I'm deep into college now, although with my schedule, I have no idea how often I can even work on this, much less update. After all, it's been two and a half years since the last one. Still, I won't completely stop until I have no choice but to. Bear with me.

Ash honestly hadn't expected this; the idea that Iestyn, or maybe Syntalius, had brought back some of their old foes from the dead had never occurred to him. Then again, he supposed it did make sense; even in their first fight, Iestyn knew how powerful his enemies could become. Leon by himself, even in a weakened state, was able to see the path of the Aura Guillotine, which even Envy couldn't do. Plus, both Iestyn's Wrath and Pride had defected against him. Without them, Iestyn had only himself to defend Syntalius. It made sense that he would find some troops to help; Aura Psychicorum's regular soldiers wouldn't make any difference when Ash and his friends got even stronger.

But as Ash clashed with Averill, he realized that only Syntalius could possibly do such a thing as bringing back the dead. There were enormous repercussions for an act like this, but what did Syntalius care? He was sealed and half-dead anyway. And he couldn't be freed just to face his punishment; even Arceus couldn't defeat him the first time around.

Such thoughts whirled through Ash's mind as he parried a pounding blow from Averill. The master had become even more powerful after coming back from the dead. Before, he couldn't even stand up to an Altered Aura Weapon like Leon's Aura Lance, but now, he was fighting evenly with Ash's Aura Twin Swords.

Despite the even match, however, Ash was still smiling, and Averill was panting in exhaustion. Although the energy being released by their respective weapons was about the same, there was no doubt that Ash was more skilled despite Averill's greater experience. The once great master couldn't even land a single solid blow, not only because Ash's swords had more reach, but also because Ash's swordplay had grown to new heights during his eight months of training.

They had been fighting for the past ten minutes, and Averill was already much the worse for wear than Ash was. And Ash was still holding back, as he was about to reveal.

"Averill, you of all people should know that being brought back from the dead is really going to piss Arceus off. Do you really think that he'll spare you this time around?" Ash asked as he put some space between himself and Averill.

"Of course not. If Arceus finds me, I know I'm on my way back to death," Averill replied.

"Then why help Syntalius?"

"Because he will win in the end. And he saved me from death. That's all I need to know," Averill said.

Ash sighed. "Well, at least your reasons are probably better than anything else I'll hear today. I'm sorry, but I have to get rid of you. The dead do not belong with the living."

"So if your father were to be brought back to life, you would protest against it as well?" Averill challenged.

"I already have, Averill. He didn't listen, and I couldn't do anything about it. But the difference between you and him is that you, just like Iestyn and Syntalius, can be stopped," Ash said.

"Do you honestly think you can stop me?" Averill shot back, rushing forward to attack again.

But Ash was done holding back. He couldn't delay any more. Averill was completely surprised when Ash increased the energy in his swords and slashed them downwards, releasing a blade-like wave of blue energy. Averill crossed his arms and expanded his own energy into a barrier, but it wasn't enough to stop the impact, and Averill was thrown backwards. Ash suddenly appeared behind him and stabbed him in the back with both swords.

Averill gasped and choked, looking down at the two swords poking out of his chest and torso. He choked again and fell backwards as Ash twisted his swords and yanked them out, releasing two twin fountains of blood that pooled.

"So you still bleed, like an ordinary person. It looks like Syntalius restores the flow of the body and the mind, then. Do you have any last words, Averill?" Ash asked.

Averill leaned up and hissed into Ash's ear. Ash nodded in response. "I will tell them. Don't worry," he said.

Averill smiled and fell back down, dying for the second time.

Ash called Raichu back from his position of guarding Lady Ilene. The lady herself smiled warmly at Ash. "You've gotten stronger. Perhaps more powerful than Sir Aaron himself."

As Raichu jumped up to Ash's shoulder, Ash looked at the painting of the legendary hero and his Lucario, and smiled as well. "I saw the miracles that Aura can bring when I went with Lucario to the Tree of Beginning. Now I'm going back, and this time, I won't be the only one who can use Aura."

He turned around and began to walk out of the throne room.

"Good luck, Ash," Ilene called.

"I hope your guards turn out okay, cousin," Ash replied, smiling back at Ilene before leaving.

Suddenly, Ash felt a large surge of Aura from nearby, and recognized it immediately. His face grew worried, and he rushed towards the Tree of Beginning. What could have possibly required Leon of all people to release so much power?

