Chapter 367: 17-Year-Old Mammon Has a 16-Year-Old Daughter, Akari — Perfectly Reasonable
Papa?
Mammon was genuinely stunned. Sure, in certain... intimate moments, he'd had Lusamine and others call him "daddy" once or twice for a little extra flavor. But that had been PLAY, dammit!
For a girl he'd just met for the first time to genuinely call him "Papa"? This wasn't right, was it?
"Akari, this is Mr. Mammon. You must be mistaken?"
Volo's own brain froze for a moment too, and once he recovered, he stared at Akari, still refusing to let go of Mammon, with a genuinely bewildered expression.
Ever since seeing Mammon's phone, Volo had already guessed that this Mammon fellow was probably, like Akari, not from this era at all — someone who'd fallen through a rift in space-time from an entirely different one.
But did it really have to be THIS dramatic right off the bat? Papa?
"No, he really is my papa. He's the one who even gave me my name."
Akari replied with complete certainty. Ever since some shameless alpaca had dumped her into this Hisui era, she hadn't seen her parents in half a year now. She genuinely missed her papa and mama, along with her second and third mamas.
Volo: "..."
The look he gave Mammon now was genuinely bizarre. Purely going by appearance, Akari and Mammon looked, at most, one or two years apart in age. Had Mammon perhaps adopted Akari as a small child?
This...
Volo felt his head spinning slightly. He genuinely wanted to summon Giratina and ask it directly — were people from other timelines really this promiscuous? Honestly, he just didn't quite understand this whole business.
"Wait, Akari, let go for a second."
Mammon said, genuinely at a loss.
This "unofficial daughter" of his seemed to have genuinely, thoroughly decided he was hers — both arms still wrapped tight around his waist, refusing to budge.
"Ohh~" Akari was obedient enough, letting go of his waist, but immediately grabbing his hand instead.
"I think there might be some kind of misunderstanding between us, don't you?"
Mammon didn't try to stop her further, considering the question before asking her directly.
Honestly, he'd already worked out what was going on — but he wanted confirmation regardless.
"Misunderstanding?" Akari tilted her head adorably, her lovely amber eyes fixed on Mammon.
Then, after a brief moment, realization dawned on her face, and her expression brightened considerably.
Right, that's why Mammon looked a bit younger than usual — and here she'd thought he'd always been the one who spoiled her most.
"I get it now! Papa, you're from an earlier point in the timeline, aren't you? You and Mama haven't gotten together yet, have you?!"
Akari understood all at once.
"Your mother is... Dawn?"
"Mm-hm-hm! Yep!"
At Akari's confirmation, Mammon smacked his own forehead with an open palm.
Of course.
No wonder Dialga had said all that cryptic nonsense before, insisting he give the Adamant Orb to his future daughter.
Turns out his own daughter — of all people — was Akari, arguably the single most broken protagonist across the entire Pokémon multiverse's canon.
Who was Akari, exactly? The one and only human ever chosen and personally acknowledged by Arceus's true body — not a splinter, the genuine original — the protagonist directly gifted the Alpaca Splinter by the Great One itself.
From the moment she'd fallen into Hisui, Arceus had personally looked after her, even converting her own phone into an Arceus Phone to carry with her at all times, guiding her along.
You could honestly say Akari was the single true "chosen one" of the entire Pokémon universe. No exceptions.
Because Akari had been chosen by Arceus's true body — note, the true body, not a splinter. She was the one selected, cared for, and personally gifted by Arceus itself.
Across all nine generations of the Pokémon games, plus every remake, plus the anime and manga adaptations — tallying up every loosely-canonical protagonist, you'd probably get well over twenty of them.
And yet not a single one of them could hold a candle to Akari. Not even Mitsuki, whose own track record was already genuinely absurd.
Holy shit. Had he really gone and fathered a game-breaking, overpowered protagonist as his own future daughter?
Mammon's feelings were, understandably, more than a little complicated. Back when he'd been in Sinnoh, he'd actually made a point of keeping an eye out for an "Akari" specifically, since a girl this thoroughly favored by the Alpaca would obviously be worth recruiting early. But he'd never found any trace of her, and had eventually assumed this world simply didn't have an Akari at all.
Turns out she just hadn't been born yet.
