So
you are here to hear one my tales, eh? Have you heard the tale of
Lorelei Belle Winters? No? Well, let me tell it to you, then. I have
collected the first part of her life in a story that I call Hell
Hath no Fury: an Ice Queen’s Saga. I suppose that I should
tell you the basics of what happened to her in that tale. Before I
begin that summation, however, I must inform you of certain things
that appertain to the proceeding tales.
First and foremost, I
shall tell you the tale of Lokrye. It is not a tale to be told
simply, nor lightly.
In time out of mind, he had grown
powerful and he had grown greedy. He wanted to rule the entire world.
The rest of the Titans could not defeat him. The other Titans turned
to the humans and Pokemon of this world, and convinced them to join
the fight against Lokrye.
But Lokrye had turned some of the
Pokemon against the others. He twisted them, in whatever fashion he
had twisted himself. They were powerful, but not very much more
powerful than they were before. This was the origin of the Dark
Type.
Back then, you have to remember, the Psychic types were
still in their homelands—what is today the Engaran Islands.
Only the Menill had traveled away from the Engaran Archipelago. No
one today is quite sure why they left, but I’m sure that you
know that they are the guardians of the shrines of Allnian, Lokrye’s
chief lieutenant.
Anyway, I suppose I should get back to the
story. Lokrye had gathered up his forces, and attacked the Psychic
homeland, and drove them out, knowing that they were the only real
type could be a real threat. The invasion was greatly helped by a
particularly famous Hypno, Engaratronley, a Psychic that Lokrye had
convinced to join his side. In return for his help, Lokrye named the
Engaran Archipelago after him.
After constructing fortresses
on the major islands, Lokrye turned his sights back to the world, and
saw the forces arrayed against him. He knew that if the humans were
united against him, he stood no chance.
So he stole away to
the mainland, and convinced several thousand to join his side. These
men he took with him back to the Engaran Archipelago. Once there, he
saw how agile the human mind was, and appointed them as commanders
over the Pokemon.
Then he turned his attention to Kanto and
Johto. He sent his forces against what is today Kanto and Tintia, and
tore his way to what is now Lavender Town. At that time, Lavender
Town was the major city of the area, and massive fortifications
dominated the landscape. It was there that the Battle for the Ages
was fought. The Titans, led by Colleon, the leader of the Titan
Council; the Pokemon that had been convinced to fight by their side,
led by Lugia and his legions; and the humans, led by a large, strong
man by the name of Gerahid fought Lokrye and his minions for two
weeks. After the battle, all that remained of the fortifications was
a single tower. Today it is called the Pokemon Tower.
In the
battle, millions of Pokemon, humans, and Titans fell. But Lokrye was
eventually defeated by a mere human—the Gerahid of whom I have
spoken before. But Lokrye was not killed—he was far too
powerful for that. The remaining Titans banded together, and banished
the Corrupted Titan to a nether-realm—neither here nor there.
Lokrye’s twisted creations were banished to an island north of
what is today Tintia, near the island of the Dragons.
Gerahid
and his men traveled with the Psychic Pokemon to attempt to retake
their home islands, but Lokrye’s minions, not knowing that
their master had been defeated, stood their ground, and repulsed
Gerahid and the Psychics. Of these battles, many tales and songs have
been made, so I do not feel that I need to say anything more of
this.
For several thousand years, there was relative peace.
The Titans left this world not long after the battle, but not before
bestowing special gifts upon the humans—powers like those of
Pokemon.
These humans were known as Elites. Their powers were
kept hidden, except in time of greatest need. In fact, not even the
Elites would know that they had the power unless it was a time to be
used. The Titans created the Elites to be sure that if Lokrye ever
escaped, they would have a better chance of defeating him again if
there were non-Pokemon that had powers above that of the Pokemon that
we now call Legendaries.
But I would be remiss if I were to
continue on without telling you of Allnian the Powerful—she was
by far more powerful than the five Immortal Birds combined. Allnian
had the gift—and the curse—of healing. Wherever she went,
she could heal whomever she wanted to—or strike down her
enemies with virulent diseases.
We do not know exactly what
her allegiances were in the afore-mentioned battles, as she changed
sides on a whim. What we do know is that after the battle, she was
banished to the ice and snow of Nuschantz, and was warned by the
Titans to never return to Alto, where she had coerced the islanders
to worship her as a god and had many shrines built in her honor that
are today attended to today by the Menill.
