Passing through the guarded secret entrance and walking down the passage, one would discover a massive space buried deep within the mountain.
Team Origin had developed and reinforced this place using special methods. The stone walls on both sides were fitted with eerie skull-shaped lamps, each one lit from within by a Litwick. Under the pale blue glow those Ghost-type Pokémon cast, the cave looked less like a terrorist stronghold and more like the meeting hall of some strange cult.
The eerie wailing coming from deeper inside only made the atmosphere worse.
It was a sharp, high-pitched voice laced with pain and screaming, as if something terribly unpleasant was happening further in. Yet the Team Origin members who occasionally walked out of the base, regardless of whether they were men or women, were all barely managing to hold back their laughter.
The ordinary members did not dare to laugh outright. They were all too aware of what Executive Robbin was capable of, and none of them wanted to end up on the receiving end of her revenge later.
As for Robbin herself, she was the frontline executor of Team Origin's Police Officer elimination plan. She was known throughout the organisation as a once-in-a-generation demolition genius and one of the most capable Executives in Team Origin's operations layer. Right now, however, she was completely at the mercy of Rene, who was carrying out the Great Master's orders to the letter and treating her exactly as one would treat a captured member of the Nirvana League.
Her loose outer jacket had been taken from her, leaving her in only her undergarments and a pair of mismatched, brightly patterned stockings. She had been hung upside down from the ceiling of the base by a length of wire that was clearly not well insulated. Rene stood below, controlling a pulley system with one hand to keep Robbin swinging steadily back and forth above him. His other hand rested on the controls of a small motor, carefully managing the output so that every time Robbin opened her mouth to curse at him from above, the wire tied to her ankles would deliver an electric shock.
"Rene! I swear I'm going to kill you! I @#%..."
The moment she started cursing, Rene quietly increased the electrical output. Robbin's words dissolved into a sharp cry that was somewhere between pain and shock, and she went quiet.
Rene was a tall man with a cold, unreadable expression. He wore his hair long, which gave him an unusual look that did not quite match the calm, methodical way he went about his work. Even as he continued to operate the pulley and the motor, he spoke to Robbin in an even tone.
"Robbin, don't blame me. The Great Master gave me this order directly. The Great Master is never wrong, and his instructions are to be followed without question. When you really think about it, this is your own fault. How could you allow yourself to be captured by an enemy at the most critical stage of the plan? You were careless, and carelessness has consequences."
Up on the wire, swinging back and forth like a Surskit on the surface of a pond, Robbin felt a deep wave of frustration wash over her.
Back in Lune Town, that wretched Police Officer shocked me with his Pokémon. Now I'm finally back at the base, and these people are shocking me too. What exactly did I escape for?
Still, the punishment was the Great Master's idea, and Rene, who followed the Great Master's word more faithfully than most Pokémon followed their Trainers, was never going to stop until every condition of the order had been met.
The blood rushing to her head from being hung upside down for so long was starting to blur Robbin's thoughts, but one idea was forming with surprising clarity.
The Great Master was obviously deranged. The young Police Officer who had interrogated her in Lune Town was also clearly not normal. And the two of them had never once appeared in the same place at the same time.
Was that not proof?
The deranged Police Officer and the deranged Great Master were the same person.
Brilliant.
Nova, who was still in Harmony City at that moment, could not possibly have guessed that the reckless, self-destructive Executive he had been so wary of had just placed him and the leader of Team Origin into the exact same category, based on nothing more than a shared talent for being unpleasant.
He was currently making preparations to travel to the Pokémon Factory in Huating City, where he would be collecting his fifth Pokémon. This was not just any addition to his team. It would be the first Starter Pokémon that Nova had chosen for himself in any real, official sense.
For this visit, Nova had asked Kim, the Gym Leader of the Thousand Lakes Gym, for her help. He had only recently met her, but it had not taken long to recognise that her connections within the Norlandia Alliance were valuable. Kim's current Trainer ranking was not yet high enough to compete for the title of Water-type Master of the Alliance, but she had inherited a Class One Gym and was the granddaughter of two Water-type Masters. That background gave her a network that was, frankly, more useful to Nova than even the connections of his own mentor, Mort Cotterill.
Across the entire Norlandia Alliance, there were hundreds of Gyms of various kinds, roughly eighty percent of which were privately run and held no official recognition. Of all the Gyms in the Alliance, fewer than fifty issued badges that could be used toward entry certification for the annual Norlandia Conference. Among those officially recognised Gyms, the vast majority were Class Three Gyms, like Mort's Withered Gym. Only eight Gyms in the entire Alliance held the Class One designation.
That single fact said everything about the standing of the Thousand Lakes Gym and the Luma Gym. A Class One Gym was not simply a battle facility. It was, in many ways, the defining landmark of the city it called home. It shaped the city's reputation, attracted top Trainers, and set the standard for competition in the surrounding region.
Mort's long-held dream was to see his Withered Gym become the ninth Class One Gym officially recognised by the Alliance. He had no illusions about doing it on his own ability. Every hope he had was placed squarely on the shoulders of Nova, the gifted young Trainer he had taken under his wing.
As for why Kim was willing to help, the Psyduck incident had settled that question. She was genuinely glad to do it. Beyond that, the Pokémon Factory in Nivan City specialised in breeding Water-type Starter Pokémon, while the Helie Gym in the same city handled Flying-type and Psychic-type Pokémon. The two operations did not overlap in any meaningful way. Because of that, even though the Pokémon Factory was located in the large international city of Huating, it had always had a closer working relationship with the Thousand Lakes Gym in neighbouring River Delta City. In fact, one of the founding genetic sources used in breeding the factory's Mudkip line had been provided by Kim's grandfather.
Because of that longstanding relationship, Kim held the honorary title of Deputy Director of the Nivan City Pokémon Factory. The title did not involve her in the day-to-day running of the facility, but it meant that arranging for a young Trainer to come in and personally select a Pokémon was something she could handle with a single phone call.
In that sense, this was an investment. Kim, as Gym Leader of the Thousand Lakes Gym, was choosing to put her support behind a young Trainer who was quietly beginning to make a name for himself.
Nova already had a small circle of people who had decided to back him. Mort had been the first, stepping in early and increasing his support over time to the point where his entire future ambition now rested on Nova's progress. Charlie had come next, noticing Nova's abilities during his internship at the Luma Gym and offering him considerable support as a result. Kim did not yet know Nova as well as either of them did, but she was well connected and well informed. She knew that Nova's name had appeared on the list of young talents currently being supported by the Luma Gym. She also knew about Mort's involvement, since he had introduced Nova to her personally by phone. Even setting aside her own assessment, the judgement of Charlie Tucker and the experienced veterans behind the Luma Gym was more than enough for her. The Thousand Lakes Gym intended to become the third party to invest in both Nova and Aresdra.
Aresdra's Psyduck could loosely be counted as her first contribution. The arranged visit to the Pokémon Factory and the selection of the Starter Pokémon would be Kim's second.
With these arrangements settled, Nova spent a late evening at home preparing a large batch of nutritious, carefully made cat food for Prosperity. The Purrloin would be staying home while he and Aresdra made the trip to Huating City, and Nova wanted to make sure she was well provided for.
It was one of the clearest differences between Pokémon and ordinary house pets. A regular cat needed you to fill its bowl or it would go hungry. A Purrloin like Prosperity, on the other hand, was perfectly capable of managing on her own. Nova had even started to wonder whether, given how sharp she was, it might not take much training at all before she could figure out how to warm up her own meals.