The temperature in the room seemed to drop.
Dark clouds moved behind Giovanni’s eyes.
On the video feed, Ariana, Archer, Apollo, and Lambda all dropped their casual manner and straightened.
Giovanni composed himself quickly.
Lance leading the Kanto League, plus a large force of unknown Trainers.
“Which faction do those Trainers belong to?” Giovanni asked.
The Kanto League?
No.
The League could not have mobilized that many people in this timeframe.
“Unknown.” Matori continued reading from the emergency report.
“Satellite imagery puts their number at over two thousand.
And from what we can tell, the Kanto League is actually trying to stop them from landing as well.”
“Their movements are completely disorganized.
They don’t behave like League Trainers, and they’re definitely not our people.
A large portion of them have already broken through the League’s blockade and are pushing against the island’s outer defenses.”
“A mob,” Lambda said coldly.
“A mob that shows up at exactly the right moment,” Apollo said with a short laugh, though his tone carried no actual amusement.
“That’s quite a coincidence.”
“Coincidence.” Giovanni’s smile held no warmth.
He stood and moved to the floor-to-ceiling window, looking out toward the direction of the ocean.
“New Island garrison activates maximum alert immediately.
All defensive installations go live.
No one reaches the laboratory.”
“Additionally, recall all available Team Rocket forces from the surrounding waters.
Clear the scattered Trainers who have already landed, then hold Lance and his group back until I arrive.”
“Boss.” Matori hesitated.
“If you appear in person, it means open confrontation with the Kanto League.
That will make future operations considerably more difficult.”
“I will not allow anyone to prevent Mewtwo’s awakening.” The ambition in Giovanni’s eyes burned clear and cold.
“Once the Mewtwo Initiative is complete, even Lance will not be able to stand against us.
All of Kanto will fall under Team Rocket’s control.”
“Yes sir.” Matori turned and left immediately.
The room was left with Giovanni and the four executives on the video feed.
Viridian Gym was airtight.
Every person inside was a trusted Team Rocket operative.
An internal leak was effectively impossible.
The Kanto League never moved without concrete evidence.
They did not take risks on suspicion alone.
Someone who knew New Island’s location, understood the full scope of the Mewtwo Initiative, and could mobilize over two thousand Trainers in a single night.
All three conditions together.
The intelligence and planning behind that combination was deeply unsettling.
“Whoever this is, they’ve buried themselves well,” Archer said quietly.
Not their identity, not their objective.”
Giovanni was silent for a long moment, sorting through every recent anomaly in his mind.
Then something surfaced.
Reports had been filtering in over the past weeks about a sudden influx of strangely behaved Trainers appearing across the Kanto region, moving in loose groups, operating outside any known faction, never declaring allegiance to anyone.
Their target had been New Island from the beginning.
“An old enemy who has been waiting, or a third party entering the game,” Giovanni murmured to himself.
He pushed it aside.
This was not the moment for investigation.
First, hold New Island.
As long as Mewtwo remained secured, whatever was being planned against them could be managed.
New Island’s coastline had become a battlefield.
Players fought independently across the shoreline, move after move lighting up the dark in overlapping bursts of flame, water, and electricity, a brilliant and dangerous web of light that covered the beach.
Team Rocket’s garrison met them with Nidoking, Arbok, Golbat, Feraligatr, Gyarados, and Beedrill, holding the defensive line with everything they had and stopping the first wave of attackers cold.
Ryuji had taken his core team to high ground at the rear and was watching the chaos below with calm, calculating eyes.
“Guild Master, it’s the League, Team Rocket, and every solo player all tangled up together down there.
It looks like an actual war,” one of his members said, staring at the scene below with open amazement.
Ryuji’s mouth curved into a measured smile.
“Good.
We keep waiting.
Let them grind each other down.
When both sides are spent, we move straight for the center and find Mewtwo.
Pass the word.
Everyone holds position and stays ready to strike.”
Out on the water, Lance stood on his Dragonite’s back with his arms crossed, red cape snapping in the wind stirred up by the battle around him.
His investigators and elite Trainers were being pulled in two directions simultaneously.
One side holding back the flood of unknown Trainers still trying to land, the other engaging Team Rocket’s defensive forces head-on.
Move after move crashed against each other across the water and the beach.
Waves surged.
Rock collapsed.
New Island had descended into complete disorder.
“Sir, the situation is deteriorating.”
A League investigator on Pidgeotto swept in close, voice tight with urgency.
“Team Rocket’s fortifications are holding firm.
Their elite Pokémon are matching us evenly, and those unknown Trainers just keep pushing regardless of losses.
We don’t have the numbers.
At this rate we cannot stop anyone from reaching the laboratory.”
Lance was quiet for a moment.
His gaze cut through the smoke and the press of bodies toward the interior of the island, where a cluster of high walls stood fully lit against the darkness.
A pulse of energy, vast and unsettling, emanating from somewhere within those walls.
Mewtwo was in there.
“Split half our forces to tie down Team Rocket’s main strength.
No direct engagement, containment only.” He gave the order without hesitation.
“Everyone else follows me inside.
The experimental facility gets destroyed.”
“Understood.”
Dragonite’s wings opened and it surged forward into the wind, and from its jaws came a torrent of energy that tore upward into the sky.
The night changed.
With a sound like the world cracking open, burning meteors split the air and came down on the Feraligatr line defending the beach.
The explosions rolled across the shoreline.
Feraligatr cried out and were swallowed in dragonfire.
On the high ground behind the fighting, Dragon Ascendant’s players watched in stunned silence.
“So that’s what a Champion-level Pokémon can do,” Ryuji said, his voice low, something burning behind his eyes.
His blood felt like it was running hot.
That attack had been more spectacular than anything he had seen in his life, more like a real meteor shower than a Pokémon move.
“Guild Master, the lead NPC just pushed inside personally.
The League and Team Rocket are fully committed now.
Both sides are taking heavy losses.” The report came in a hushed, electric voice.
Ryuji raised a hand and the murmuring around him stopped.
His eyes sharpened.
“The moment is right.
Follow that NPC in.
Dragon Ascendant, full advance.
Avoid the main engagement.
Target the research facility core.
Whoever finds Mewtwo first is the best player on this server.”
“Move.”
Over a hundred players answered at once.
Pokémon trained to near Gym Leader-level strength appeared across the high ground in a wave.
Using the chaos of the battle as cover, Dragon Ascendant slipped around the edge of the fighting zone and drove straight toward the island’s interior like a blade finding a gap in armor.
The battlefield shifted fast.
Team Rocket’s front-line defenders picked up the movement almost immediately.
“Report.
Large group of Trainers flanking from the west, moving directly toward the laboratory.”
The Team Rocket squad commander’s expression went white.
He pulled units back from the front to respond.
The moment he did, Lance’s assault on the beachhead intensified, and the defensive line broke open.
The chaos spread across the entire island.
On a ridge above the fighting, Ichiyo looked down at the scene below, something bright and focused moving behind his eyes.
“Emboar.
It’s our turn.”