Hello and welcome to the next chapter of the Final Test.

And I must thank the two reviewers for the last chapter: PokePiplupGirl21 and Guest. Thank you guys for the support.

Just so you guys know, I have started a poll for the choice between Jolteon and Sylveon, and you can vote through the poll, reviews or PMs. So far, the results are:

Jolteon- 1

Sylveon- 3

I put a lot of background information in this chapter that I will be explaining in more detail in the bottom AN, as well as some preview info I put in the Kanto Arc.

Also, this chapter marks the end of the Intro Arc, and in the next, things start heating up within the group (because you can't have this big or diverse a group together peacefully without a lot of conflict first).

Anyways, I hope you enjoy this chapter.

The next morning dawned to another day of clear skies and a peaceful breeze. Ashley was finally calm after the last week of worrying and it was a relief for everyone when Ashley came out her room cheerful for once.

After a nice breakfast, the group of seventeen walked to the stadium, picking fun at each other and guessing what the next round would involve. It was all good fun, even if Paul pretended to not notice them the whole way.

The stadium battle field wasn't as crowded as it was last week, since only three hundred and four trainers were left. The only one of the group that couldn't stand on the field was Bonnie, who wasn't even old enough to be a official trainer, so she sat in the stands with Dedenne and strict instructions from her brother to not talk to any strangers.

"Welcome, trainers, to the third round of the Master Tournament!" Mr. Goodshow said, to the cheers of the trainers and audience. "You were picked for your great accomplishments, but only one of you can become the first Master. These last two rounds, you showed your strength and cooperation in pairs. But now is the time for a harder challenge: One that shows your leadership, willing to learn and nurturing skills. In three days, all of you will set out on a journey through the six regions in order to find six League officials hiding within that region. Each Regional Professor will give a series of clues as to where the official is. You'll only have a year to complete this to qualify for the fourth round. But because of the large number of you, the League decided to split you into groups of sixteen. You have two days to register your teams."

He paused here to allow that excited chatter to end before continuing. "If any of you have younger siblings that aren't yet ten that want to come with you, they can but their safety will be your group's responsibility," he warned and Ashley saw with aura a spike of excitement from Bonnie.

"And now onto the other half of the challenge: Each of you will be given an egg to care for during the year. This egg, and the hatchling within, will be given to you when you register your team. Their happiness and growth will be another factor on if you qualify for the fourth round. And I want to make this very clear: While members of your team can help each other with the eggs, you can't just assign one person to care for them."

The excited chatter started up again since some trainers never got to raise a hatchling. Ashley was excited herself since the last hatchling she raised was Noivern and she was eager to test her aura sight to see if she could predict what everyone would get.

They were excused to go about their day, and the group met up with Bonnie as they were leaving. Sixteen of them were chatting about what was revealed, Paul ignoring them to a point yet again. No one was offended, since that was just the way he was though Ashley did wish he'd loosen up a little.

"You know, once we register and get our eggs, I can probably tell you guys what'll hatch from them," Ashley said with a smirk. Only she didn't see the new arrival before they spoke.

"Not this time Little Spitfire."

Ashley cringed, there was only one person who called her that. "Hey Riley, what are you doing here?" she asked in an innocent-sounded tone. The rest of group turned to face the young man in blue that only four of them recognized.

"I had to take care of some business for Ilene," Riley said with a smile. "And don't try to use that tone with me Ashley."

Said ravenette pouted, upset that he didn't fall for the tone. She hardly ever used it, but Riley, being an Aura Guardian, could never be fooled by it.

"Who are you?" Paul asked bluntly. That made Riley notice the rest of the group and he grinned while Ashley blushed.

"I guess I forgot you were all there, and that most of you never met him," Ashley admitted quietly. "Everyone, this is Riley. He's an Aura Guardian who lives on Iron Island, though he technically works for Lady Ilene. He's also my mentor."

Everyone shared greetings with the older man for a few minutes before they got back to what they were talking about before.

"What did you mean by that anyway?" Gary asked in curiosity. Riley glanced at him for a moment before turning to the group as a whole.

"After Ashley started actively training her aura, Ilene had to tell the League that an applied trainer was an aura adept training to become a Guardian. Since Ashley didn't want anyone she didn't trust to know, no names were mentioned. Three weeks ago, Mr. Goodshow checked with Ilene to see if any of the competing trainers was the adept and she confirmed that one was. So they asked me to put an aura block on all the eggs so that no matter which egg the adept and their group got, they wouldn't know the species," Riley explained with a grin.

