of nutrition and taste, were among the world's top level. Especially Ash, who still had room for improvement; his Breeder level was currently stuck at intermediate.
In short... for Little Lugia, being with Ash was simply much, much better than going back home!
This made her so happy that she almost forgot to return home. Even after just two days, if the way home was right in front of her, she might not even take it. Isn't the human world wonderful?!
These past few days, Ash had uncharacteristically not engaged in Pokémon training. For him, soothing Lugia's unease was the most important thing. As a result, his actions of accompanying Lugia these past few days were a great success!
At least now, Little Lugia had completely lost her initial stiffness and slight fear. All she had was a longing for the food, drink, and entertainment of the human world.