Sarah dodged shot after shot of Aura from Gluttony. The thing was, she was barely expending any effort to do so. Every time a shot came at her, she was already out of the way before it could hit her. No matter how quickly or closely the blasts came, Sarah just couldn't get hit.

Nearby, Richie and Gary watched in awe as Sarah continued to easily evade any shots that Gluttony took at her. Even simultaneous shots from the robot couldn't touch her, as she would move out of the way of even attacks that should have been physically impossible to see coming. It was as if she knew what Gluttony was going to do before it was going to do it.

Sarah couldn't feel Aura or energy in general. She could only detect the presence of objects or beings in her general area. The only way she could have an idea of her opponent's power was by seeing its results. But as if in exchange for the fact that her energy senses were the weakest of her group, her mental perception and sensory abilities were right through the roof, even higher than the likes of Damian. Not only was Sarah gifted with very high general intelligence, but she was also using a psychic ability, one that she had discovered and trained along with telekinesis.

What Sarah was using was another application of telekinesis, and contrary to popular belief, it was not a power that could be gained with telepathy. Sarah was using extrasensory perception, a sixth sense along with her original five.

ESP was a basic for most of Aura Guardians and Psychics. It was the reason why many of them seemed to have powers far higher than the average human being. Aura Guardians and Psychics could dodge even the most unavoidable attacks not because of their higher energy level or mental ability, but because of a sixth sense that warned them. Mind's eye or instinct were also ways to describe ESP.

However, telekinetics like Sarah could take ESP to another level. Because their natural powers employed the use of perceiving nearby objects and using them as weapons, ESP was very important to telekinetics. Therefore, telekinetics in the past had developed a way to create a general area in which their perception of every object was strengthened to enormous levels, from the smallest ant to the largest mountain, and everything in between. The method was quite simple; focus all your effort into doing so, and it would be done. However, there was a drawback. The sensory information one would receive would come all at once in a frightening wave. Anyone without sufficient mental strength would break down completely and even go insane. Therefore, it was normal and even necessary to train by starting small, with a radius of about an inch, and then maintaining that area of ESP for a few hours to get used to it. Then, slowly expand that area over the course of a long period of time.

But Sarah was a prodigy. When she had started out, she did so with a radius of six inches. And then every increment was added with two inches. The difficulty level was increased dramatically, but Sarah endured, doing twice as much work to increase her ESP Field more than most other telekinetics could handle in the same amount of time.

And now, after eight months, the maximum radius of Sarah's ESP field was nearly one hundred feet; more than enough for almost any sort of close-range battle. Sarah's ESP abilities were astronomically high.

In this battle with Gluttony, it was obvious who the winner was. Within ten minutes after the fight began, Sarah sensed an opening between Gluttony's attacks. She quickly gained control of Gluttony's body, all of it machine, and crushed all of its systems before compacting the robot into a cube.

Sarah smiled. "I'll have to make a trip to the junkyard later," she quipped to herself.

She released her mental field and suddenly collapsed to her knees, groaning and holding her head in pain. Gary and Richie ran over to her, but she waved them away.

"Don't worry about me. I just have a headache. I'll be fine in a few minutes, just let me rest."

As Sarah kneeled there under the worried gazes of Richie and Gary, she thought to herself, it's a good thing I finished it quickly. One hundred feet is my absolute limit. I should just stick to fifty from now on. Increasing the area of ESP only tires me out.

Damian's fight barely took him a few minutes. Unlike the others, he did things quickly, with a mercenary-like attitude.

After dodging two of Vigo's Aura attacks, both of which would have given him surprising damage even in his former state, Damian recognized when Vigo was trying to focus for a psychic attack.

True enough, Vigo unleashed a near-blizzard of rocks and dust, coupling it with a few rebounding shots of Aura that bounced towards Damian to catch him by surprise.

Damian only grinned and released a huge surge of silver Aura that consumed everything that Vigo threw at him. Vigo was blown backwards by that enormous blast, and when he came to, Damian was standing in front of him, grinning wickedly.

"Say good night."

That was the last thing that Vigo heard before Damian's Aura Razor cut his head off.

Victor and Envy clashed viciously, chain hook on claw, each dual-wielding their respective weapons as they advanced, retreated, and advanced again in turn. Envy, like the others, had not increased in strength at all in his time dead. He had, however, changed his attitude. Or rather, it had been changed by forces beyond Envy's control.

