Her voice was cool and gentle at the same time. Silver hair fell across her shoulders, her skin pale as jade, a quality of deep calm surrounding her that felt less like composure and more like she had simply been here long enough that nothing could disturb her.
She stood as though she belonged to this place, to the Coronet Highlands themselves. Her eyes were clear and looked through things.
Cogita. The mysterious woman from the legends of ancient Sinnoh. Her identity had always been debated: Cynthia's ancestor, a former Celestica person, a being with an unnaturally long lifespan.
She possessed deep knowledge of Legendary Pokémon and an unexplained connection to Arceus. In the records Lucien knew, she appeared roughly three hundred years before the founding of the modern Pokémon League, when the land was still called Hisui.
But the founding of the League was at least two thousand years away from now. Even for someone with an extraordinarily long life, that gap made no sense.
"My name is Lucien," he said. "I come from the distant land of Unova. I came specifically to visit the Celestica people."
Cogita looked at him with mild surprise. "You seem to recognize me. Have we met?"
"You're not surprised to see me?"
"There is nothing to be surprised about." She looked faintly resigned. "The Sinnoh Lord sent me back thousands of years without a word of explanation. I suspect that has something to do with you." A pause. "Am I here to assist you?"
Lucien stared at her. "I..."
"You appear to be someone displaced from their own time as well," Cogita continued, studying him with those clear eyes. "Though I did not expect the person who would found the Sinnoh League and lead the early coexistence of humans and Pokémon to look quite like this."
Lucien was thoroughly bewildered. "Are you from the future Hisui?"
"It is called Sinnoh," she said. Seeing his expression, she explained with the patient tone of someone who has had to describe something fundamental to many confused people.
"From ancient times to the present is called the universe of space. From the present to the future is called the universe of time. Time and space interwoven: that is the whole. The Sinnoh Lord, the Creator God, exists at the far end of that whole, where time and space meet. He maintains the balance there, so that the world continues and humans and Pokémon may live in peace."
She looked at him steadily. "For someone from another era, this is understandable, I think."
Lucien was quiet for a moment.
"You're saying Arceus, the Sinnoh Lord, sent you from the future to this era?"
"Yes."
Lucien absorbed that.
Arceus had noticed him. A transmigrator operating in this world, altering the course of things. And rather than simply removing the anomaly, Arceus had sent Cogita back to assist him. Which meant Arceus intended to help him complete what he was building. The possibility of that settled over Lucien in a complicated way.
"What does the future look like?" he asked.
Cogita smiled slightly. "Humans and Pokémon will have achieved true coexistence. Trainer culture will flourish. It will be a prosperous and thriving era."
Something in Lucien's chest released. Two thousand years of prosperity, the world he was working toward already existed in the future. He had been moving in the right direction all along.
But the relief brought its own question.
"If that future is already determined, why would Arceus complicate matters further by sending you here?"
Cogita turned her eyes toward Mt. Coronet, as though looking through the clouds to something beyond them.
"The course of history is a river," she said. "But your arrival has diverted it from its original path. You arrived in a mortal body and gained control of multiple Legendary Pokémon. You swept across regions, established governance, and forced several civilizations into a new order ahead of their time. Your path is not history. It is a defiance of the original course."
Lucien's chest tightened.
"The Sinnoh Lord noticed, and the disruption your presence has caused is shaking the fabric of the space-time river," Cogita continued, her voice remaining gentle. "A single misstep, and that prosperous future could collapse, and the world itself could fall into space-time turbulence."
"So he sent you to discipline me?" Lucien's voice dropped slightly. "He wants to eliminate me as a variable?"
"No," Cogita said. "He sent me to protect you."
Lucien blinked.
He had Kyurem. He had Hoopa, who could summon Calyrex, Zacian, and Zamazenta at will. In this world, in terms of raw power, there was very little that could threaten him. He was about to say so when another thought surfaced.
"Is someone planning to kill me?"
Cogita laughed, briefly and genuinely. "I did not expect that the person who unified the regions, founded the League, and is leading humanity and Pokémon toward coexistence would say something like that."
Lucien said nothing.
"Perhaps what the Sinnoh Lord truly wants," Cogita said, her voice softening, "is to establish a deeper connection between you and the Celestica people. You are the one the Sinnoh Lord has chosen. Guiding you is the mission the Celestica people carry."
The tension in Lucien's shoulders eased.
So Arceus was simply... giving him a gift. Support, at exactly the moment it was needed. He thought of the transmigration itself, of the ease with which certain things had come together, rare Pokémon appearing at convenient moments, the abilities he had arrived with, and now a messenger sent from the future to assist him directly.
There were no accidents in the plans of a being who existed at the intersection of all time and space.
Had all of this been arranged from the beginning?
"Was all of it arranged by the Sinnoh Lord from the start?" Lucien asked.
Cogita did not answer directly. "The Sinnoh Lord's will is not something we can presume to interpret. He observes the entire river of space and time. Each arrangement has its own meaning, which we may not see immediately."
