Bai Chen looked up at the sky.
The sky above the base was already covered by thick, heavy clouds.
Lightning flickered within those dark clouds.
Judging by the situation, a thunderstorm would probably descend before long.
He then looked toward the corner of the arena where Kirin and Zinogre were resting.
The two were gathered together, and high-voltage currents formed a layer of lightning shroud around their bodies, giving off an extremely dangerous aura.
│ "I believe in your ability to tame Elder Dragons," the Commander reminded Bai Chen, "but they are still natural disasters; even unconscious actions can have a massive impact on the base."
Bai Chen fell silent for a moment.
The reason Elder Dragons were feared was precisely because of their power to alter nature itself.
│ "If that kind of power can't be controlled, it really will become a headache for me as well."
After all, Bai Chen did not want disasters following him wherever he went, nor did he want these creatures causing trouble for the world in the future.
│ "I understand," Bai Chen replied, "I'll think of a solution."
After seeing the Commander off, Bai Chen poured another bottle of potion down his throat to recover from his injuries.
Nergigante emerged from her monster ball, and her condition was not very good either, with more than half her spikes broken and several rare bone-deep wounds on her body.
Bai Chen took out another fresh potion and shared it with Nergigante.
When they had encountered Valstrax earlier, Nergigante had joined the fight as well, but even the two of them together had been unable to change the outcome of defeat.
Still, things were not entirely hopeless, since Nergigante could at least clash head-on with that Elder Dragon for a while.
│ "Once we've recovered, we'll go explore again."
│ "Roar."
Nergigante responded.
Cosmog floated over as well.
│ "Mogu!"
Bai Chen smiled.
│ "Of course, we'll be relying on your teleportation too."
Bai Chen walked over with Nergigante and Cosmog to where Zinogre was resting.
As he drank another potion, he pondered.
│ "What should we do about this voltage and these thunderclouds? Should Cosmogteleport them away?"
At present, that seemed like the most effective way to save the entire base.
│ "Teleporting them away isn't difficult, but that only treats the symptoms, not the root problem. If they can't control their disaster-creating abilities, trouble will still come sooner or later."
Bai Chen marked out an area, preparing to have Little Nebula teleport the land itself away.
Just as he finished marking it, Bai Chen suddenly froze in place.
He turned to look at Nergigante on his shoulder, who was gulping down potion after potion.
Noticing Bai Chen's gaze, Nergigante tilted her head in confusion.
│ "Roar?"
She looked at the potion in her hand and handed the remaining third to Bai Chen.
│ "I don't need it, you drink it," Bai Chen shook his head.
Nergigante let out a short roar, drank the remaining potion, then jumped off Bai Chen's shoulder and crawled straight into the backpack, pulling out a brand-new potion.
She skillfully popped the cork and gulped the entire bottle down in one go.
Bai Chen stared at Nergigante, deep in thought.
│ "What is the essence of weather-changing power? At its core, it's an extremely advanced application of natural energy, and the fact that all natural energy turned Electric-type during the fight with Kirin proves that."
│ "Nergigante's gear shift works by absorbing natural energy to temporarily lift restrictions, so if she uses gear shift here, could she eliminate the thunderclouds in the sky?"
Looking at the ever-thickening storm clouds, Bai Chen thought to himself.
│ "This is absolutely worth trying."
│ "Nergigante," Bai Chen called out to her.
Nergigante looked over in confusion.
│ "Cancel the reduced form and activate First Gear."
│ "Roar!"
Nergigante's body rapidly expanded, reaching her peak size in an instant.
Golden light rose from her body, and an exquisite gear-like phantom formed around her.
Click—
The gears turned, and natural energy surged into Nergigante's body at an astonishing speed.
A faint energy vortex appeared in the sky.
At the same time, crimson light flared from Nergigante, and the surrounding air began to distort under the energy's influence.
│ "It's been nearly half a month since she mastered First Gear; she's been training nonstop, and can now maintain her sanity for ten minutes. With more practice, her restriction should be completely removed in the near future."
Bai Chen looked up at the sky above the base, and while the thunderclouds had indeed thinned, they were far from gone.
│ "Looks like First Gear isn't enough to change the weather. Should we try Second Gear?"
Bai Chen looked at Nergigante, who was still rational.
│ "She can hold her mind for ten minutes in First Gear, so activating Second Gear now should be fine."
After a moment's thought, Bai Chen made his decision and prepared to use the Bond Stone.
│ "Activate Second Gear."
│ "Roar."
The gears turned once more.
Suddenly, Bai Chen felt the world go quiet.
All sounds vanished, and even the energy in the air froze in place.
It felt as though time itself had slowed by half a beat.
Click—!
The sound of the gears shattered the silence.
At that instant, all natural energy surged violently into Nergigante's body.
The thunderclouds in the sky gradually dissipated into nothingness.
The moon emerged from behind the clouds, glowing with an eerie blood-red hue.
Bai Chen looked at Nergigante, cold sweat seeping down his back as he felt an overwhelming sense of chaos.
│ "First Gear massively boosts all stats, so Second Gear definitely isn't limited to that alone," Bai Chen looked back at the sky, "and she actually absorbed the entire disaster; she may be even more suited to hunting Elder Dragons than normal Nergigante."
The moment Nergigante entered Second Gear, dense killing intent began eroding her sanity.
Countless spikes erupted from the ground around her.
In the blink of an eye, half the arena was covered in sharp spikes.
