The story rewinds to 5:30 PM on the same day.
After finalizing the plan with Officer Jenny, Nova was making one last attempt to find a way out.
With less than five hours before things were set to begin, he had no interest in throwing himself into the middle of a battle between Team Origin and the Security Officers if he could help it.
Regular Pokemon battles were sporting events, governed by rules and a mutual understanding between Trainers. Battles that broke out in the wild between Trainers, driven by conflict and desperation, were something else entirely. There were no rules, no referees, and very little mercy.
What was about to happen in Lune Town would involve at least five hundred people on both sides. A fight at that scale was not a battle. It was a war.
No rules. No limits. No mercy. Each side had one goal: to completely destroy the other.
Nova had read enough books and seen enough stories to know how badly things could go for even a skilled individual caught in the middle of a war. In wuxia tales, even the greatest masters of powerful sects could be cut down if they wandered into the path of an organized army. Individual strength meant very little against numbers and coordination.
And in this world, wars were fought through Pokemon. Nova's own body was not built for that kind of punishment. A glancing hit from a stray move could put him down. A direct hit could kill him. Unless it was absolutely necessary, he had no intention of putting himself in a position where he might be taken out by some wide-reaching attack from an unknown direction.
The situation as it stood was straightforward enough. Team Origin would have the roads out of Lune Town covered. Anyone trying to leave and make their way back into territory controlled by the Norlandia Alliance would be walking into an ambush.
The east side of town was under the jurisdiction of Harmony City, and Team Origin would be watching that route closely. But what about the west?
To the west lay the Tamar Desert, vast and featureless, stretching thousands of kilometers without a single landmark worth noting. If someone walked northwest from Lune Town, the view would not change. Desert became wasteland, and wasteland became more desert.
Would anyone in their right mind try to escape that way?
And if no one was going west, would Team Origin bother guarding it?
These were only guesses, of course. Nova had no way of knowing the actual situation. If Team Origin had enough people and had covered the western perimeter as well, heading out that way would be just as dangerous.
Before meeting Jenny and agreeing to work together, Nova hadn't seriously considered the west as an option.
Team Origin's plan had too many unknowns. Who could say exactly when they were going to act? And Nova had not come prepared for a long stay. He had planned to collect his money and leave quickly, so he had barely any supplies on him. Even if the west truly had no guards, flying into the desert on Corviknight would only be useful for a day at most before they would have to turn back. If Team Origin hadn't made their move by then, nothing would have changed, and Corviknight's stamina would have been spent for nothing.
As for flying west and then looping all the way back around to reach the Norlandia Alliance from another direction, Nova had not even let himself consider it.
Putting aside the question of whether his supplies could last such a journey, the Tamar Desert was one of the most difficult environments to navigate. There were no landmarks on the ground. Magnetic field disturbances were not unheard of in places like this, and if they were unlucky enough to encounter a Nosepass, its magnetic field could throw off their sense of direction entirely. Getting lost out there would be a death sentence.
So at that point, Nova's only option had been to wait for Team Origin to make their move and find an opportunity to slip away in the confusion.
But meeting Jenny had changed everything.
Now he knew exactly when Team Origin planned to strike, and he knew what they were really after.
If the west was clear, all Nova needed to do was move three to five kilometers in that direction, find a dip in the sand or a dune to wait behind, and sit tight until Jenny and the Security Officers had finished the fight. After that, he could simply follow the same road back to Harmony City.
Nova was not a Security Officer. Having him on the front line would not make a meaningful difference either way. So why should he take that risk?
He had a Meowth, an Arcanine, a home, and Aresdra waiting for him. He also had a bag full of gifts that Taylor had, in his own extreme way, left behind. There was no good reason to risk his life. A Trainer who was dead could not earn a single Poke Dollar.
Following the sensible principle that a careful Trainer does not walk into unnecessary danger, Nova put his last hope for an easy way out onto Corviknight's broad steel wings, sending it ahead to scout the perimeter.
This also made one thing clear to Nova. His current team still had a gap that needed to be filled.
Corviknight could fly, which was useful. But it was large and slow, built more like a fortress than a scout. It was a dependable shield and a reliable mount, but stealth was not its strength. For the kind of wilderness travel Nova was getting used to, he needed a faster, lighter partner who could observe from a distance without being noticed.
Corviknight, for its part, seemed perfectly comfortable with its role.
"Just point me where you need me," it seemed to say with the easy confidence of a Pokemon that had never once doubted its own usefulness.
The reluctant scout launched itself into the air with a wobble and took off, carrying Nova's hopes with it.
Corviknight first flew toward the east. Within moments, several Flying-type Pokemon rose to intercept it. When they realized there was no Trainer on its back, they seemed to conclude it was simply a wild Pokemon that had drifted in from the desert. They did not attack directly, only pushing it away from the area.
Corviknight had not planned to force its way through anyway. It leaned into the act, playing the part of a wild Pokemon convincingly. After a brief and suitably dramatic clash with a Dustox that made the whole thing look believable, it let itself be driven off and turned toward the west.
Just as Nova had guessed, nothing moved to intercept it on the western side of Lune Town.
Even so, Corviknight did not cut corners. This was a matter of life and death, and it seemed to understand that. Setting aside its usual relaxed pace, it followed Nova's instructions carefully, scouting three kilometers out in three separate directions and circling the area for over ten minutes before reporting back. It did not Slack Off even once.
The southwest was clear. The west was clear.
But in the northwest, Corviknight spotted something that made it slow down and look more carefully.
A group of people was camped out there, dressed and equipped like an expedition team heading into the desert.
Corviknight was sharp, and it knew what it was looking at. It had been playing the role of a wild Pokemon itself for the last little while. It recognized a performance when it saw one.
Those people on the ground were faking it, just like it was.
They were not an expedition team. They were watching the road.