Every single one of these Swoobat had a toxic needle driven cleanly through its forehead; they had been instantly executed by a single, lethal strike.
"It seems we have outside intruders," Vio said, pointing toward the wide-eyed, lifeless Swoobat.
"These Swoobat were specially bred. Standard Swoobat have white eyes, but the moment these specimens detect a stranger, their eyes turn blood-red. We need to be exceptionally careful; a third-party faction has successfully infiltrated Team Plasma's territory."
"Up ahead, we will enter the third threshold. The layout there is incredibly intricate, and the corridors change constantly. Everyone must follow my lead precisely," Vio warned, his face clouded with deep anxiety.
The exact moment Vio guided the vanguard to the entrance of the shifting corridors, Mewtwo's telepathic voice bridged into Feng Che's mind.
[Feng Che, I've detected something exceptionally fascinating. This entire corridor system is heavily saturated with an immense matrix of teleportation traps. The exact millisecond anyone steps into these nodes, the spatial arrays will forcefully displace them into various sectors heavily garrisoned by Team Plasma's elite forces.]
[Do you wish for me to intervene and recalibrate the parameters of these teleportation nodes?] Mewtwo inquired.
[Yes. Re-engineer the traps, but group our line precisely according to my directions: displace Vio and Feng Lu to the same destination, send Victor and Drayden to another, warp Jax and Iris together, and I shall operate independently,] Feng Che instructed.
He had distinctly sensed the specific genetic resonance of Unown within the deeper chambers, and he intended to investigate the phenomenon entirely on his own.
[Understood. I have successfully rewritten the spatial coordinates of the traps. The displacement will execute flawlessly according to your parameters,] Mewtwo confirmed.
Right at the entrance threshold of the shifting corridors, a masterfully camouflaged pinhole surveillance camera was silently recording. The feed meticulously transmitted Feng Che's every single movement straight to the central command center's main display.
N sat before the massive screen, calmly observing the real-time telemetry. He had long since mapped out his defensive layout, deploying the five remaining Sages to their respective sectors. The exact millisecond Feng Che's vanguard stepped into the corridor, the teleportation traps would violently fracture their line.
"N! This strike force represents the absolute pinnacle of the Dragon Clan's military assets. As long as we systematically crush them within these vaults, absolute victory belongs to Team Plasma!" Ghetsis bellowed from behind him.
"I just intercepted a high-level League log—Feng Che has been formally nominated by Supreme Leader Sky to stand as the Acting Champion of the Unova region. The exact second we terminate Feng Che in this sector, the Unova League will be left completely leaderless, and claiming absolute sovereignty over the region will be child's play!"
"I shall completely break Feng Che's line within these walls, Father," N responded softly, his eyes fixed on the screen as a definitive, hidden resolve steeled his gaze.
"Magnificent! N, you have finally grown into a true sovereign. Your father is profoundly gratified," Ghetsis laughed ecstatically, thoroughly delighted to see N's core ideology shift, no longer blocking his path to becoming the absolute master of Unova.
The moment N cleared the threshold of the monitoring bunker, Ghetsis wheeled his mechanical chair around, tracking a secure elevator down to Colress's central laboratory.
The cybernetic facility was colossally massive, its holding bays heavily stocked with rare, highly specialized specimen lines—with the single largest density belonging to Zeraora clones. At this exact millisecond, Colress was meticulously extracting a fresh blood sample from a severely emaciated Zeraora specimen.
"Colress, what is the exact status of our Mythical Pokémon replication trials? Can the sequencing data we purchased from Team Rocket be deployed effectively within our matrices?" Ghetsis demanded anxiously.
"Reporting to Leader Ghetsis, the Mythical cloning matrix has successfully achieved a ninety-five percent stabilization rate. I am a mere single micro-calibration away from full completion," Colress reported smoothly.
N had posed the exact same question to Colress mere hours ago, yet the chief scientist had delivered a completely contradictory data set to the young king.
"Superb! As long as we command an infinite garrison of these Mythical clones, I can leverage raw military parameters to conquer the entirety of Unova—no, the absolute entirety of the Pokémon world!" Ghetsis rumbled.
His ambitions had long since outgrown the sovereignty of Unova; he intended to stand as the absolute master of the global order.
