Pokémon Detective Case Files.

"The Pokémon technologies I've listed are all revolutionary discoveries in the world today. Yet you scoff at them. Doesn't that mean... Oh dear, what should I do?"

The scholar patted his forehead in frustration.

"I've never heard of any future ally that we're going to be dealing with is a complete novice who has no knowledge of the cutting-edge field of Pokémon studies."

"Enough! Do you know what kind of person you're talking to?"

A fat man wearing a Lava Team red uniform squeezed out from behind the leader, glaring angrily at Akromma—

"Before founding Team Magma, Boss Crimson Pine was a double PhD in geophysics and ecological engineering. He even personally participated in the exploration and excavation of the first Mega Stone veins in the Hoenn region! As for those cutting-edge Pokémon knowledge you're boasting about, Boss Crimson Pine's research in these fields was already far ahead of its time more than a decade ago. How dare you jump in front of us and try to teach us your own tricks?"

“Oh, really?” Akromma shrugged.

"That's even more puzzling. Why should a respectable researcher be confined to a hot and narrow rock crevice like a lava worm? In my opinion, a smart person should use a smarter approach."

Before the words were even finished, the Lava Team's secret hideout fell into a deathly silence. Due to their shared anger, almost everyone present held their breath at the same time.

At this moment, all that could be heard was the friction of lava slowly flowing through the lava channels.

"I have no reason to tell you. After all, you are not trustworthy in any way."

With a blank expression, Akame raised her hand to stop the high-ranking officer, Himura, who was about to continue his rage, and delivered her definitive conclusion to the Plasma Team scholar before her—

"This farce should end now. Team Lava is not a place for clowns. Letting you leave without a single burn mark is already the greatest mercy we can show you and the organization behind you."

"So, you don't think those things can help you?"

Seeing the Lava Team leader's reaction, and the unwavering disdain in his eyes, the disheveled Plasma Team scholar actually laughed.

—A genuine, happy, and innocent smile appeared on his face, like that of a child discovering a new toy.

"In the vast academic world of humankind, some studies attempt to use the energy of the primordial crystal to pry open the gears of time, some studies want to use the radiant stone to reach the edge of parallel worlds, some studies try to use the giant meteorite to create an inexhaustible energy source, and some studies intend to use the miracle of bonds to evoke the legendary existence... And you, since you already know the wonders of those extraordinary powers, still look down on all of these things?"

Akroma stared intently at the man in front of her—

"It seems that what you seek is not just ordinary super evolution or unlimited energy... I see, I see! Is it that thing? In the face of that power that can change planets, even the greatest scientific discovery of this century is nothing more than a child's toy."

"That's utter nonsense, throw him out."

Chi Yansong turned away indifferently, giving orders directly to his subordinates with his back to the visiting scholars.

Akromar's shoulders were immediately grabbed by two Lava Team officers, one on each side, who grabbed his clothes and tried to drag him out of the base.

"Wait a minute! I have one more question to confirm!"

The captured scientist suddenly shouted, causing the leader of the Lava Team to stop in his tracks briefly.

"After seeing this, can you still maintain that the project you're undertaking doesn't require any help from me or Group Plasma?"

pat!

Crimson Flame Pine heard the sound of a hard object hitting the ground behind him, the echo reverberating in the cave for a long time.

"There's more than one kind of fun toy!"

The refined man uttered a seductive charm, like a demon's.

"While it may not be the earth, rock, or fireball you crave—compared to these attributes that are countered by water, what you desire most right now is something that can restrain water droplets and devour the ocean, isn't it? How fortunate you are, how fortunate you are. In this matter, only I—Akromar!—can fulfill your request!"

.

How long did it take me to turn around?

The Crimson Pine no longer remembers the answer to that question.

Scientists have this bad habit—once research is going well, their concept of time becomes particularly blurred.

For the scholars involved in this study, the plan to devour the ocean was particularly captivating—because the progress of the research could be directly judged from the size of the creature brought by Akroma.

"The essence of life's evolution is matter's resistance to the increase of entropy. But when we give it an infinite source of energy, the nature of this struggle changes."

With the help of the gadget brought by the Team Plasma scholar, the joint research between Team Magma of the Hoenn region and Team Plasma of the Unova region progressed as rapidly as the mushroom was growing.

In return for the Plasma Group's scientist Akroma and for Quidditch's contribution of the artifacts unearthed from the underwater temple, the Lava Team shared their improved fossil reconstruction techniques—and a promise.

They promised that if Team Plasma were to encounter any dire situation in the Unova region, Red Pine and his Team Magma would leave Hoenn and provide their partners with unreserved military support.

This condition may sound a bit harsh, but Team Plasma is currently in a very good position in the Unova region, and the so-called support is probably just a backup plan.

