Pokémon Chronicles 零 (ZERO)

Episode 6: Clash on Fossil Hill

"To you who have met the qualifications to awaken this altar, I offer you my elemental trial. Should the trial be complete, you will be granted the anima for flames. The dragon of fire will awaken within you, a dragon that consumes all flames..."

"I'm not the only one hearing voices, am I?" I questioned, looking up and around at where the voice might have come from. We were still surrounded by the blue lights, but the particles were no longer relieving to us. It was as though I had been healed by some kind of magic, but that healing had no effect anymore.

"I do too... what's going on?" Shelly asked, sounding afraid. He was answered by a sudden shift from the statue on the edge of the cliff, which drew all our attentions. The statue of the frog pokemon was surrounded by the lights as well, and one of its arms had moved out of the position it was in when I first saw it.

"Don't tell me..." Megan said in warning. The statue's other arm moved, making us all shift into battle ready poses. Surely enough, the statue began to animate completely, gradually moving quicker and quicker. It was as if it was stretching to ready itself for battle, eventually moving at the speed of a normal pokemon.

"That statue is of a pokemon called Greninja... I only just realised how weird it is that it's here, of all places," Lucca stated, standing on his tail to draw his swords.

"So it's a ninja and a frog? How cool is that?" Megan squeaked, flaring up her back again.

"Do we have to beat it? This isn't what we came here for..." Shelly moaned, backing away from the whole thing. I glanced back at him briefly and then took his place, holding back an arrow.

"As long as this thing is a statue, it's okay to hurt it with no remorse, right?" I cried, not getting the chance to get an answer. The Greninja statue attacked with a hydro pump attack, surprising the lot of us into all getting hit at once by the speed and suddenness of it. I felt like I had been punched to the ground, shocked to have been hit with so much force that my back scraped a few metres across the floor. There was no way that wouldn't leave a mark.

My body normally inflated just before I used water moves like bubblebeam, as did many other water types when using their water attacks. The Greninja statue didn't move or charge at all, it just blasted us with forceful water in an instant – this wasn't going to be a normal opponent.

"Ugh that was fast... and for real? No care for the bestia at all?" Lucca growled, swiping his two swords aside. Mimia was the first to retaliate against the statue, galloping forward and jumping high up to try and smash it with his front paws. The Greninja statue darted to the left to avoid him completely; having to crouch and sprint back and forth to dodge Mimia's following attacks. Lucca soon joined in, having no luck with landing a hit either. All of their attempts to punch and slash their enemy ended with them hitting thin air.

"Watch out you two!" Megan warned, breathing in deeply. She exhaled a huge flamethrower without hesitation, managing to hit the Greninja from the back. Thanks to its focus on Lucca and Mimia, it failed to dodge her attack and got hit fully, being pushed forwards towards the edge of the cliff.

"You know, you've really got to stop carelessly using your moves like this..." I sighed.

"Why? I can use them without worrying about bestia, you know that," she bragged, putting her hands on her hips.

"Yeah but we don't know why or how. If it has any negative effect on you or something-"

"Megan, Crystal, eyes open!" Lucca shouted, bringing us back to the battle. Greninja had jumped high up and targeted us with a rain of blue shuriken, somehow remaining high in the air to continuously throw them. I growled and quickly thought of shooting them down with arrows, having a strange revelation as I did.