"Spoil sports," Ashley muttered mock bitterness.

"What's the difference between an aura adept and an Aura Guardian?" Bonnie asked innocently.

"An aura adept is an aura user, someone who can manipulate aura, who is actively training to fully control their ability while Aura Guardians are fully trained and work to keep nature in balance. It used to be that aura adepts were found as soon as they turned ten and were taken to Rota for training before being spread to the different kingdoms," she explained. Bonnie looked interested, as did Brock, Gary, Max and Clemont.

"So which are you, Ashley?" Iris asked.

"Well, even though I'm now eighteen as of today, I am still only an adept. I only discovered my ability when I was fourteen and became a user, but didn't start training until an incident last October, when Pikachu basically forced me to go to Rota for training," Ashley explained with embarrassment.

"You never did say what happened," Riley said. That got everyone's attention, even Paul, who was again pretending to ignore them. Ashley scratched the back of her head in nervousness.

"Well..." Ashley trailed off, her cheeks flushed red in embarrassment.

"You have to tell the story now," Misty said with a smirk.

"Fine," she said while pouting. Again. She knew that she had to get rid of the habit or run the risk of being called a child (which she hated). She saw the whole group staring at her expectantly, so she sighed and began her tale. "So this is what happened..."

~Flashback: Five months previously~

Ashley smiled as she watched her Pokémon relax. Her Grass-Types (Bulbasaur, Bayleef, Sceptile, Torterra, Snivy and Leavanny) were sunbathing alongside three of her Fire-Types (Charizard, Quilava and Torkoal) while her Infernape and Pignite were sparring with Primate, Krookodile, Scraggy, Greninja, Hawlucha and Goodra. Her Water-Types (Wartortle, Lapras Crocanaw, Corphish, Buizel, Oshawott and Palpitoad) were all enjoying a small pond while Heracross and Haunter were racing her Flying-Types (Pidgeot, Noctowl, Swellow, Staraptor, Unfezant, Talonflame and Noivern). Glalie was practicing his Ice-Type moves while Snorlax, Boldre, Pikachu, Gabite and Donphan slept and a single Tauros grazed.

Feeling confidante that her Pokémon would be fine, she picked up a notebook and began writing in it. Soon, she felt the world fall away, and as such didn't notice when the peace was disturbed.

A loud roar of fury snapped her concentration and she looked up to see what had set Charizard off. The scene that she was met with was such a contrast that she actually stood up to figure out what happened.

Her Bulbasaur, Charizard, Wartortle, Infernape, Pignite, Snivy and Greninja were glaring at Haunter, Primape, Glalie, Donphan, Swellow, Oshawott and Scraggy, who returned those glares. Pikachu, Pidgeot, Noctowl, Torterra, Sceptile, Leavanny and Goodra were yelling at both groups, trying to calm them down. And the rest of them were watching with varying degrees of bafflement.

"What is going on here?!" Ashley asked sternly while walking to the four groups. The watching and peace-keeping groups all tried to explain, but their voice overlapped too much for her to understand what they were saying. The two glaring groups ignored their trainer, too focused on each other.

And that was when all hell broke loose.

Everyone in those groups attacked someone from the other group, getting more violent the more time passed. That scared Lapras, who began screaming her song in fear and splashing her fins desperately.

Ashley could feel her anger mounting, faint memories rising to the surface of a war that shouldn't have happened. Her vision washed blue and she blacked out.

~Flashback End~

"I woke up again about an hour later to a destroyed field. Pikachu explained that my aura had basically exploded in response to my anger. We left for Rota right after everyone got check out in the nearby Pokémon Center the next day. I never did find out what actually started the fight," Ashley said, finishing her story. Everyone was staring at her. During the story, they reached an empty park and they took advantage of that fact, settling down on the ground to listen.

"Well, when you said that you had an aura outburst, this is not what I expected," Riley admitted with a chuckle.

"Aura outburst?" Dawn asked in confusion.

"Basically, it's when an aura user, adept or Guardian gets so angry or scared that their aura explodes outward in waves and attacks whatever upset them. Like how an Electric-Type will release sparks if they're angry and outright attack with you push your luck," Riley explained. "An aura user or adept is more likely to get to that level, as part of an adept's training to control their anger before becoming a Guardian."

"What I still don't get is what started it," Drew admitted. From what he knew of the species involved, only a few of them were prone to violence.

"Which group had something in common?" Max asked, deep in thought.