Moreover, the research brought by Akromma did indeed bring enough rewards to the Lava Team—the Lava Team had been shouting the slogan of expanding the land for so many years, but this was the first time they had personally witnessed the spectacular scene of the "land" increasing day by day with their own eyes as they worked hard.

Of course, as the item catalyzed the Pokémon's ever-growing size, the organic nutrients Team Magma needed to provide for that Pokémon also began to expand at an alarming rate. The organization's members had to collect vast amounts of wood and agricultural waste from across Hoenn to nourish the mycelium that was growing rampant beneath the mushroom.

After completing the Pokémon's adaptability tests in the saltwater environment, these believers of the land hurriedly began secretly acquiring ships and heading towards the heart of the ocean, avoiding the eyes and ears of hostile organizations. They then constructed a temporary floating island on the sea for the fungus, which had grown to be larger than a bathtub.

Although the floating island was deliberately placed in a remote location far from the main shipping lanes of the Hoenn region, if someone were to pass by in a boat, they would see a giant black pudding floating on the water.

Fungi prefer to grow in dark environments away from sunlight, and the Pokémon with similar habits to mushrooms is no exception.

Therefore, before the fungus's network of hyphae could completely spread across the dark ocean, the Lava Team erected a huge truncated cone-shaped tent on the floating island.

The materials used were, of course, black waterproof fabric, supported by a lightweight aluminum alloy structure. The team later added solar panels to supplement power. Whenever the sea breeze blew, this precarious floating island and the even more precarious tent on top would sway from side to side with the waves, much like the absurd metaphor of pudding.

The underwater artifacts sent by the Plasma Cluster Sage seemed to possess a power that could transcend the laws of nature, while the mad scientist's wild ideas amplified this unknown power without any limits.

When that item is worn normally on a Grass-type Pokémon, its effect is only to slightly increase the power of Grass-type Pokémon's moves, with an effect comparable to a high-quality Miracle Seed. However, the latter wears down with each use of the move, while the former has remained unchanged for thousands of years.

In order to unleash the full power of the item, Akromar came up with a ruthless plan—to find a Pokémon suffering from dissociative identity disorder and to repeatedly activate the item's amplification effect.

He created a machine to fool the green brick: when the underwater relic came into contact with the test subject, a specific consciousness would trigger the item's amplification. By limiting the conductivity of energy and light, Akromar delayed and misled the Mystic Tablet's judgment, causing it to treat the entire test subject, containing all its consciousnesses, as the amplification target—an operation that could be repeated rapidly.

Just two milliseconds after the current amplification begins, Akromar's machine will trigger the slab's amplification cycle again using the same method.

With this continuous increase, the almost limitless Grass-type energy was squeezed into every cell of this fungal Pokémon, giving it endless growth potential. The mycelial roots of the experimental subject continued to spread underwater, and the fungal cap grew to the size of a football field...

Scientists initially speculated that this abnormal growth would eventually turn the experimental subject into an indescribable monster. However, whether due to the influence of the mysterious artifact or the underlying logic of the creature's genes, the scholars' concerns did not materialize. The Pokémon maintained its original proportions when it was only the size of a palm, and even the mushroom cap on its head retained its standard hemispherical shape—perhaps not quite perfect, but at least much rounder than an orange.

At this stage, the Lava Team even had a chance to induce the experimental subject to evolve, but they ultimately decided to abandon this expansion route—for no other reason than that these terrestrial believers did not have the extra production capacity to help the evolved Exfoliating Mushroom grow a pair of useless cap hands.

In addition, the evolutionary process may permanently change the Pokémon's mental state. If this results in the Pokémon being unable to use underwater relics to induce boosts after evolution, then they would have suffered a great loss.

Team Lava doesn't need a giant, thinking mushroom. In the grand ambitions of these fanatics, this Awful Mushroom is merely a testing ground, a blueprint for endless land expansion, and a bridgehead for their confrontation with the vast ocean.

And so the experiment continued, albeit in a morbid yet resolute manner.

On a stormy night, the total weight of the contents of this black dessert finally exceeded the floating island's carrying capacity, and it began an unstoppable sinking—the entire island, like a leaky shipwreck, was slowly and irreversibly swallowed into the abyss.

Finally, the enormous canopy, a kilometer in diameter, crashed onto the black sea, unleashing thunderous waves. Gale-force winds tore apart the black tent, now without its base, as the aluminum alloy steel pipes let out a final, tragic sigh before collapsing. When the sun shone again on the sea the next day, only a few pitiful pieces of black cloth remained where the floating island had once stood…

This was, of course, within the expectations of Team Lava and Akromma, or rather, they had been eagerly awaiting this day.

The personnel and equipment had already been moved away long ago. The moment the giant Aiya mushroom fell into the deep sea, Crimson Pine's wild dream of conquering the ocean truly began.