Bai Chen hurriedly dodged aside.
│ "This is…?"
Looking at the arena now filled with spikes, Bai Chen recalled the dream he once saw when Nergigante lost control.
Around the crimson sphere that sealed her, the ground had also been covered in these spikes.
│ "So Second Gear allows her to generate these spikes out of nothing. I wonder just how far she can take this."
Bai Chen wanted her to test it, but unfortunately, Nergigante had already lost control.
Before things escalated further, Bai Chen quickly used the Bond Stone to restore her sanity.
│ "Roar?"
Nergigante looked at the meter-high spikes around her in confusion.
Clearly, she had once again lost all memory of her rampage.
She shrank back down and flew onto Bai Chen's shoulder.
Bai Chen crouched down and carefully examined the newly formed spikes.
│ "Hardness…"
He grabbed one and snapped it with force.
│ "Roughly equivalent to ordinary stone, but with thousands of them, that's already terrifying."
│ "Energy…"
Bai Chen activated Super Perception and Natural Vision.
The surrounding natural energy had been completely stripped away, and the spikes themselves radiated crimson power.
This energy did not belong to any known type discovered in the world, resembling pure chaos instead.
Upon closer inspection, Bai Chen was shocked to find the spikes were still eroding the land, slowly but steadily.
│ "This is like a disaster created by Nergigante herself."
│ "The system really gave me a Forbidden existence," Bai Chen muttered, patting Nergigante's head. " Velkhana Dragon was also a system-granted egg. I wonder what kind of surprise it'll bring."
Standing up, Bai Chen looked at the now-clear sky, then at the spikes covering the ground.
│ "The thunderstorm is gone, so there's no need to move Zinogre for now, and these spikes can't be wasted. I'll have Tinkatuff harvest them and turn them into equipment."
That night, sensing a dangerous aura, the Commander came to the arena to investigate.
He stared at the spikes covering the ground for a long time without speaking.
In the end, Bai Chen explained it away as Nergigante's potential awakening, barely smoothing things over.
Since a short-term solution to natural disasters had been found, Zinogre and the others were no longer forced out of Astera during their evolution.
Days passed one by one.
Only eleven days remained until Bai Chen's return to the Pokémon world.
Having finally recovered from his injuries, Bai Chen prepared to head back to the Coral Highlands.
At that moment, a "volcano" erupted within Astera.
The long-slumbering Basarios finally awakened.
When Bai Chen rushed to the arena, Basarios was eating voraciously, and with his digestive ability of the Ultra Beast Guzzlord, he could devour anything.
He had already demolished half the arena, and only Bai Chen's timely arrival prevented him from eating the entire base.
Taking Basarios away, or rather, now Gravios, Bai Chen led him into the wild.
He consumed nearly a thousand tons of ore before his evolution's energy requirements were finally satisfied.
His appetite had now increased to over ten tons of ore per day just to grow properly.
Bai Chen calculated the expenses.
In the Monster Hunter world, he would need to complete at least one five-star quest per day to afford Agnaktor.
In the Pokémon world, it would cost him the equivalent of ten James' salaries per day.
Despite the cost, Bai Chen felt it was absolutely worth it.
After enhancement from Zorah Magdaros's skills, Gravios's body length had reached fifty meters.
Normally, even the largest Gravios only reached about thirty meters.
Bai Chen's Graviosr was nearly the size of two wild ones combined.
His appearance was also different from ordinary Gravios.
Normally, Basarios had thick stone armor, and upon evolving into Gravios, that stone disappeared, replaced by heavy plates.
But Bai Chen's Gravios still carried massive rock on his back, except now it formed a small volcano, obsidian-black like Zorah Magdaros.
Just like before, the volcano produced refined special ores, a trait beloved by Tinkatuff.
│ "With an appetite like that, you'd better work hard to earn your food."
With Zinogre and Kirin in hibernation, earning skill proficiency fell entirely on Agnaktor.
However, due to his low intelligence and Tinkatuff's busy schedule, Bai Chen had no choice but to ask Ira to accompany Gravios on quests.
Ira happily agreed.
Hunting alongside a monster was a brand-new experience for her.
She quickly witnessed Gravios's terrifying strength.
One blast of Super Thermal Beam pierced five-centimeter steel plates with ease.
That night, Ira was so excited she couldn't sleep, according to the other receptionists.
Meanwhile, Bai Chen began intensive exploration of Valstrax's nest.
Five days before his return, Zinogre and Kirin finally awakened.
They immediately consumed massive amounts of food, all prepared by Indeedee.
As expected, Zinogre evolved into Thunderlord Zinogre.
However, he too differed from ordinary Thunderlords.
Normally, one horn would grow thicker and remain permanently supercharged.
Bai Chen's Thunderlord had both horns thickened and could permanently maintain supercharge.
In battle, he could further release higher voltage and enter the True Supercharged State, a Rarity-8 enhancement.
His lightning had turned from pale white to golden, and his scales shifted from blue to emerald green.
As for Kirin, under Zinogre's influence, his Pale Horn had already regenerated halfway, and would likely be fully restored in ten days.
Their awakening was excellent news for Bai Chen.
With five days remaining, Indeedee temporarily ended her cooking studies and joined Zinogre in hunting again.
On the same day, the Great Ravine team decided to release Zorah Magdaros.
Their research was complete.
│ "Now let this giant return to nature and meet his destiny."
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