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Centuries of guardianship had finally pushed Tapu Koko to the brink.
Infected by the Nightmare Seed, its life force had long since burned down to embers. Its body grew weaker with every passing year.
Yet at the same time, those same centuries had forged their legacy into something terrifying.
Wave after wave of Ultra Beasts had been repelled by its thunder.
So many, in fact, that even within Ultra Space, the fear of Tapu Koko's lightning had spread far and wide.
For a very long time, Ultra Beasts deliberately avoided the Ultra Wormholes leading toward the City.
They knew.
On the other side of those wormholes waited an opponent whose strength bordered on the absurd.
Of course, no matter the world or dimension, there was always a certain type of creature.
The reckless kind.
The one that never listened.
The Guzzlord that now lurked within City was precisely that sort of anomaly.
When its kin had warned it away, it had ignored them completely, charging headfirst toward a wormhole others avoided like a death sentence.
In a cruel twist of fate, that recklessness saved it.
Because under the pressure of Tapu Koko's overwhelming deterrence, Ultra Beast incursions had become rare. By the time Guzzlord slipped through, Tapu Koko's internal energy was already nearing exhaustion.
For the first time in centuries, its vigilance slipped.
Guzzlord crossed over undetected, and Tapu Koko missed the brief window when the Ultra Beast was at its weakest.
By the time the guardian deity realized something was wrong, it was already too late.
Guzzlord devoured entire sections of the surrounding ruins. Steel, concrete, sand, debris, all vanished into its abyssal maw.
With its black hole-like digestive system, it rapidly replenished its strength and survived the vulnerable adaptation phase.
At that point, Tapu Koko's body had deteriorated too far.
Defeating it was no longer possible.
Killing it was out of the question.
All Tapu Koko could do was rely on the fear it had cultivated over centuries, combined with what little thunderous power it still possessed, to restrict Guzzlord's movements.
The Ultra Beast was effectively imprisoned within the ruins of City, unable to roam freely and consume the outside world.
And because Guzzlord had been infected by the Nightmare Seed the moment it entered the Pokémon world, its mind had steadily degraded.
Its thoughts grew dull. Its instincts blurred.
It never realized that the being suppressing it was nothing more than a bluff held together by reputation.
So it stayed.
Until now.
When Tapu Koko sacrificed itself to seal the Ultra Wormhole, the energy fluctuations it released were impossible to hide within a ruin that had been dead for centuries.
Guzzlord noticed immediately.
And then it realized something far more important.
That lightning aura it feared was gone.
Tapu Koko was… dead?
With its final restraint erased, the Nightmare Seed corrupted Guzzlord plunged into absolute madness.
Cold steel. Cracked concrete. Dry sand and broken stone.
Everything was devoured.
And then, carried on the air, came something else.
Fresh flesh.
A scent so intoxicating that foul saliva flooded its jaws.
Without thinking, Guzzlord followed the trail, swallowing everything in its path.
At the same time, Kael was still drowning in the grief of Tapu Koko's death, lost in thought as he planned his future path.
By the time he sensed that something was wrong, it was already too late.
"ROOOOAR!!"
The savage roar tore through the air, shockwaves rippling outward.
Walls that had withstood centuries of erosion began to tremble as though struck by an earthquake.
Dust and powdered concrete rained down, filling the air.
A single beam of blinding light cut through a crack in the wall.
Then another.
Then another.
BOOM!
The reinforced concrete wall collapsed entirely.
Before it could even hit the ground, an overwhelming suction force erupted from behind it, grinding the rubble into fine dust and dragging it straight into a massive mouth lined with black-and-yellow fangs.
A pitch-black, serpent-like tongue thrashed violently through the air.
Bright blue pupils locked onto Kael with unrestrained greed and brutality.
"…This is bad."
Panic surged through Kael's chest.
"Why is it already here?!"
He had been thinking about how to avoid Guzzlord and escape the ruins.
And now it stood right in front of him.
"What do I do?"
Their previous encounter had already proven one thing.
Right now, Kael stood no chance against Guzzlord.
Run?
Before he could even move, a massive column of black light slammed down around him.
Escape vanished instantly.
Within the darkness, hundreds of crimson eyes blinked open.
"Mean Look."
With Tapu Koko gone, Guzzlord had no intention of letting its prey escape.
The moment it spotted Kael, it used the move designed specifically to prevent retreat and force combat.
"Damn it!!"
Kael clenched his teeth, crimson pupils blazing as he stared down the rampaging colossus.
Fury burned in his eyes.
But inside, his mind was ice-cold.
He knew that losing his composure now meant only one outcome.
Death.
His thoughts raced.
Strategies surfaced and collapsed in rapid succession.
"No… that won't work either…"
Against such overwhelming power, even the most meticulous plans felt meaningless.
Whoosh!
Before Kael could settle on anything, Guzzlord's attack was already upon him.
The air detonated with a tortured scream.
A massive, spike-covered tongue lashed out at blinding speed.
Pure instinct took over.
Kael twisted and leapt sideways.
CRACK!
The concrete floor split apart, debris exploding outward as a crater formed.
Before Kael could even breathe, a second tongue snapped toward him.
Whoosh. Whoosh.
The twin tongues blurred through the air, raining down a relentless barrage.
Guzzlord's mind was consumed by hunger so intense that even the Nightmare Seed's influence was temporarily drowned out.
No games.
No torment.
No delay.
It wanted only one thing.
To swallow the fresh, living prey standing before it.
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~Support with 200 PowerStones = 1 Bonus Chapter
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