In fact, no one in the entire League knew just how strong Rope was.
Even Cynthia only had a vague idea.
Even Cynthia only had a vague idea of how strong Rope was, because it was impossible for anyone in the League to fight Rope. Rope has never shown his true strength in front of the public, and even before, when he subdued Eternatus, he only used part of his strength.
As for the year and Cynthia together side by side battle, that was several months ago, Rope's strength can be said to be improving day by day.
And what was even more painful for Rope was... he didn't know exactly how strong he was now.
"There's no control..."
Rope sat on the branch of a tree, looking at the large, still more or less organized and disciplined group of Pokémon in front of him, and sighed with lifeless eyes.
By all rights he should be taking Azure Flute and going to have a chat with the alpaca version of Arceus right now. Whether it was a subjugation or something else, it would eventually be able to get some strength enhancement, or perhaps information.
But because of what was going on here, Rope didn't go.
Rope had a feeling that if he didn't go this time, he wouldn't have much chance to go afterward. After Katsuhisa's defeat at her own hands. The person behind that wouldn't leave much time for himself.
"It looks like the showdown is just around the corner..."
Rope had a bit of a headache, after all, he still didn't know if his current self had the strength to carry the load.
But he thought that it shouldn't be a problem. since Year was able to save his own hand in front of Marianne, Year also reminded him when he was about to fail.
There is nothing wrong with the company using the secondary world as a place to select newborn geniuses. However, after confirming that this person has cultivation value, the company will also upgrade the level of help for this savior.
Not all saviors are geniuses, and if the ones who are not geniuses can't complete the task, then they can't complete it, and the company will just send regular employees to take over. Formal employees are often people who have already made a name for themselves in the void. Dealing with the extinction crisis of a sub-world was generally not a problem.
The world was just so cruel, and it was good to have a use for them. It wasn't really a bad thing for others to nurture you with good intentions or malice. After all, once a person didn't even have the value of being utilized by others, then that person was destined to live a life of futility.
Being inactive may not be a bad thing in peaceful years, but one can also realize that in certain eras, in certain phantom realms, such as the Void's environment where disputes are constant and all kinds of strengths are competing for survival space. Being inactive was the equivalent of throwing oneself into the garbage heap.
It was a good thing that Rope was clearly not part of the trash heap.
If it really was a puddle of useless muck's, Year and Al wouldn't have come together to give him a hand.
It was all to each his own though, I guess.
"Rope, it's time to come to Lumiose City. The place is mostly ready. Loto!"
Rotom's voice came over the headset. Rope, on the other hand, frowned, "Are you sure you don't need me to curate outside on the Lumiose City side? There are still quite a few powerful Pokémon out here."
There were always a few Elite Four or even Champion level Pokémon amongst the Pokémon tide, of course, the Gods were not amongst them, and Rope had already arranged for Mewtwo, Mew to go and calm the Gods down. Although the gods felt that humans and those ordinary Pokémon were basically ants, they didn't even need to think about it to know who these gods would help if there was really a large-scale conflict.
Don't think that just because some gods are close to humans that they'll throw everything they have at them; they're Pokémon gods first and foremost.
And for the gods to not come out and stand up for Pokémon Tide at this point in time would already be the greatest kindness to humans.
There were some things that always had to be resolved by humans themselves.
"Should..."
As a result, before Rotom could finish his words, a snatch came from his headphones.
"No need. We're good enough to handle it on our own."
Diantha's voice came over the headset, apparently snatching Rotom over to speak for herself.
Rope smiled and said, "Well, since you guys can handle it yourselves, I don't need to come over there."
"Huh? No, wasn't that the deal to come over?!"
Diantha's tone could easily hear surprise, as well as loss and frustration.
Rope didn't feel apologetic or anything at that moment. If he had really snubbed Diantha simply to keep his distance, then Rope probably would have actually felt some guilt.
But it was different now.
Rope craned his head to his right, where there was a valley, and on a day when the sky was clear and cloudless, Rope actually saw a patch of gathering dark clouds, which was just off the charts.
It was a clear message that something was wrong here, so come over and take a look!
How could Rope refuse such an invitation?
"There's something going on over here, I've been asked to go on a haunted house adventure."
Rope looked at the valley and smiled.
"Do you need us to go help? There should be two additional groups of troops available out there right now."
Diantha's residual strength immediately became serious after hearing Rope's words.
The so-called group army was an army where the entire legion had all cultivated Pokémon with the same attribute and no more than five varieties.
That in itself was an exaggerated thing. These armies, in turn, tend to develop their own Group Skills.
Don't think of humans as so incompetent! It wasn't only fighting alone that could show how powerful humans were.
These group armies were originally prepared in case certain gods suddenly went mad and then only. Only to find out later that the gods came and went like the wind, like flying nuclear bombs. If the group armies wanted to cause effective killings of the gods, they would have to assemble in time, only how could it be an easy thing to assemble such a large number of armies.
Everyone knew in their hearts that such a thing was basically impossible.
So the group army was in a very awkward position. It should have been their area of responsibility, but they couldn't be in charge of it, and those other places, they really didn't use them too much. Normally, there weren't that many violent attacks by wild and powerful Pokémon...
Even if there were, there weren't many, and the Elite Four Champions and Gym Leader were more than enough to handle them.
But now it did seem that the Group Army was quite effective in dealing with this whole Pokémon Tide thing.
It's just that it's hard to say how many other Group Armies will be able to maintain their establishment after this battle...
After all, it would be a shameless waste to have a large number of redundant personnel.
"By the way, let Whitley and Hoopa stay on your side first, they can also help out more or less, it's kind of like I'm troubling you to take care of the two of them for me."
