Chapter 367: Doubts Upon Doubts, and a Way to Save the World Tree

Within the scenes of the past—

Aaron and the other Waveguide Guardians were still engaged in an intense discussion.

From Lucario’s explanation, it seemed that Aaron and the others were discussing what needed to be done before they could transfer their Waveguide.

Although Chen Mo could sense that Lucario was deliberately concealing something, none of the Waveguide Guardians, with Aaron at their head, showed the slightest hesitation about transferring their own Waveguide.

For a moment, Chen Mo fell silent.

His understanding of Waveguide was limited, but he knew that transferring Waveguide was fundamentally different from ordinary expenditure.

The “transfer” here meant extracting all of the Waveguide within one’s body—the Waveguide that represented one’s very life force.

Waveguide was the manifestation of the human spirit.

If a human were compared to a tree, then completely extracting their Waveguide would be equivalent to uprooting that tree.

There was absolutely no chance that the person performing the transfer could survive to the end.

And yet—

the people before him resolutely went through with it.

Even though they were afraid.

Even though they still had things in this beautiful world they couldn’t bear to leave behind.

“Lord Aaron…”

Zoroark stared blankly at the Waveguide Guardians, one after another, extending their palms and beginning to release their Waveguide, slowly transferring it into Mew’s body as their own bodies gradually crystallized.

Although Zoroark had long understood that, even if it reached the depths of the World-Origin Tree, it would most likely only receive news that Aaron had already died—

for some reason,

when it truly learned the truth and witnessed this scene with its own eyes, its chest still felt unbearably heavy.

It felt as though something was flowing from its eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

Lucario gently placed one arm around Zoroark’s shoulder.

“It’s okay, Senior. I just…”

Zoroark lowered its head.

Droplets of water continuously struck the ground.

At that moment—

another arm gently rested on Zoroark’s other shoulder.

Chen Mo gazed at the gradually fading scenes of the past and spoke softly.

“Zoroark, although it may not be appropriate for an outsider like me to say this, Aaron was carrying out his own convictions from beginning to end.”

“The hymn of humanity is a hymn of courage. The greatness of humanity is the greatness of courage.”

Within the livestream—

the many high-ranking officials of Xia, who were likewise seeking the truth in hopes of securing a peaceful and stable future, couldn’t help but offer the highest respect to those people from another world who had willingly walked toward their deaths.

“Hero, I beg you. Please save Lord Mew. Save the World-Origin Tree!”

Lucario dropped to one knee and made its plea to Chen Mo.

Well.

Now it was Chen Mo’s turn to have a headache.

He habitually asked Marshadow:

“Marshadow, what do you make of everything that happened this time? After all, although we didn’t witness it personally, according to Lucario, Ho-Oh really did appear.”

“I…”

Marshadow hesitated before pulling the Rainbow Wing from within its body.

Nothing happened.

After thinking for a moment, and urged on by Chen Mo, Marshadow answered irritably.

“It’s not like I’m with Lord Ho-Oh every second of every day.”

As a Legendary Pokémon who was practically a complete shut-in, Marshadow loved nothing more than hiding inside Ho-Oh’s shadow and sleeping.

But some things couldn’t simply be obtained because it wanted them.

“If I remember correctly, during the period before you crossed over, you were always resting inside Suicune’s shadow, right?”

“That’s right. What’s that got to do with anything?”

Marshadow had barely finished speaking when it too realized that something was wrong.

Because it spent most of its time asleep, Marshadow’s sense of time had never been particularly clear.

But while living inside Suicune’s shadow world, it did know that the world had been relatively peaceful during the period before the transfer.

In other words—

Suicune, Marshadow, Manaphy, and many, many other Pokémon had all been transferred to Earth at roughly the same time.

According to Zoroark’s earlier explanation, that had most likely happened in Alliance Year 1031.

From Marshadow’s perspective, Ho-Oh should also have arrived on Earth around that time.

Yet—

according to Lucario’s account, in Alliance Year 1032, Ho-Oh was still active.

It had even personally descended to heal Mew and given Aaron and the others a prophecy.

“This…”

Marshadow stared blankly at the Rainbow Wing in its hand.

It froze.

Chen Mo’s question came again.

“After coming to this world, Marshadow, you and Suicune—did any of you ever meet Ho-Oh?”