What was once a man as battle-hungry as Victor was was now an empty husk moving only on what was more or less muscle memory under Syntalius's control. Although his skill had not decreased at all in death, Victor's training allowed his abilities to surpass Envy's by far.

Although the nearby spectators couldn't tell, Victor was just playing with Envy, even though Envy was fighting at the best his zombified and previously bifurcated body could allow. Envy kept on getting closer and closer, even getting Victor into his claws' striking range several times, but every time that happened, Victor leapt backwards and yanked his chains back with surprising strength, enough to use a hook to parry Envy's attacks and keep him at bay.

Still, Victor had to end the fight quickly. The last parry Victor made was part of the final exchange before Envy's death. As Envy recoiled, Victor used the opportunity to control another chain and shot it towards Envy, looping it around so that the hook was pointing towards Envy's back. The husk whipped around and parried with one claw, then stopped Victor's charge with his second claw. Victor whipped his second arm forward, armed with another hooked chain, but Envy attacked at the same time.

Victor's hook sunk into Envy's shoulder, but Envy's claw merely sunk into a tough coating of Aura that Victor had placed around himself before the battle, as a precaution. While Victor felt the impact, there was no pain, and so while Envy hesitated for an instant, Victor took the chance to send a burst of energy into Envy's body through the chain, blowing off the corpse's arm.

While such an injury would be more than enough to kill almost creature thanks to the shock, Envy was undead, and so required something more. Which was why Victor immediately followed up with another powerful blast point-blank at Envy. When it was done, there was nothing left.

"Odd. He was so excited when we started. Such a man wouldn't normally just die without saying anything," Victor mused. He turned around to grin at May, Max, and Morrison, who suddenly became apprehensive. "Too bad you couldn't keep hiding from me! Rapidash!"

Rapidash raced out of hiding and used Flare Blitz at a spot directly behind the others, who whirled around as the real Envy swore and lost his element of surprise. Envy tried to attack again, but was hindered by the burning flames of the fire horse. Victor disappeared and reappeared in front of Envy, and without another word, brought and stuck three chains into Envy's chest.

Envy coughed up black miasma instead of blood, but his eyes were hateful as he glared at Victor's smug look. "Invisibility of all things? Too bad. I told you we've gone far beyond you."

"YOU BASTARD!" Envy roared, before screaming as Victor injected bursts of energy through his chains once again, before quickly annihilating Envy's body with a point-blank energy blast so the others behind him wouldn't be forever scarred by the sight of a person literally exploding in front of him.

"There it is," Victor commented, before turning to Rapidash and petting his neck. "Good work, Rapidash. Very nice speed and attack power." Rapidash nickered in appreciation at the praise, and Victor laughed before returning it.

"Thanks for holding out for so long before we all got here. Are you all okay?" Victor said to May, Max, and Morrison.

May sighed. "It was scary, to be honest."

Victor smiled, not his Cheshire grin, but a true smile. "It's why we didn't want you to get involved in all this, but all things considered, the way things are now, it was probably better that you knew ahead of time. Who knew this would involve the entire world?" He sighed. "Oh, well. What's done is done."

Victor's ringtone blared out, and Victor cocked his head. "Hm. Let's see who this is."

Marisa was actually having some trouble. She was bleeding from a cut near her neck, and she was flexing the fingers in her left hand to work out the kinks. There was no doubt in her mind as to the reason that Ian was the former leader of Tier 5. Back then, his skill was even greater than Ash's and his power surpassed Leon's. It had taken Marisa and her allies months to reach their present level, and yet the eight-month dead Ian was still holding his own against her, as if he had been training in the land of the dead.

But still, Ian couldn't as easily defeat Marisa as he could back when he was her leader. Marisa's powers had increased dramatically, just like those of her friends, and instead of the easy defeat Ian had expected, Marisa quickly had him on the ropes.

What had happened? Ian had landed the first few blows easily enough, but after that...he couldn't seem to hit her. Marisa smirked at his growing impatience. As respectful as his power and progress was, Ian was no serious match for her.

But she was not like the battle-hungry males in her group. She had to finish this as quickly as possible so that she could regroup with her friends. "Sorry, Ian...but this fight is mine!" She leapt clear away from Ian's Aura Scythe, stuck three fingers into her mouth, and let out a shrill whistle, laced with particles from her Aura Voice. The Orange Island Gym Leaders recoiled and frantically plugged their ears at the harsh sound, but the brunt of the attack was directed at Ian, who had rushed in and reacted too late.