Lucien looked at her for a moment.
He decided there was limited value in continuing to think about it. The more useful question was how to work with the Celestica people to develop the Sinnoh Region.
Lucien set aside the larger questions and looked at Cogita directly. "If this is the Sinnoh Lord's intention, then I thank him for his assistance." He moved to the point. "My purpose in coming to Celestica Town is to establish contact with your people, work together, and build a Pokémon League in the Sinnoh Region, guiding the integration of humans and Pokémon here as I have done elsewhere."
Cogita smiled and nodded. "The Celestica people will do everything we can to help."
With that settled, Lucien left the details of the Celestica cooperation in Cogita's hands and returned to Jubilife Village.
In the course of a single day, through Hoopa's rings, enormous quantities of building materials had been transported to the site. When Lucien arrived at Jubilife Village, the gate was already lined with a fully assembled pioneering team.
Elif stood at the front, a group of Unova officials behind him, and behind them a dense formation of workers and Pokémon waiting for the order.
"Your Majesty, you've returned." Elif stepped forward. "Building materials, food, and tools are all ready. Hoopa can activate its rings at any time."
Lucien looked over the formation. On the open ground nearby, Steelix and its companions were pressing boulders into sorted stone blocks. Simisear, Machamp, and the other Pokémon were ready to begin. Braviary's squadron circled overhead for surveillance and aerial transport.
The people who had come from Unova showed no fatigue, only anticipation.
"No need to wait," Lucien said. "We leave now."
The site had already been identified: the Coronet Highlands, with the Celestica people's cooperation, where the Pokémon League headquarters would serve as the center, expanding outward until it reached all of Sinnoh.
Hoopa rose into the air with great enthusiasm. "Leave it all to Hoopa!"
Its hands moved in a circle, and an enormous spatial ring opened. Timber, stone, and sacks of food poured out from the other side in a continuous flow, landing directly on the expanding plain at the foot of Mt. Coronet.
Cogita and the Celestica people were already waiting there, ancient compasses and hide maps in hand. Cogita and several elders bowed as Lucien approached, their eyes carrying the particular reverence reserved for someone the Sinnoh Lord had chosen.
"Lord Lucien, we have selected the location." Cogita pointed toward the mountain range ahead, where it met the plains. "Backed by Mt. Coronet, which blocks the northern cold currents. The land is fertile and defensible. An excellent foundation for a major city."
Lucien looked out across the view: the clear mountain range rising behind, flat open land ahead, the scale of it entirely suited to what he had in mind.
"Good. We build here."
Construction began immediately.
The Celestica people, skilled in ancient geography and spatial planning, determined the city's boundaries and laid out the ritual areas and water channels. The Unova builders brought architectural techniques far ahead of this era, dividing the space into residential, commercial, training, and Pokémon living quarters, systematically and in order.
The Pokémon were the main workforce. Machamp and Conkeldurr lifted massive logs for the city wall framework. Steelix excavated foundations and underground water channels.
Fire-type Pokémon treated the timber against dampness and insects. Exeggutor and Grass-type Pokémon accelerated the greening of the surrounding areas. Kyurem stood at the perimeter, its cold aura radiating outward, keeping dangerous wild Pokémon from approaching.
People and Pokémon worked side by side, voices and Pokémon calls mixing together, dust rising, the sound of something being built where nothing had stood before filling the Coronet Highlands.
Within a few days, a city had risen from the plain.
At its center stood the League headquarters tower, the governing structure for the Sinnoh Region. On one side of the city, a large area of natural forest had been set aside for Pokémon. On the other, squares and training grounds gave people and Pokémon space to interact and grow together.
Lucien stood on a high point and looked out over it.
"Cogita," he said, "what should this city be called?"
Cogita smiled. "You already know the answer."
Lucien looked at the mountain rising behind the city, steady and ancient.
"Coronet City. Backed by Mt. Coronet, this is Coronet City."
The pioneers and their Pokémon let out a cheer that carried across the plain.
Cogita nodded, something quietly satisfied in her expression. "Coronet City. Fitting for the Sinnoh League headquarters." She gestured to several Celestica elders, who stepped forward carrying an ancient hide map inscribed with cinnabar and silver thread, showing the full landscape of Sinnoh's rivers, mountains, and terrain.
"With Coronet City established, the foundation is set," Cogita said. "The Celestica people will assist in two things going forward. First, pacifying the surrounding tribes and bringing them into the alliance under the order of human and Pokémon coexistence. Second, traveling across Sinnoh to spread word of the League's establishment and the peace it represents."
Lucien looked over the map and nodded.
With the Celestica people's help, Sinnoh's development would move considerably faster. With Coronet City as the base, Cogita and the Celestica people assisting, and Kyurem and Hoopa behind the operation, the region would change in ways that none of its current inhabitants could anticipate.
He would also call on Calyrex and Landorus at some point, to demonstrate to the surrounding villages what cooperation with Pokémon could produce for their fields and harvests. Calyrex would not turn down the opportunity to gain more believers.