What? You do not
know of Alto? My, my…I can not believe this! I must tell you
all about her. Formerly known as the “Jewel of the North,”
Alto is the Avian capital of the world. What? You don’t know
what an Avian is? An Avian is a bird! Big birds, little birds—from
Pidgey and Dodrio to Altaria and Tropius—if it’s a
Bird-type Pokemon, or if it can fly, at least two hundred of the
breed live on the island. Legend tells that Alto is also where the
magnificent Ho-oh the Vengeful, the Light-Giver, first appeared, and
it is well known that the other four immortal birds—Articuno
the Wise, who, as I’m sure you know, originated from Nuschantz,
Zapdos the Peace-Bringer, Moltres the Light-Bringer, and Lugia the
Water Warlord—took roost there in the times before man
subjugated their Pokemon brethren.
Alto is a wonderful place,
and holds the distinction of having the second Pokemon League ever.
Five months after Kanto established its League, Alto established its
own, and was followed closely by Johto. The Pokemon Leagues
distinguished themselves as the ultimate rite of passage. Those who
thought that they were ready would set out on a Pokemon journey with
but a single Pokemon companion (in those days, the starter Pokemon
were merely friends of the PokeCatcher, not a slave), and traverse
the entire country to collect a series of 8 devices that were the
forerunners of Pokeballs, using the same basic technological concept
that we still do today. Those that attempted this challenge were
called PokeCatchers. With these horribly expensive devices, the early
trainers would capture additional Pokemon. This was before Pokemon
developed resistances to PokeCapture technology. Back then, if a
PokeCatcher hit a Pokemon, it was instantly caught, unless it was
impossibly strong—in which case it would tear you to shreds
before you could run five yards.
The early trainers who
collected and used all eight PokeCatchers, as they were called, that
they were given, would then be inducted into the League of Pokemon
Masters. Hundreds of young men set out on the journey each year—only
a handful survived the journey.
Pokemon training was viewed as
too dangerous for any real use. Back then, it was. But this was
before the Psychic Pokemon traveled to what is today Kanto and
Johto—before then, most of them had lived in the Orange Islands
with Grass and Water-type Pokemon. These powerful beings upset the
fragile balance between the humans and the Pokemon that had ensued,
and thus began the second Great Pokemon War, the first being the War
of Lokrye, nearly a millenium before.
There are many tales I
could tell you of the interceding period, but my purpose is to give
you information about Lorelei, as she was a very important person in
recent history.
The war stalemated—led by the Psychics,
the Pokemon were held at bay by the technology that humans had at
their disposal. Though limited, it was enough. Then the war turned
against the Psychics, as a new form of Pokemon, the Steel type, was
discovered by a group of humans that had been driven North to the
very Ocean that separated them from Alto. The Psychics had hoped to
trap them between themselves in the South, and Dragon Isle in the
North. But they had forgotten about another island just north of what
is today Kanto. They had forgotten about Dark Isle.
You have
to remember until very recently, all the different types were
separated, and didn’t mix well with each other. Only the
Pokemon League, and the catching and releasing of Various Pokemon
into alien environments changed this. It is rumored in legend that
Dark Isle was the birthplace of Lokrye, the Dark Titan and now it is
forever tainted.
When the humans, trapped on the Northern
shore, traveled out into the sea to find what refuge they could, they
found two islands. Dragon Isle—all who tried landing there were
killed—and Dark Isle. A Psychic Pokemon attack caught the
humans just as they were landing, but the Psychics were repulsed by
the Dark-types that inhabited the islands.
The humans formed
an alliance with the Dark-types, and together, the humans and the
Dark-types left the island and began a counter-attack. The human
technology, combined with the Dark-type ability to resist Psychic
attack, decimated the Pokemon forces. The Psychics and the other
Pokemon negotiated a Peace Treaty, the bulk of which is what is now
known as The Agreement—ten rules that Pokemon Masters, and
anyone else with a PokeCatcher had to agree to, or they were fair
game for all Pokemon to kill.
Since then, not much has
happened in the arena of human-Pokemon relations. However, the humans
in the country of Effeular and the Pokemon therein never agreed to
The Agreement. The country has been at war for more than a century,
and shows no sign of stopping.
Whenever the humans discover a
new form of technology to fight against the Pokemon, the Pokemon
invariably get more support from their brethren, and the table evens
out, and the balance of power sometimes even turns back against the
humans.