"Bulbasaur, Charizard, Wartortle, Infernape, Pignite, and Greninja were all abandoned by their original trainers and Servine ran away from her first trainer," Ashley said sadly. "And I already figured that had something to do with it, I just don't know the exact cause."

"Sounds to me that they probably started talking about the past," Gary mused, "and it set off more than a few tempers and just got out of control from there."

"I guess, but knowing my Haunter and Dewott like I do, they could've easily started the whole thing as a joke. Especially Haunter," Ashley said.

Riley had to leave after a few more minutes, so the group of seventeen went to get registered as a team with the League. There, they were met a surprise; they had to pick a team name so that the League could keep better track of them. That sparked a slight argument until Gary spoke teasingly.

"How about the 'Chosen Ones'?"

While Ashley glared at the brunette researcher, everyone else were nodding. Since they couldn't agree on anything else, that became their team name, much to Ashley's chagrin.

They were given their eggs, which were all young enough to not gain their colors and were instead pure white, and a tracker card (which was given to Brock) by the official who registered them, who explained that the tracker also severed as a transportation ID for boats and airplanes so that trainers don't waste money on those things.

The last two days before they set out were spent packing, gathering any supplies they needed and last minute training. And so, on the first of April, all nineteen groups of sixteen were sent off by the League, some making plans to start in the other regions and come back to Kanto later in the year. The Chosen Ones were planning to start in Kanto, before going to Johto, then Hoenn, then Sinnoh, then Unova and finishing with Kalos and returning to Kanto if they had enough time.

Ashley knew that this was going to hard. With the six Pokémon limit removed, it'll hopefully be easier to survive, but she didn't hold on hope that everything would smoothly. Especially with Team Rocket and that Dark Aura Guardian on the loose.

But she could hold onto that hope as long as nothing too bad happened.

And who knows. Maybe this final test will be the thing that finally gets her to admit to Gary what she actually feels about him.

How was it?

First to address: the challenge. I really loved the "travel around the world" thing that NoSignalBlueScreen did, but I wanted my own little twist. So, I added the mystery eggs! I really hope you guys could help me figure out what each egg hatches into, because I actually have no idea.

Two: Ashley's birthday. I put her birthday to be March 28th because it made little sense to me that kids who just turned ten started their journeys the same day. Plus, as shown by later regions, starting trainers are given appointed days by the regional professor to come get their Pokémon. Since Ashley and Gary both started their journeys on April 1st, I chose March 28th to be her birthday, two days beforehand.

Three: aura outbursts. As I said in the story, this is caused when an aura user of any level (user, adept or Guardian) becomes so scared or angry that their aura literally explodes. This is because aura manipulation is a power that has to do a lot with emotion and intent, and when charged with strong, mainly negative emotions like anger or fear, it will burst and lash out at whatever caused this emotional distress. I actually got the idea from the Harry Potter series in how accidental magic worked.

Four: how one becomes and Aura Guardian. This explanation actually won't happen in the story until the third chapter of the Kanto Arc, but I figured I could explain a little bit here and explain more then. A lot like what NoSignalBlueScreen did, aura has four aspects; strength, emotion, loyalty and wisdom. However, in this story each are a double-edged blade in how they work. With loyalty you have selflessness (like what happened in the second chapter, A Near-Kidnap), with strength you have weakness in mind and body, with emotion you have insecurity (like in the last chapter) and with wisdom you have corruptibility (?) (I don't really know). In order to become an Aura Guardian, you must find all four links, so to speak, and unlock that aspect by overcoming their dual-blade. Again, I shall explain more on this in a later chapter.

Five: a quick question. Do you guys get the 'war that shouldn't have happen' reference? I will expand more on this in the chapter I'm currently working on (chapter 5), but I want to see if you all get it.

Also, can anyone guess who Ashley's step-father is? If enough people guess right, and if people request it, I might do a one-shot based on that time-period and what was going on, but that's up to you guys.

Also, I need help figuring out some plot-points and Pokémon for everyone. So if you guys could help me out, that would make me happy.

And one more thing: When do you want Ashley and Gary to get together, Hoenn or Sinnoh? The absolute earliest I can do is late Johto, but any work. Just not Kanto because these two need more work before admitting it to each other.

And please remember to vote on which Eeveelution you want to see Ashley end up with. (And don't worry about Ashley not having more than one Electric-Type, she'll get more.)

So, see you guys next chapter, whenever that may be, and please remember to review! I will not update unless I get at least one review related to what you guys want to see in this (plot or Pokémon wise) because I am open to suggestions.

~pokedawnheart

5/11/2019