"The effect is this strong?"
Even Axel hadn't expected Necrozma's craving for light to reach this level.
Those red lights were clearly mixed with chaotic spacetime power, yet Necrozma still devoured them as if it were starving.
And those lights even seemed to have some effect, giving Necrozma a faint tendency to shift toward its "Radiant Deity" form.
Under its efforts, the blood-red sky kept fading, and the suffocating pressure gradually weakened.
The originally twisted and torn spatial distortions seemed to be smoothed out by an invisible hand. Although it hadn't fully returned to normal, the worsening trend had been completely halted.
It worked.
Necrozma was like a bottomless energy black hole, greedily swallowing the accumulated chaotic energy above Mt. Coronet.
This process lasted for several full minutes. Most of the blood-red color in the sky had already faded, revealing its original hue.
However, just as everyone thought success was within reach, Necrozma's absorption speed clearly slowed down.
The rotation of the prisms around its body was no longer as smooth, and the golden particles flowing inside grew dim and sparse, as if it had reached some kind of saturation threshold.
In the end, it stopped absorbing.
There was still a considerable amount of faint red light lingering in the sky, like a haze that refused to dissipate, but compared to before, it was a world of difference.
Spacetime no longer fluctuated violently, and the Mt. Coronet area that had been affected by the spreading distortion returned to calm, shifting back from its inverted state to its normal appearance.
Necrozma itself gradually took on a more draconic shape, with six wings radiating blazing light emerging from its back.
Only when the wings on its back, along with its entire body, fully radiated light would it truly return to its original state.
Clearly, this current form was not it.
It slowly lowered its head, and that glass-scraping voice once again sounded directly in Axel's mind.
But this time, the pain within it had lessened significantly, replaced by an unsatisfied craving and deep exhaustion.
["This energy… is very pure. It is… greatly beneficial to me,"] Its thoughts came in fragments, ["It has filled the… emptiness I have carried for so long, letting me recover a trace of… 'light.'"]
It slightly moved its now sharper and more solid limbs, as if savoring this long-lost sense of "fullness."
But soon, its thoughts turned heavy again.
["But… there are too many impurities…"]
["And they are impurities at a very high level of rules. In my current state, I cannot absorb much…"]
Necrozma raised its head, "looking" toward the remaining red light, and beyond it, toward the deeper spacetime structure that had not yet fully stabilized.
["Without absorbing that spacetime energy, relying on light alone can only repair a negligible part of me."]
["Like a cup of water on a burning cart… it cannot restore me to completeness, nor is it enough to support me in… completely stabilizing the root of this distortion."]
Its focus settled on Axel, conveying a clear message:
["I need more… pure light."]
["In my current state, I have only temporarily suppressed the spread of those rules and absorbed the most superficial overflow of energy."]
["The true root… still lies deeper."]
["If it is not eliminated, it will eventually accumulate again and erupt once more."]
Necrozma made it very clear.
It had brought hope, but also pointed out the difficulty.
This "solution" itself needed to grow stronger before it could completely resolve the problem.
Professor Rowan's eyes shone with extreme excitement as he muttered to himself, "Just as expected… just as expected! Absorption, conversion, evolution! This is a dynamic process."
"We need to find more and stronger energy sources for Necrozma!"
"Axel, how about letting Necrozma go to Sunyshore City? The light there is among the strongest in the entire League."
"No…", Axel shook his head, dismissing the idea.
"For Necrozma to recover is extremely difficult. The amount of light it needs far exceeds your imagination."
"Based on its behavior in Ultra Space, even if it absorbs the light of an entire region, that region would fall into months of complete stillness."
Hearing Axel's words, everyone fell silent.
Everyone present was well-educated. Months without light… that kind of thing was terrifying.
Pokémon powers often couldn't be explained by science. If it were something like polar day or polar night, it might be manageable, since life could still continue at night.
But Necrozma's absorption clearly wasn't like that.
Once absorbed by Necrozma, light would completely disappear, not merely be blocked.
An entire region would lose all forms of light, and many forms of life wouldn't be able to endure it.
"But I do have another idea," Seeing the low mood, Axel didn't drag it out and directly explained the situation about Volcanion.
"There's actually something like that?", Hearing about the mechanical kingdom where Magearna was, Professor Rowan's beard twitched uncontrollably.
"A massive energy kingdom, and that prince wants to use mechanical power to rule the world?"
"It's hard to imagine. In the Pokémon world, there are still people putting this much effort into developing technology, and pushing it to this extent…"
Cynthia had seen more of the world. After hearing that the prince of the mechanical kingdom wanted to coerce Magearna into helping him rule the world, her first reaction was very similar to Axel's.
"Doesn't that mean if we stop them, we can use that mechanical kingdom to generate light for Necrozma?"
"Not only would that kingdom lose its means to dominate the world, we could also solve our own problem!"
"That's right," Axel nodded lightly.
"Then when do we make our move?", After hearing about Magearna and Volcanion's situation, Cynthia's sense of justice was already overflowing.
And since resolving that kingdom might save the Pokémon world, she was even more eager.
"Hmm… I'll contact Volcanion and see if he knows the coordinates of that place."
"Come to think of it, after meeting him, I never actually asked how he came to this world."
["No need to look,"] Just as Axel was thinking about how to find Volcanion, a muffled voice suddenly rang out.
Along with the sizzling sound of steam burning, Volcanion's figure drew closer, his tone filled with excitement.
["Ever since we parted last time, I've been waiting for the day Necrozma reappears."]
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