"Dad, what was that Mantine that showed up? Why did you just let them go like that?"
The moment Derren stepped back onto the warship, David rushed over with questions already spilling out of him.
"Ow!"
Derren clicked his tongue and rapped his son lightly on the head, clearly annoyed.
"What are you thinking? Sure, I could have kept them here — but what about all of you? I can't fight someone like that and protect you and the rest of Belon City at the same time."
"Would you really want me to risk the lives of millions of people in this city, and yours as well, just for a chance to stop them?"
Derren looked at the confusion still written across David's face and sighed.
"That man is one of the top leaders of the Supreme Organization — the Ocean Throne, ranked second among the Four Thrones. His name is well known in this region."
"If it had come to a real battle, your old man wouldn't have backed down. But if he had truly wanted to, none of you would have made it out. At best, I could have gotten a handful of people away safely."
If Derren had only wanted to stop them from leaving, he likely could have. In terms of raw strength, he was likely above the man who had appeared. But the situation was more complicated than that.
The Ocean Throne was clearly part of the Family of the Sea — a trainer who had devoted everything to Water-type Pokémon. If a real fight had broken out near the ocean, with both sides sending out Pokémon that were close to Legendary in strength, the resulting clash would have been devastating. Half of Belon City could have been left in ruins. And that was before even considering what might happen to David and the others caught in the middle.
"Heh..."
David let out an awkward laugh and scratched the back of his head. These old-timers were something else. They always seemed to be hiding their true strength until it mattered. If his dad hadn't shown up when he did, things could have gone very badly.
"Alright, enough of that," Derren said, his tone shifting. "The Breath of the Sea God — it's with you, right?"
"Of course! And not just that." David swung his spatial bag forward with a grin. "Pretty much everything worth taking from the Sea God Temple ruins is in here."
It was the spatial bag he had grabbed from one of the Supreme Organization's operatives. The majority of the treasures plundered from the ruins during the chaos had ended up inside it.
Between the Breath of the Sea God itself and the three feathers from Legendary Bird Pokémon, the haul was remarkable. Aside from the enormous library of texts housed within the temple — whose value was harder to measure — over ninety percent of the most important items had found their way into David's possession.
It made David wonder, only half-joking, whether this was just how trainers made their money.
If the many trainers who lived carefully and saved every last bit of their earnings to support their Pokémon could have heard his thoughts, they probably would have been tempted to give him a good smack.
Derren took the spatial bag and pulled out the sealed container holding the Breath of the Sea God. He was genuinely curious about this artifact, one that had been passed down through Cloudspire's history for generations.
Inside the transparent, specially made container rested a deep blue crystal with a faint golden sheen, sitting quietly as though it were asleep.
"So this is the divine power crystal of the Sea God Lugia — the sacred treasure of the Family of the Sea passed down through the ages..."
Derren examined it carefully, then handed it back to his son.
"You really are a lucky one. This Breath of the Sea God holds a trace of Lugia's most fundamental power."
"Don't be fooled by the oceanic energy on the surface. That's just what's visible — the outer layer. What Lugia truly commands at its core is something else entirely."
Derren spoke seriously, choosing his words with care. This kind of information came from the Moore Family's private records — detailed notes on Legendary Pokémon, especially those considered first-tier. Such knowledge was closely guarded. Only old and well-established organizations had access to it. Most people would never come across it.
"Hold onto it and study it properly. Lugia's true nature is the wind — not the sea. The oceanic power is secondary. When your Shelgon evolves into Salamence someday, this treasure may do far more for it than you'd expect."
A curious look passed briefly over Derren's face. He already knew about the blessing David's Shelgon had received during the Dragon Festival — the details had not escaped him.
Now that he thought about it, it really was a strange coincidence. Wind and sky went hand in hand. It seemed like this boy had a certain kind of luck about him.
What Derren didn't realize, however, was that David's understanding of Legendary Pokémon far exceeded even the most knowledgeable researchers in the field. It wasn't knowledge he had pieced together from dusty records or difficult expeditions — it came from somewhere deeper, an instinct for connecting what little was known into a clear picture.