The viciously sharp sound cut deeply into Ian's ears, and he cried out as his eardrums were perforated. This was far more than enough opening for Marisa to finish the job. She raced up to Ian, spread her hands against his chest, and quickly annihilated the majority of his body with a blast of yellow Aura.

Marisa burned the rest with another blast, and she sighed as her former leader went to rest for a second time.

Drake and the other leaders ran up to congratulate and thank the girl, but she fell to her knees, her face in her hands. The Orange Island leaders were surprised at this sudden development, but Drake went to address their concerns. "Are you alright, miss?"

"H-he was our leader...he didn't deserve this horrible fate…why did it have to be me?" Marisa sniffled.

Blissey emerged from Marisa's Poke Ball and hugged her. Marisa hugged back, burying her face into her favorite Pokemon's warmth.

The gentlest of souls within our group...and that's even when compared to Anabel and Sarah. Priscilla's voice suddenly sounded in Marisa's mind.

Well, it's not exactly a bad thing. Will you be okay, Marisa? Anabel asked.

Yeah...I'll be okay. Thank you both for caring. But how are you guys doing?

We both used the same methods to win, actually, Lust and Sloth's powers both relied on their minds more than anything else, Priscilla said.

So all we did was shut down the majority of their capabilities and rendered them completely harmless before erasing the memory of even being brought back to life. Natural body processes did the rest, Anabel explained.

Eww...did you at least bury them?

Priscilla scoffed. Of course! I couldn't have Lust's body just rotting in the street!

I just asked Celebi to return Sloth's body to a point in time where it was still buried. Time travel is oddly convenient that way, Anabel commented.

Marisa laughed out loud and wiped her eyes. "Thank you. I'll meet you guys at the Tree of Beginning."

We'd better hurry. Something's going on with Leon, Anabel said.

Leon was angry...

No, he was furious. "They don't deserve this...they weren't even on your side to begin with!"

Unlike the others, he had two opponents to deal with. By themselves, they weren't a threat to him, but together… "Do bonds of love persist even after death, Cardinal?!" Leon roared as Cardinal Chang knocked aside Leon's lance, protecting Miss Temple's unconscious body.

Cardinal Chang responded only with a rasping growl as he slashed at Leon. Unfortunately for him, his powers hadn't grown enough in death to match Leon's abilities, and Leon effortlessly avoided every single attack.

Until Miss Temple woke back up. Leon felt the instant her powers began to affect him, because Cardinal Chang's red sword sliced a shallow wound into his arm when he tried to dodge. Leon backstepped a few times, putting some distance between him and Chang, but Miss Temple, using all the strength her telekinesis would allow, restrained him somewhat.

"Stop this! Try to break free, Cardinal Chang, Miss Temple! I don't want to have to fight you!"

"You...killed us…"

"What?!" Leon started at Chang's rasp.

"You...let us die. We...trusted...you…" Miss Temple's neck creaked as she turned towards Leon. "Whyyyy?"

Leon had lost all patience, and roared as he released a surge of green Aura to blow the other two away. As Cardinal Chang and Miss Temple recoiled, Leon prepared and aimed his hands at them. "I won't waste my time explaining myself to you two. All you need to know as I return you to rest is that I never meant for anything to happen to you. Goodbye!"

With that, Leon completely annihilated Cardinal Chang and Miss Temple with an incredible amount of green energy, far more than necessary to destroy their bodies. It was enough to engulf the clearing in dense green Aura, but Leon had to make absolutely sure that he left no loose ends.

"You guys can blame me in the afterlife as much as you want. We'll settle things in about eighty years," Leon snarled, once the dust cleared.

"That was too much power, Leon," Ash called as he flew in on Charizard.

"They didn't deserve what happened to them. The least I could do is make there was no more part of them that could suffer under Syntalius's control," Leon retorted.

"Fair enough," Ash agreed. "But still, there's still a chance that they blame you for their deaths. Humans aren't exactly known for being rational when dealing with each other."

Leon sniffed. "As I said, they can settle things with me in about eighty years. They'll probably even save me a spot in Hell to do just that."

Ash chucked and clapped his friend on the shoulder. "Don't go dying on us yet. We still need you. At least stay alive for Sarah's sake."