If this mushroom can only grow successfully under the shelter of humans, then no matter how big it grows, it will only be a single, carefully designed case of scientific evidence.

Only by enabling it to exist and expand independently without relying on any human intervention can the resources and effort that Team Lava has invested in it be considered worthwhile.

The experimental subject did not disappoint the researchers' expectations—its root system, which originally drifted in the water like seaweed, became a conduit for extracting nutrients the moment it came into contact with the seabed sand and gravel.

The nutrients that originally required a large amount of resources from the lava team can now be completely self-sufficient using only seabed sediments and deeper minerals. The endless seabed has become the best culture medium for this fungus.

Even more so because the Red Flame Pine specifically chose a dormant underwater volcano as a potential energy reserve when selecting the site for the floating island, the Ayak Mushroom successfully absorbed the geothermal energy hidden in the volcano through its spreading root system after sinking, and its growth rate was even better than before.

Although the experimental subjects in the ocean have begun to become self-sufficient, Team Lava has not yet given up its control over this giant mushroom.

Long before the total weight of the experimental subject reached the critical value, the Lava Team had already restructured the slate catalytic device, upgrading it from a mobile machine that clung to the mushroom like a spider to a spherical chamber equipped with energy storage, a monitoring system, and an operating platform.

This observation room is made entirely of transparent glass and utilizes deep-sea pressure-resistant technology developed in collaboration between the Plasma Cluster and the Aqua Fleet. It can not only move along the entire body of the experimental subject using the stone slab props, but also manually control the subject's movement and adjust the frequency of the amplification device.

Such technology was actually used by Team Aqua to stuff into Wailord's mouth as a storage room for smuggled goods... Whenever he thought of this, Akamamatsu couldn't help but laugh contemptuously at the mind of the Team Aqua leader who was his equal—he was devouring the ocean, while his opponent was still studying Wailord's belly.

At first, this safe house was like a tumor, ugly parasitic on the slender stem of the agaric mushroom. However, as time went by, this hideous tumor gradually turned into an insignificant pimple mark on the test subject's body.

Six years later, the enormous, spherical mushroom cap reappeared on the sun-drenched sea, its slender stem now as thick as a pillar supporting the ocean.

Countless aquatic Pokémon live in the darkness under the shade of Aquafoil, large numbers of Corsola migrate here, and tens of thousands of Wishiwashi form a silver vortex in its shadow.

As for the tiny observation chamber, it was as insignificant as a speck of dust adhering to the surrounding massive island. When it surfaced, it resembled a tiny water droplet atop a mushroom, but as it ventured into the deep sea, it was densely enveloped by the mycelium spreading from the experimental subjects.

In the final stages of the research, Akroma also attempted to reference the Dynamax phenomenon in the Galar region, using the power of extraterrestrial life to absorb the energy of the entire underwater continent, hoping to use this to make Agaric expand two to three times its current size.

However, this plan failed to achieve its intended goal. Despite the numerous attempts made by the Team Plasma scholars, they were ultimately unable to simultaneously address both the Dynamax phenomenon and Agaric's inherent growth potential. In the end, they were left with only a failed byproduct, marking the bankruptcy of the "Dynamax" approach.

According to Akromar's speculation, the Grass-type Slate that powers Auragra's boost likely originates from a force higher than Dynamax, thus causing Auragra to instinctively reject other types of power due to the excessive amount of this force. In his own words, it's like an extremely concise program being incompatible with outdated code.

However, even outdated "legacy code" has its occasional uses...

Crimson Pine looked ahead and saw that the Mega Metagross's claws, which had changed direction, had transformed into a howling "Comet Fist" and were rushing towards him.

"Ugh……"

In retrospect, all these sudden changes seem to have started when that guy who called himself a technician announced that the research was complete and said goodbye to Team Magma, leaving the Hoenn region.

The leader of this Hoenn illegal organization sighed inexplicably, lightly tapping the frame of his tactical goggles with his fingertips. The next instant, a dazzling seven-colored light also appeared on him and the Pokémon beside him.

boom!

The comet that streaked across the sky didn't hit anything, because an "active volcano" had already blocked its path—a long-planned "fire eruption" that solidly blocked the move from the genius champion of the Hoenn region.

"Although I don't know how you discovered this place, now that you're standing on this 'land,' the Alliance must know its location. An exposed base is no longer of any use. We made the necessary preparations the moment it was built, but... I didn't expect that moment to come so soon."

Mega Metagross ignored the nonsense of the person in front of it, and then slammed its scorching hot claws heavily onto the ground in front of Mega Camerupt, thus unleashing the "Earthquake" move.

However, the "soil" of the island beneath its feet seemed to exceed the expectations of this Ironfoot Pokémon, which possesses a brain comparable to a computer.

The steel claws, which were thought to be able to shatter rocks and shake the earth's surface, actually sank deep into the soft organic structure.