Sweeping his gaze across the reinforced cultivation units, his eyes locked onto a dark entity suspended within a primary stasis pod—it was a Darkrai. Lining the containment walls behind it were several duplicate pods, each housing a Darkrai clone immersed in premium nutrient fluids.
"Is this the original Darkrai our strike teams harvested from the Sinnoh region? You have successfully stabilized its genetic clones?!" Ghetsis breathed in pure awe.
Darkrai stood as a pitch-black, shadow-wrought entity. A dense shroud of churning, white, fog-like plumage crested its head, obscuring the vast majority of its facial features to leave only a pair of brilliant, sharp blue eyes gleaming through the dark. A crimson, jagged, collar-like growth ringed its neck, while two long, tattered strips of black shadow draped elegantly from its shoulders like tattered fabric—a Pokémon whose sheer design radiated an absolute, peerless coolness.
"Phenomenal work, Colress! Maintain maximum operational focus!" Ghetsis praised loudly.
A brief flash of intense impatience bled into Colress's eyes, but Ghetsis, utterly consumed by his manic delusions of global conquest, failed to catch the scientist's irritation.
"Feng Che's strike force has successfully breached our outer perimeter. You must lock down this entire laboratory sector; do not permit a single individual to compromise or harvest your research data," Ghetsis commanded before steering his mechanical chair out of the laboratory facility.
The exact second the security doors sealed shut behind Ghetsis, a cold, mocking sneer warped Colress's lips. "A miserable creature of your caliber truly believes he possesses the capacity to stand as the sovereign of Unova? If it weren't for the fact that I require your unchecked funding to synthesize a perfect clone of the primordial dragon, do you truly believe I would willingly chain my intellect to this dump?"
He turned on his heel, walking briskly toward the absolute rear of the facility to access a heavily classified chamber. Inputting an alphanumeric encryption key into a hidden console, the wall slid open to reveal his private, self-funded sanctuary.
The hidden laboratory was colossally massive, crammed with an array of highly sophisticated quantum instrumentation arrays. Row after row of advanced stasis vats lined the sector, though the nutrient fluids feeding these pods were of a significantly superior tier compared to the outer facility. Floating within the luminous fluids were precious legacy fragments harvested from various Legendary deities—Ho-Oh's Rainbow Wing, Lugia's Silver Wing, the ancient scaling tissue of Groudon and Kyogre, and a viable blood vial extracted from Rayquaza.
At the absolute center of the grand matrix rested a gargantuan cultivation pod housing a physical construct that closely mirrored the anatomical layout of Kyurem. However, the clone's physical vessel remained partially underdeveloped, its wings yet to break through the embryonic tissue.
"Kyurem... my absolute, peerless masterpiece," Colress murmured softly, his eyes reflecting the soft glow of the stasis fluid. "I eagerly await the exact hour your eyes snap open to greet this world."
Meanwhile, the exact millisecond Vio and the strike force stepped into the corridors, the environment violently warped, the entire chamber spinning in a dizzying blur of spatial displacement.
When the spatial distortion finally cleared, Vio found himself standing within a massive, fortified vault, completely surrounded by a dense blockade of armed Team Plasma grunts. With a heavy thud, Feng Lu materialized right beside him, crashing hard onto his backside against the stone floor, his face contorting into a painful grimace as he clutched his tailbone.
"Ouch... Dad, what on earth is this place?" Feng Lu groaned, rubbing his bruised hip as he bared his teeth in pain.
"This sector shall serve as your absolute, permanent burial ground," a cold voice echoed from the shadows. Sage Giallo stepped out into the light, cutting Vio's reply short.
"It has been a long time, Vio. I personally hand-picked this specific coordinates to serve as the threshold for your demise. Tell me, are you satisfied with the scenery?" Giallo sneered sinisterly.
"Not particularly," Vio replied, shaking his head with a cool, unbothered composure. "The sector severely lacks a decent bottle of premium vodka and a fine cigar. Furthermore, I find the physical dimensions of this vault to be exceptionally cramped."
"And more importantly—it is quite amusing to watch an individual I have repeatedly thrashed in the past stand there and utter such theatrical garbage about executing me."
Vio's sharp, dangerous gaze locked squarely onto Giallo, his eyes slicing through the air like razor-sharp blades.