"That goes without saying. Anyway, what's our next move?" Leon asked.

Ash extracted his communicator. "Two options. Stay on standby at the Tree of Beginning, or attack Volans Forta directly, which should be on its way here anyway." He contacted each of their allies in a shared group chat, and waited for their faces to come up.

"We're attacking Volans Forta," Ash said once they were connected.

"We'll be on our way momentarily. Just let us finish up," Anabel replied.

Ash smirked. "Oh, sweetheart, you misunderstand. I meant…"

"I know what you meant. I can't really stop you both from here, now can I?" Anabel replied, with almost the same smirk as Ash's.

"Can you at least try?" Sarah asked, although the smile on her face showed an entirely different emotion from worry.

"Even if Anabel and I worked together to knock them out from a distance, they'd either wake up too early and go ahead anyway, or too late to help us," Priscilla explained.

Victor sighed. "Just go. But make it flashy," he encouraged with his Cheshire grin.

"No. Don't make it flashy," Marisa demurred.

"We're wasting time. Good luck to you both. We'll be there to back you up soon," Damian said, before cutting off his connection.

"He's not lying. We're all more or less done here. See you at Volans Forta?" Sarah asked.

Leon blew a kiss at her as he released Aerodactyl. "It's a...let's say quadruple date?"

Priscilla only scoffed before cutting off her connection. Damian chuckled. "I'm sure all of you are dying to know why I haven't courted her yet…"

"Not now, Damian. We'll tease you two later. See you all in a bit," Marisa cut off her connection, followed by each of the others. Damian was the last, cutting his off with a whimsical sigh.

"I swear, he's changed way too much since he joined up with us," Leon commented.

"We're all a bunch of characters, Leon. Too much insanity does that to a guy," Ash pointed out. Raichu nodded in agreement.

"We should get moving," Leon said, climbing onto Aerodactyl. Then his face lit up in excitement as he saw Volans Forta in the distance. "Hey, Ash...I have an idea of how to make this operation a little more fun."

Ash smiled as Charizard took flight. Aerodactyl followed. "Shoot."

Leon told him, and Ash grimaced. "Seriously?"

Leon nodded excitedly, almost like a child, and Ash sighed before smiling, just as excited at the prospect as he thought it over. "Yeah...while we're not here for fun, there's no reason why we shouldn't. You have something in mind?"

"Definitely. Remember that movie we saw while we were preparing for that reunion party that went bust? The one that came out just after we got Damian and Priscilla on our side?"

Ash smiled. "No way."

"Oh, yeah…"

"You didn't."

"I did. Just before we left with your dad." Leon held out his communicator. "All we need is right here."

Ash grinned. "Yeah. This is going to be FUN."

Ash and Leon easily managed to sneak past the guards patrolling Volans Forta's exterior, and snuck in through a side window. They almost barreled right into more guards, but Raichu had gone ahead and quickly silenced all of them with a quick but powerful jolt of electricity. Not enough to kill them, but enough to knock them out for at least a few hours.

A few hours was more than enough for Ash and Leon to race to their destination, which was not the security room as most would expect, but the communications room. Leon sent Luxray in along with Raichu to subdue all the guards within. The two Electric-Type Pokemon did so with superb teamwork and skill, having become much more powerful due to training. When Ash and Leon entered, their two Electric-Types were standing at the microphone, ready for Leon's plan to be implemented.

Leon plugged his communicator directly into the main computer and moved around the files he needed. It took nothing more than a minute, after which he disconnected his device and grinned at Ash. Ash grinned back as he let out Gallade, Sceptile, and Glalie, while Leon released Infernape, Swampert, and Shiftry.

Leon moved the microphone closer to the speakers on the computer. He clicked a certain file, and while it loaded, he grew more and more excited. "Let's get this party started," he chuckled, before switching on the microphone.

All of the Aura Psychicorum agents scattered around Volans Forta looked up, ready for an announcement as the microphone feedback screeched for a moment. All of those agents became confused when some music blared out.

Iestyn sat in his room, and while the other agents were confused, he grinned. "They're here."

Yes, yes, I know it's been two and a half years, but since I updated last time, all of my ideas have become outdated, so pressure to update wasn't particularly high for me, mostly because I wasn't too sure how I wanted to go about this chapter.

That is, until I suddenly got an idea. And now it's here. Have fun looking forward to the next one.

Leave a comment below if you so wish.