“…”

There was no answer.

Because their communication took place directly through their minds, speaking with Marshadow was essentially instantaneous.

Seeing that Marshadow had given no response, Chen Mo had already obtained his answer.

He shifted his attention back to Lucario.

As he helped it to its feet, he quickly said:

“Lucario, let me make something clear first. Although, in a certain sense, I am indeed serving as a hero, I don’t know Ho-Oh very well, nor can I be certain that I’m the person Ho-Oh’s prophecy referred to.”

“Mm. I’m telling you all this because I want you to understand one thing. My mind is a mess right now, and I don’t have a way to save Mew and the World Tree.”

Lucario showed no sign of panic after hearing this.

It gently shook its head and once again used telepathy.

“Hero, regarding how to save Lord Mew and the World-Origin Tree, Lord Aaron actually told me the method before sealing me away.”

“Oh?”

“The World-Origin Tree is an enormous lifeform whose primary nourishment is light. The root cause of its current condition remains the disappearance of its light source.”

Lucario spoke with absolute seriousness.

“So the method of saving the World-Origin Tree is actually very simple.”

“Return the World-Origin Tree to a world filled with light.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all!”

Lucario’s answer was firm and decisive.

Chen Mo said nothing further.

He stroked his chin, appearing to seriously consider how this could be accomplished.

Just then—

Gengar, who had been responsible for filming all this time, reached out a little claw and gently poked Chen Mo in the back.

Chen Mo came back to his senses.

Looking at the barrage of questions about what was happening, he finally realized that he had been so immersed in everything going on that he had completely overlooked the officials who were still watching the livestream.

There was no need to simplify anything.

Chen Mo directly relayed everything Lucario had told him.

Inside the conference room at the temporary base, everyone began discussing the matter heatedly.

Hu Chengliang sat among them, his brows tightly furrowed.

“A world filled with light…”

At that moment, it was around five in the afternoon in the waters where they were stationed.

The sky outside had already begun to turn golden.

The setting sun bathed the sea in a warm glow, golden ripples glittering across the waves and blending with the patrol fleet in the distance.

It looked like a beautiful oil painting.

Hu Chengliang stared at the scene.

“If we’re talking about our world, then it seems to meet Lucario’s requirements. The problem is, how do we transfer the World-Origin Tree from the Mystery Realm here…?”

Suddenly—

an image flashed through his mind.

Unlike the sunset before him, it was a bright and vibrant morning.

At that time, Hu Chengliang had been deep within Cangqing Mountain, carrying out a mission to persuade the Chansey clan.

“An ancient ruin!”

Hu Chengliang suddenly stood up, instantly drawing everyone’s attention.

Across from him, Elder Deng, one of the people in charge of the Countermeasure Bureau, was the first to speak.

“What ruin?”

Realizing that he had become overly excited, Hu Chengliang hurriedly sat down before speaking rapidly.

“Didn’t we discover a ruin in Cangqing Mountain that had been transferred here from the Pokémon world?”

“So I think we can transfer the World-Origin Tree into our world as well.”

“If we do that, wouldn’t the problem of the World-Origin Tree needing a light source be solved?”

With Hu Chengliang’s reminder, everyone in the conference room immediately understood.

“You mean… the Unown?”

“Exactly!”

Hu Chengliang nodded.

According to Chen Mo’s previous interrogation of the Unown in Cangqing Mountain, it had already been confirmed that the ruins had been under Giratina’s control.

The Unown had worked together to transfer the ruins from somewhere else into Earth.

And now—

those Unown were still sleeping inside the ruins.

“Can we really do that?”

Some people still couldn’t believe that the problem could be solved so easily.

After thinking for a moment, Professor Zhou spoke.

“I think it’s feasible.”

“Right now, Xia can receive signals from Earth even while Xiao Mo is inside the Mystery Realm, allowing him to conduct his livestream.”

“So although the situation with the Mystery Realm containing the World-Origin Tree isn’t as obvious as the previous Mystery Realm, I believe it has most likely already established some degree of direct connection with our world.”

“Under these circumstances, judging by the abilities demonstrated by the Unown, as long as they are willing to do it, they should still be capable of directly transferring the World-Origin Tree to Earth.”

As soon as he finished speaking, the conference room grew noisy.