However, as amazingly resourceful as humans are, they
are also all inherently greedy. And that greed causes them to form
alliances against one another and claim territory. This has caused
numerous inter-human wars, and also many difficulties.
One
such division exists in the icy nation of Nuschantz. Known as the
Skiing capital of the world, Nuschantz is a mainly frigid nation on
the northern part of the continent of Multipol. However, having a
coast, some of the coastal areas are temperate, or even tropical
right on the ocean. Nuschantz, as mentioned before, is the home of
Allnian the Powerful and the birthplace of Articuno the
Wise.
However, it is also home to two rival human factions—the
Resorters and the Nomads. The Resorters, as is self-explanatory, have
set up and run a series of retreats around the nation for the
enjoyment of tourists who come to the country to ski and enjoy the
snow and cold. These bastions of what the Resorters call “culture”
are massive, sometimes miles in diameter. In addition, they also have
tropical resorts on the northern coast for tourists that prefer a
balmier setting. In fact, a Tropical Resorter (a faction to
themselves within the Resorter faction) owns the Sea Princess Cruise
Line, who owns such ships as the S.S. Anne, the S.S Abigail, and
others. The Resorters as a whole believe that because they are richer
in international currency, they have the right to be the recognized
government.
However, the other faction, the Nomads, are a more
traditional people, and actually the original inhabitants of the
mountainous region. They live much as their ancestors did for
centuries—by subsistence on what little natural resources there
are available. When the Resorter's predecessors first came north from
Effeular, Acquar (a desert country that is almost completely below
sea level), and Sintaur (a country populated almost entirely by horse
lovers and horse Pokemon) the Nomads welcomed them and gave them
land. But when the massive resorts were built, the Nomads became more
and more uneasy.
When the Resorters declared that they ran the
country, the Nomads were enraged, and declared war on the Resorters.
A long and bloody war followed, but the Nomads just didn't have the
technological advantages that the Resorters did. The Nomads then
split into two camps—one, the conservative Nomads, and the more
radical Nomads. The conservatives retreated deep into the mountains
and lived as best they could between the ever-expanding Resorters and
Pokemon too powerful for the Nomads to handle. The radical Nomads
travelled to other countries to garner support for their cause, and
tried to form a political party called the Blizzard Party. However,
the Resorters refused to recognize them, and this drove most of the
radical Nomads, after a decade of being ignored by the Resorters,
decided to take back the country by force. Those that were outside
the country and had worked for some time and some had amassed a large
amount of money. Those that had formed an organization, based in
Hoenn, called Devon Corporation, named after a famous Tintian woman,
whose story will not be told here. This broke the monoploy that Silph
Company had enjoyed previously, and the two organizations battled
each other, figuratively, of course, to see who could make better
products.
With the revenue from Devon Co, the Blizzards bought
weapons and technology equal to and, in some cases, greater than the
Resorters, and formed an organization based on the old standings of
the former Blizzard Party, and called themselves Team Blizzard. They
dedicated themselves to freeing Nuschantz from what they called “the
oppression of the Resorters” and declared war on the self-same
group.
The Resorters branded them terrorists, and returned the
declaration. The Blizzards, however, managed to push back the
Resorters out of an area nearly fifty miles in area before their
advance stalemated. That was fifteen years before the start of my
story. Since then, the Blizzards have withdrawn into the territory
that they now have, planning an even bigger offensive to retake all
of the country that had been theirs.
Devon Co, once just a
front for Team Blizzard, is now a highly successful organization in
tight competition between themselves and Silph Company. However,
there is a new player to the mix—Specter Corporation.
Specter
Corporation was a new company in the period in which most of the
story takes place. Five years before the second and main part (I
won't say what differentiates it, only that the differentiating event
happens early—I don't want to spoil it for you, after all),
Specter Corporation was a small company operating out of Lavender
Town. Then a pair of partners named Blade Starr and Tyrell Dugan
bought the company, and within a year its sales had matched those of
Devon Co and Silph Company.
There are dark rumors whispered in
the night that Silph Company, like Devon Co, is merely a front for
another organization with much different intentions. No one has any
proof of this, but some believe that a group of individuals calling
themselves Specter Shadow Warriors engage in corporate espionage. No
one knew then the scope of the Shadow Warrior's true intentions.
And
even today, not many do.
Well, I believe that I have supplied
you with enough information for you to enjoy my story. Please
enjoy.
—Merlindros, the Psychic Titan