"I think I understand now." Mammon let out a sigh.
Though honestly, the whole situation still felt genuinely surreal.
Mammon studied the willowy young... daughter standing before him. Damn it, he was only seventeen himself, and he'd apparently already got a fifteen-or-sixteen-year-old daughter out there.
Anyone else out there who could relate to this feeling? Anyone at all?
"Heheh~ do I look good, Papa?"
The girl seemed to notice Mammon's gaze, laughing and stepping back a couple of paces, giving a little twirl to let him take in a full view of her.
"This is a local outfit I picked out specially — really warm and practical. The climate around here's genuinely bizarre, and the nights get freezing cold."
Akari complained lightly, though in truth her constitution was remarkably sturdy — she rarely fell ill.
"Mm, the outfit suits you well. Mostly because you're a lovely girl to begin with," Mammon answered with a smile.
Worthy of being his and Platinum's daughter — the genetics really had come through impressively here.
"Heheh~ I love Papa the most."
Akari's face lit up with a delighted smile, her big eyes crinkling into crescent moons, thoroughly adorable.
As she spoke, she threw her arms around her father once more, burying her face in his chest and taking a deep breath.
Papa's scent~
The girl's eyes narrowed happily, a genuinely blissful expression settling over her fair, delicate face. So comfortable.
She hadn't smelled it in so long. Though it was slightly different from the scent she remembered from her own father, it somehow smelled even better.
Mammon, a mix of exasperation and unmistakable fondness, gave the girl's back a few gentle pats.
He still felt genuinely strange about the whole thing — mostly because a daughter this grown had just abruptly appeared out of nowhere. Not that he couldn't accept it, exactly, it was just... genuinely bizarre!
"Emmm..."
Watching the father and daughter locked in this embrace, Volo's own expression twisted once more, his handsome face scrunching up further.
How to put it — he felt like his entire worldview was taking a genuine beating right now.
These two really were father and daughter? Genuine blood relations, that kind?
A seventeen-year-old boy with a sixteen-year-old daughter, that was really...
Giratina help him, was this actually normal? This world really was too bizarre.
"Papa, Mr. Volo, let's head inside first. Wusi... sister Wusi just stepped out, might be a while before she's back."
Akari ushered the two of them into the cabin. Since Marnie had recently accused her of being the one responsible for the King and Queen's rampage, Volo had brought her here to lay low for the time being.
The cabin wasn't especially large, but it was reasonably well-equipped.
Akari took the initiative to brew a pot of tea, pouring it for both Mammon and Volo, demonstrating her own genuinely good upbringing.
"Akari, how did you end up in this particular era?"
Mammon sat at the wooden table, took a sip of the hot tea, and asked her.
"It's Arceus's doing."
Akari answered without holding anything back, a note of genuine complaint in her voice.
At the mention of Arceus's name, something flickered in Volo's eyes — though he concealed it well enough that it didn't show.
Mammon caught it out of the corner of his eye, the corner of his own mouth curling up slightly.
"I'd just turned sixteen, you know — you and my mamas all helped celebrate my coming-of-age ceremony together, and I was supposed to set off on my journey the very next day."
"Akari, did you just say... 'mamas,' plural?"
Volo genuinely wondered if he'd misheard.
"Yep, I have a lot of mamas." Akari answered this as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
"My birth mama, and my second mama, third mama, fourth mama... lots of mamas."
Mammon: "..."
Volo: "..."
This... was this genuinely normal?
Volo looked at Mammon in bewilderment. Mammon simply lifted his teacup and took a sip, pretending not to notice the look.
How was he even supposed to explain this? He honestly didn't have a good explanation either.
"Well then, this humble one's simply been sheltered, I suppose."
Credit where due, Volo really was Volo — even with his worldview taking yet another significant hit, he recovered his composure quickly, offering an awkward but perfectly polite smile.
"Anyway, that night, while I was sleeping, Arceus appeared in my room. It asked whether I'd like to take part in a truly one-of-a-kind trial — a journey unlike any other. It said once the trial was over, I'd surely become incredibly strong, strong enough to genuinely surprise you all, Papa."
Akari related this, lodging a genuine complaint against a certain alpaca's "kidnapping."
"And you agreed?" Mammon more or less understood by now.