Many of the participants began whispering among themselves, seriously discussing the feasibility of the proposal.

Soon—

someone raised an objection.

“Our current intelligence tells us that the World-Origin Tree came from another world.”

“But there is still one very serious question we haven’t answered.”

“How exactly was the Mystery Realm containing the World-Origin Tree formed?”

“In other words, should we seriously consider the possibility that the World-Origin Tree was deliberately separated from somewhere by some unknown existence?”

“If we recklessly use the Unown to bring the World-Origin Tree into our world, could that cause some kind of danger to Earth?”

“After all, everyone knows that in that other world, even light has disappeared.”

The discussion in the conference room grew even louder.

Some nodded.

Others shook their heads.

Everyone sitting in that room held positions of responsibility.

That meant they had to take responsibility for the people—and all other forms of life—living on this land.

Therefore—

they absolutely could not act purely on emotion, no matter how admirable Aaron and the other Waveguide Guardians were.

From a rational perspective, the World-Origin Tree might be extremely important to the other world.

But to Earth, its importance wasn’t actually that great.

“I’ll briefly share my thoughts.”

At Professor Zhou’s signal, Hu Chengliang raised his voice and drew everyone’s attention.

“The World-Origin Tree isn’t completely unrelated to our world.”

“When we first came to this island, everyone saw the numerous wild Pokémon gathered around it.”

“It’s obvious that the World-Origin Tree has already begun affecting our world to some extent.”

“So I believe that instead of simply letting things develop, we should take the initiative and transfer the World-Origin Tree to our world ahead of time.”

“Otherwise, once the World-Origin Tree completely dies inside the Mystery Realm, it may cause some additional effects on our world.”

After he finished speaking—

many people in the conference room fell into thought once more.

Seeing this, Hu Chengliang pressed on.

“Personally, I believe a living World-Origin Tree is far more valuable than a dead one.”

“Furthermore, if we save the World-Origin Tree, then once Mew recovers and awakens, we’ll effectively have established a connection with a Legendary Pokémon.”

Many people’s brows furrowed even more deeply.

On the screen—

they could still see the pink, cat-like Pokémon frozen inside the red crystal, surrounded by the crystals formed from Aaron and the other Waveguide Guardians.

Earlier, Chen Mo’s ten-year agreement with Zapdos at the power station had already excited many of Xia’s senior officials for quite some time.

And now—

Mew was right before their eyes.

This wasn’t some ordinary Legendary Pokémon like Zapdos.

Mew’s own strength was already at the pinnacle of the Legendary tier.

Moreover, Mew had close relationships with multiple top-tier Legendary Pokémon, including Ho-Oh and Regigigas.

Saving Mew would mean gaining the friendship of an entire group of Legendary Pokémon.

That…

was indeed difficult not to find tempting.

Just as countless people were struggling with the decision, a deep, authoritative voice came from a laptop placed at the head of the conference table.

The entire conference room fell silent.

Everyone listened attentively to the nation’s top leader.

Even Hu Chengliang, who still had more to say, obediently kept his mouth shut.

“According to Lucario, the Waveguide that Aaron and the other Waveguide Guardians transferred to Mew is also approaching its limit.”

“We don’t have much time left.”

“Since everyone still has differing opinions, let’s put it to a vote.”

“Let’s settle this matter as soon as possible.”

A few minutes later—

looking at the voting results, which showed an overwhelming majority in favor, Hu Chengliang’s hands, hidden beneath the table, unconsciously clenched into fists.

His face was filled with barely concealed excitement.

It worked!

Elsewhere—

after hearing Chen Mo suddenly say, “Wait for me,” Lucario had quietly observed him from the side.

Although Lucario was no stranger to the technology humans had created—despite often living in the wilderness with Aaron—it was familiar with devices such as the phone Chen Mo was holding.

It understood that Chen Mo was probably communicating with other humans.

The big dog patiently waited for Chen Mo’s answer.

Just then—

Lucario, with its keen senses, suddenly noticed the corners of Chen Mo’s mouth curling into a faint smile.

He slowly raised his head.

His voice was filled with joy as he quickly said:

“The problem has been solved.”

“If nothing unexpected happens, the World-Origin Tree will soon be able to go to a world filled with light.”

🌟 The story is already written… waiting to be unleashed.

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