He already knew that Lugia's essence was that of the master of monsoons and ocean currents — the great wind that shaped the seas. He had even begun to think ahead, quietly working out how Salamence might one day learn to harness the power of those winds.
It was worth remembering something many people tended to overlook: Lugia is, at its core, a Flying-type Pokémon.
As for the rest of the items in the bag, Derren barely glanced at them. His interest only extended to artifacts connected to first-tier Legendary Pokémon. The three Legendary Bird feathers were rare and valuable, certainly, but they weren't something he hadn't seen before. The Moore Family's collection already held a few treasures of that level.
With everything settled, Derren introduced David to the senior officials of Belon City. He made a point of greeting Naomi personally — it turned out she had attended the same school as David's parents and had been a good junior of theirs. David hadn't known that until now.
After a brief exchange of pleasantries, Derren politely turned down the invitation to the celebration banquet. They rested for the night, and the following morning, he took David straight back to Imperial City.
There wasn't much of a choice. Whether David was lucky or simply disaster-prone was hard to say, but the results were starting to form a pattern. His gains each time were significant — but so was the trouble he stumbled into.
The last time, he had crossed paths with a growing cult with possible ties to the first-tier god Yveltal. This time, he had walked straight into the middle of an Supreme Organization operation, which had also drawn in the Family of the Sea and the first-tier god Lugia itself.
Perhaps that was simply the nature of it — fortune and danger always seemed to arrive together. The more perilous the situation, the greater the opportunity hidden within it. And the more valuable the opportunity, the more danger tended to follow.
With only two or three days left before the new school term began, Derren decided it was better not to tempt fate any further. He packed David up and headed straight for Imperial City before anything else could go wrong.
In the end, the whole incident wrapped up cleanly.
The senior officials of the Belon City Alliance were relieved. They had braced for serious consequences when things began to spiral, but there had been no significant casualties, and the crisis had passed. On top of that, the Sea God Temple ruins — having been released from the sealed space — had settled back into the seabed, giving Belon City a new and unique landmark to build around.
The resources that the Supreme Organization had sent as compensation for the disruption of the Sea God Festival were handed over to the city officials by Derren. The small losses from the interrupted event were more than covered.
The biggest winner by far was David. Whether it was the legendary resources he had obtained or the treasures the Supreme Organization had gathered from the ruins that had ultimately ended up in his hands, he had come out of the whole ordeal with an extraordinary amount.
The Belon City officials were sensible enough not to bring up those items. In fact, since David had been caught up in the sudden crisis as an uninvolved party, he was set to receive a fair amount of official compensation on top of everything else.
There were, however, a few members of the Family of the Sea still within Cloudspire's borders who took notice when word spread that the Breath of the Sea God was now in David's hands. For a moment, it seemed like they might try something.
Then they looked at Derren standing beside him. They measured the gap between their own strength and his. They said nothing and quietly stepped back.
David paid little attention to them. For an ordinary trainer, holding onto an artifact like the Breath of the Sea God while dealing with the Family of the Sea looking for reasons to reclaim it would have been exhausting. The pressure alone might have been unbearable.
But David was not an ordinary trainer. The advantages of his background made themselves clear in moments like this. Facing someone who had come from the Dragon-Riding Moore Family, even the Family of the Sea had no ground to stand on. They didn't dare utter a word.
Against someone else, they might have argued for some form of inheritance claim over the Breath of the Sea God. Against David, they had nothing to say and nowhere to push.
Even at the height of their power, the Family of the Sea would have struggled to go up against the Moore Family directly. With neither persuasion nor force as a viable option, they had no choice but to quietly withdraw.
The ones who truly suffered in the end were the people of the Supreme Organization. After everything they had put into this operation — the planning, the resources, the effort — they had come away with nothing. Worse than nothing: they now owed a sizable amount in compensation.
It had been a costly lesson.