"Yep, because it was Arceus, obviously."
Being Mammon's own daughter, Akari naturally knew exactly who Arceus was — she'd even met it in person a few times.
"And after that, I just passed out. By the time I woke up, I was already here in Hisui."
Akari said this with a genuinely wronged expression.
Honestly, when she'd first come to, she'd been completely dumbfounded. That alpaca genuinely had a screw loose somewhere! Was THIS what a "trial" was supposed to look like? Just dumping her straight into ancient history?
"What Akari's saying checks out. As I understood it, Akari fell through a rift in space-time at the time — though it's genuinely surprising that the other side of that rift turned out to be your own world, Akari."
Volo's brow furrowed tightly; this didn't match what he'd originally assumed at all.
He'd always believed the space-time rift Akari had fallen through led back to the realm where the Sinnoh Deity, Arceus, itself resided. He'd genuinely puzzled over how she could have fallen out of it.
And now, according to Akari's own account, the whole reason she'd ended up in this world was simply because of a trial being run for her benefit?
Volo pressed his lips together tightly. Great One, why does your compassion never seem to extend to me? Do you truly favor this child so much?
When it's ME who's the true, rightful heir of the ancient Sinnoh people!
Volo's expression darkened briefly, but he quickly composed himself.
No matter. It's fine. It's fine!
He would prove to the Great One that he, this humble servant, was the one truly worthy of its favor!
The timing simply hadn't come yet.
Volo understood this clearly — the timing had not yet arrived. Since Akari's presence in this world was, in fact, Arceus's own trial for her, that trial would surely have to end someday, and when it did, Arceus would surely appear once more. All he needed to do was defeat Akari at that precise moment.
He would win!!
"I'm not entirely sure myself," Akari said, blinking, then shaking her head.
"I see."
The three of them chatted casually for a while longer. To Volo, both Mammon and Akari were people who'd crossed over from the modern era — and the advanced, novel world they described was genuinely, deeply fascinating to him.
"What a shame — this humble one has no way to witness that world of yours with my own eyes."
Hearing about the existence of a modern-day organized Pokémon League and its official competitions, Volo, being a Pokémon tamer himself, couldn't help feeling a genuine pang of longing. But to him, that world remained, for now, hopelessly out of reach.
Which meant...
If he could earn Arceus's own recognition, and take hold of Arceus's power for himself, he would become a brand-new god!
Couldn't he simply recreate a world just as beautiful, on his own terms?
Volo's eyes burned with fervent, genuine anticipation.
But first... he needed to defeat Akari.
Volo quickly steadied himself, turning his gaze back to Akari, a flicker of genuine envy and resentment lingering in his eyes.
Why, exactly, had this particular girl earned the Sinnoh Deity's own personal favor — enough that it had gone out of its way to arrange this entire trial specifically for her?
But then again — wasn't that exactly the opportunity he needed? He could simply seize this "qualification" from Akari's own hands, the very moment she completed her trial!!
Volo held genuine confidence in himself — he was, after all, the single strongest Pokémon tamer of this entire era, with Giratina's own assistance behind him besides.
"Actually, there might be a way around this, come to think of it."
Mammon considered the matter for a moment, then spoke up.
Honestly, time travel was a genuinely rare phenomenon across the Pokémon world — though not entirely unheard of. Those capable of enabling it included Celebi, Dialga, Terapagos, and Arceus itself.
Celebi's version was genuinely the weakest of the bunch, though — and Dialga would very likely come looking for him directly. After all, Dialga governed the balance of time itself — though clearly, Dialga's authority didn't extend over Arceus, which meant it likewise held no real authority over someone personally "singled out" by Arceus, like Akari.
At the end of the day, Dialga had once solemnly, confidently lectured him about how "no one may touch the flow of time" — only to turn around and contradict itself, mumbling something about "the future being an entirely separate matter."
Turns out it had already foreseen Akari's existence back then, hadn't it.
Akari was, without question, a genuinely singular case. And technically, he supposed he counted as half of one himself.
"If I could bring Akari back with me to my own timeline... tch~"
Mammon studied his adorable, precious daughter, eyes narrowing slightly.
Now THAT would be genuinely entertaining.
And besides — she was his own daughter, wasn't she? What exactly would be the problem with bringing her along?
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