The pressure didn't fade.
It focused.
Cyrus felt it snap inward, like the city itself had taken a sharp breath and decided who mattered.
Him.
Mega Darkrai hovered above Divide City, its fractured halo grinding slowly around its form. Every rotation peeled nightmares loose—shadows rippling across walls, streetlights flickering into unfamiliar shapes.
Cyrus stepped out onto the hotel's external terrace despite every instinct screaming don't.
Wind howled upward, unnatural, pulled toward the thing in the sky.
Hoopa's rings shimmered into existence around him—three this time, unstable, wobbling like coins on edge.
"Big shadow's loud~," Hoopa sang softly. "But not alone~."
Every streetlight flickered between hues—soft bioluminescent blues and pinks stuttering into harsh reds and sickly amber. The glowing mushroom forests on the fairy side pulsed too fast, too bright, their caps flaring like warning beacons. On the dark half, the towering trees twisted, bark cracking as veins of red-yellow light surged violently beneath the surface.
And above it all—
Mega Darkrai.
It hung impossibly high, yet felt suffocatingly close.
Its body was larger than legend ever depicted, stretched and sharpened by the Mega energy warping it. The crescent collar around its head no longer floated cleanly—it rotated in fractured segments, grinding against one another like broken clockwork. Every rotation shed something unseen that rippled outward.
Dreams unraveling.
Nightmares waking up.
Cyrus's breath fogged the glass.
"…So that's new," he murmured.
Gengar floated next to Cyrus low and silent, his usual grin absent. His eyes reflected the sky's distortion, wide and unblinking.
"…Gar," he said quietly.
"I know," Cyrus replied. "I see it."
Another pulse rolled outward.
Somewhere below, alarms began to scream.
Not evacuation sirens.
Psychic distress warnings.
Divide City didn't have many of those.
Hoopa arrived without ceremony.
No flash. No ring-first flourish.
The space beside Cyrus simply folded, and Hoopa slipped out of it like a thought that hadn't finished forming.
Three rings hovered behind him—unsteady, wobbling in uneven orbits.
"Big shadow's yelling~," Hoopa sang softly, but the usual playful lilt was thinner. "Not with words~."
Cyrus didn't look away from the window.
"You feel it too."
"Mmm~."
Another pulse.
This one slammed downward.
People poured into the streets.
Cyrus could see them now—tiny figures scattering, some collapsing where they stood, clutching their heads. Pokémon reacted harder. Fairy-types fled en masse toward the city's center, instincts screaming balance had snapped. Dark-types didn't flee at all.
They gathered.
Watched.
Waited.
That was when Cyrus noticed the stillness.
One figure.
Dead center of the boundary line.
Everyone else ran.
This person didn't.
They stood in the open plaza below, framed by the exact point where pink grass ended and gray began. Where glowing vines faded into bioluminescent roots. Where Divide City refused to choose.
The figure wore a hooded cloak so dark it absorbed the surrounding light, edges blurring as if the fabric rejected the world's rules. Their posture was calm. Reverent.
Slowly—
They raised their hands.
Not shielding their face.
Not signaling distress.
Offering.
Cyrus's stomach dropped.
"Hoopa," he said quietly. "You see that."
Hoopa's rings tightened, stabilizing just enough to stop wobbling.
"…Mhm~."
Mega Darkrai reacted.
Not violently.
Precisely.
Its head turned.
Just enough.
The pressure sharpened.
Cyrus felt something click into place—a truth snapping tight.
"That's not control," he whispered. "That's acknowledgment."
Below, the figure tilted their hood back slightly.
The symbol stitched into the fabric caught the city's fractured light: a circular sigil of layered darkness, broken and asymmetrical, like a moon shattered and stitched together again.
The air around them warped.
Then...
The world narrowed.
Elsewhere in the City:
The noise of the city faded until only the sky remained.
The hooded figure smiled beneath the shadow of their cloak.
"It's beautiful," they breathed. "Without her."
Their voice trembled—not from fear, but awe.
"For centuries, Divide City pretended it was stable," they continued softly. "As if light and dark coexist naturally. As if balance doesn't require… maintenance."
Their hands curled into fists.
A faint shimmer pulsed beneath the cloak—contained, restrained, wrapped in seals layered so thick they hummed.
"Cresselia," the figure whispered. "The jailer disguised as a guardian."
Above them, Mega Darkrai pulsed again—stronger now, its presence tearing at the sky's seams.
"She slept," the figure said reverently. "So he slept."
They laughed quietly.
"Taking you wasn't cruelty. It was honesty."
They lowered their hands.
"Rise," they murmured. "Without chains."
Then they turned,
And stepped into the crowd, their form dissolving into overlapping shadows, vanishing as if they'd never been there at all.
Cyrus
Cyrus's breath came back all at once.
The figure was already gone.
Just another panicked street. Another fleeing silhouette.
But the damage lingered.
"Someone stole Cresselia," Cyrus said, voice flat. "Didn't they."
Hoopa hovered closer, rings chiming softly.
"Took shiny-moon~," Hoopa agreed. "Shadow-moon doesn't like being alone~."
Gengar growled low in his throat.
"…Gar."
Another pulse struck the city.
Windows shattered.
People screamed.
Mega Darkrai descended.
Not fast.
Not slow.
Deliberate.
Cyrus stepped back from the glass as the hotel's safety barriers activated, translucent shields sliding into place. The Axis Atrium's neutral systems struggled—lights flickering as psychic pressure slammed against them.
"This city was built on borrowed peace," Cyrus said quietly. "And someone just called the debt."
Hoopa spun once, rings clicking.
"Not fun if everything breaks~," he admitted.
Cyrus turned to him fully now.
"You don't like this."
Hoopa tilted his head, expression unreadable.
"Too loud~," he said. "Too sharp~."
Cyrus nodded.
"Then help me," he said. "Not as a trick. Not as leverage."
He gestured at the sky.
"As backup."
Hoopa hesitated.
The rings wobbled.
Then one widened—just slightly—locking into place.
"Okay~," Hoopa sang. "But only a little~."
Space bent.
Not tearing.
Folding.
Mega Darkrai stopped descending.
Its eye snapped downward.
Locked onto Cyrus.
For the first time since this began, the nightmare wasn't merely emanating.
It was responding.
Cyrus's pulse hammered, but he didn't look away.
Below, Divide City trembled.
Above, the god of nightmares regarded him.
And somewhere in the crowd, a missing moon slept in chains—while a city stood on the brink of remembering what imbalance truly meant.