Just then, the trainer's voice came from behind—

"Spin your claws! Create smoke with 'Draft'!"

Upon receiving the order, the blue metallic behemoth's eyes under the cross lit up, and its four enormous claws, deeply embedded in the ground, immediately began to spin at high speed like electric drills, raising a large cloud of plant debris-like dust along the coast.

The "Draft" move was swift and sudden, causing Super Fire Camel to instinctively unleash flames in response. However, the burning only turned the dust into an even denser fog.

Amidst the smoke, Aerodactyl and Skarmory burst forth, while Aggron and Claydol summoned an even more intense "sandstorm" from the shore, attacking the other Team Magma members, except for Crimson Pine, from both flanks.

"Fire-breathing camel, 'burn to ashes.'"

Looking at his subordinates who were being routed by Mr. Champion's reinforcements, Crimson Pine showed neither resentment nor regret. He simply ordered the Fire-Breathing Camel to change its tactics, using flames carrying fresh air to instantly ignite and dispel the mist that filled the air in front of it.

Then, he took a step forward toward the Metagross's steel claws, his voice, as stubborn as a rock, echoing in the sea breeze—

"Of course, I've also prepared a generous gift for the destroyers when the base is abandoned—I originally thought the recipients of this surprise would be Archie and the Team Aqua. However, using it to teach the Hoenn League a lesson seems like a worthwhile deal."

A hint of confusion flashed across the rich young master's face.

However, the next moment, as Chi Yansong grabbed the communicator and issued some orders to his subordinates in a low voice, the ground beneath their feet began to tremble.

"Among the Pokémon population, there are always some mutated individuals that grow to an exceptionally large size. This phenomenon is widespread in all regions. Among them, it is especially prevalent in areas that have experienced massive meteorite impacts."

Daigo quickly realized that the tremor beneath his feet was not from the earth itself, but from the sea behind him—something was about to break through the waves.

"Unlike Hoenn, where the meteorite energy was mainly consumed by legendary Pokémon, no creatures emerged in the Galar region, which was struck by a giant meteorite 20,000 years ago, to claim this power for themselves. As a result, the phenomenon of Pokémon growing rapidly in a short period of time became common knowledge on that island, and even today, wild Pokémon that have grown to enormous sizes still appear there from time to time."

A steep, cliff-like horn emerged from beneath the water's surface. At this moment, Champion Daigo could already see the dark shadow of a giant creature lying prone in the outer ocean.

"The current president of the Galar League has used local energy points to reliably reproduce this Dynamax phenomenon and is using it for commercial purposes—but in my opinion, he is far from realizing the true efficiency of this mechanism."

The creature in the ocean raised its head, and the mere movement stirred up a huge wave. Under the yellow, rock-like horn, Daigo saw an indigo head the size of a building.

"If you recklessly exploit artificial energy points, you can keep Pokémon in their Dynamax state and adapt to it—but what kind of miracles will happen if you continue to induce Pokémon to evolve at this stage?"

As the mountains rose above the sea, Crimson Pine's face was shrouded in darkness. He watched the wealthy young master's shoulders tremble slightly with nervousness, and finally, a smug look appeared on his face.

"Will the Pokémon remain in its Dynamax form as usual, or will it grow several times larger than before? And if it continues in this Dynamax form, what interesting things will happen if we feed that Pokémon, which is covered in Dynamax energy, a large amount of Dynamax mushrooms that can induce a change in its body shape, and Dynamax Sweet produced by the Dynamax Queen Bee?"

Behind Steven, the giant Pokémon with red clouds swirling around its head finally revealed its full form.

It was a turtle-like Pokémon covered in a shell. Its horns on its head resembled towering cannons, and its shell on its back looked like an uneven hill. Beneath its head, curled up under its neck armor, was a disproportionately large jaw, as if it could easily topple a small mountain with a single bite.

"Come on, league champions."

Crimson Pine walked to his Super Fire-Breathing Camel and calmly beckoned to Steven.

"Your League subordinates should have arrived at the airport by now, right? They're probably happy to have landed safely. But unfortunately, apart from me, all of Team Magma's elite officers have already headed there. How many Elite Four members are on that plane? If your Hoenn League doesn't even send half of its members, they probably won't be able to get here to reinforce you before that Gigantamax Drednaw crushes you to pieces, will they?"

The Hoenn champion was also trying hard to suppress the trembling in his body.

"Speaking of which, this is really... extremely interesting."

Even though they were facing a life-or-death crisis, the tension brought by those enormous creatures seemed to completely disappear when they heard this.

Daigo, who had just spoken to Hugo on the phone not long ago and even used Devon's satellite positioning to pinpoint the island's exact location, couldn't help but burst into laughter, covering his face with his hands as he thought about what would happen here soon.

Chapter 357 The Solution - The First Card