With that said, Rope smiled and hung up.
Diantha released Rotom and took a deep breath.
Then to Whitley, Hoopa on the side, she said, "Rope has gone to deal with the man behind the curtain."
Whitley and Hoopa's faces changed in unison then looked at each other, Hoopa was immediately ready to open the door and go to Rope.
Diantha quickly stopped the two then said, "No, no, no, no, he said you two shouldn't go, just stay right here."
So Whitley and Hoopa looked at Rotom in unison.
Rotom in turn nodded directly at them, there was no need to mess around with that, Rope had indeed instructed that. And it really was Rope's style too. Not going to haphazardly involve other people in a battle they weren't supposed to be involved in in the first place.
Just like Rope's previous concern, he didn't even know what kind of strength he had, so how could he be sure that he would be able to protect the people around him in front of a great enemy?
Therefore, the best choice was instead to let Rope face these dangers by himself, and then entrust the people around him to those who could be trusted to help take care of them.
The key was for the place to be safe.
"Leaving you guys behind is probably just in case loto! After all Hoopa you're still great at evacuating people Lotor!"
Rotom chimed in.
Hoopa nodded as well, which was definitely part of Rope's idea. With Hoopa around, then the situation here wasn't as likely to get out of hand. Even if it got worse, it could still remain viable.
And then again, Hoopa, as a god, would still have some face by coming out as a peacemaker.
Hoopa glanced at Whitley and passed over a questioning look.
Whitley naturally read it and just shook his head, "There's no need to be like that, I'm not so fragile that I even have to avoid this kind of situation."
Said Whitley as he removed the elf ball from his waist.
"Come out!"
A Serperior with Red-colored flame patterns on its body appeared with a haughty look and powerful aura. Even in front of a Champion, she had no fear, and even had the feeling of leaping into action.
Diantha looked at the Serperior in front of her with some amazement, which was about a third longer than a normal Serperior, and was a bit emotional for a moment.
"Worthy of being Rope's disciple, is it also so talented in the aspect of Pokémon training?"
As soon as these words came out of her mouth, Whitley blushed a bit in embarrassment.
Seriously, Whitley's talent was definitely there, if it was originally possible to become an Elite Four by virtue of himself, then now with Rope's help, Whitley shouldn't have much of a problem becoming a champion as long as he put his heart into it. After all, the Unova region...really speaking, the stronger ones are Alder and Caitlin.
The more talented Iris naturally hasn't grown up yet. And even if she had grown up, Whitley was definitely stronger than her.
After all, Whitley was surrounded by the strongest hangers-on in this world.
"Champion Diantha, I wish to help out on the front lines."
Whitley had a serious face.
Diantha didn't object, after all, the so-called frontline wasn't in any danger at the moment, and with Whitley's current strength, it was enough to deal with most of the dangers.
It could be said that many of the people at the frontline right now were actually not necessarily much stronger than Whitley. There were even some that were quite a bit weaker.
But they were also on the frontline, and they were even the ones who had blocked the one, two, three waves of the Pokémon Tide's attack, before entering the present stalemate.
Whitley was Rope's disciple, but she wasn't some golden girl who couldn't suffer. Going to war was just that, every moment one lived was a war against the world.
"Then go. Go to Meyer, he'll arrange these things."
Diantha agreed straight away.
As for danger...don't kid yourself. hoopa was still following her around, what danger?
Diantha had seen Hoopa on fire back in the day...
"Alright everyone, break is over, get back to your stations, let's proceed as planned!"
Diantha picked up a walkie-talkie and spoke seriously.
"Yes! Champion Diantha!"
And while this side was starting to get into the swing of things, over there from Rope had also arrived before the valley.
Gusts of gloomy wind seemed to be mixed with cries coming out from the valley.
"Tch, what a netherworld...it doesn't even look like the same picture as this world."
Rope couldn't help but spit it out as well.
After all, although this world also had ghost-based Pokémon, it still looked less spicy in the end. If we were to talk about scary stories, it would probably be the legends of burying people alive back in the day, pale ghostly hands, and the like.
It's also true that it doesn't quite fit in with the basic style of the whole world.
A reddish-golden flame emerged from Rope's hand, eventually evolving into a small sun-like ball of fire.
Rope made a shooting maneuver, leaned back, and threw the fireball.
The fireball didn't draw any graceful parabola, but rather, it directly and simply rushed towards the direction of the dark clouds in a straight line.
And in the process of flying towards the dark clouds, the fireball kept expanding, expanding.
In the middle of the valley, Katsuhisa, who was originally calm, looked at the expanding light, and in her eyes, in addition to surprise, there was also a hidden fear that surfaced.
So many years had passed, but when he saw this man's flame again, his fear of fire seemed to have returned.
On the other hand, the black-skirted woman who was watching this scene from across the crystal ball had a shocked look on her face...
"Golden flames... this..."
The fireball was still swelling and swelling, and eventually, it reached its peak when it was close to the dark clouds.
The dark clouds were broken through by the golden fire, and they all dissipated almost instantly. It was like a dusty black snow on the side of the road, being irradiated by the scorching sunlight, melting away in shame.
At this moment in Lumiose City, both humans and Pokémon were all looking over. If they hadn't noticed the original dark cloud image for some reason...
Then the current vision couldn't have been more conspicuous.
"The sky... why is there..." said Diantha, a little lost in thought.
"Shaa! (Two suns!)" Scizor's face is shocked.
And in front of the valley, Rope's face wore a happy and bright smile, like a small child who saw fireworks.
"Katsuhisa, I'm coming to play with you."
And with that smile, he walked into the valley.