Darkrai hovered silently in the air, making no move and launching no attacks at Xiao Ran or Ye Ling beside it. It simply remained there.
Lying on the ground, Xiao Ran wore a terrified expression. He seemed to have returned to that scene from years ago.
It had been his first encounter with the darkness of this world, his first sight of splattering blood, his first confrontation with the power and terror of Pokémon, his first time watching a living being vanish before his eyes. For the first time, he had frozen like a child.
Once again, he felt the fear in his heart with painful clarity: fear of death, fear of life slipping away, fear of someone taking Ye Ling from his side.
In his dream, he once again charged desperately toward Ye Ling. He could not let anyone take her away, yet someone dragged him back again.
Once again, despair gave way to collapse. He witnessed his own helplessness, watched Ye Ling being taken away...
Across both his lives, this was the greatest fear buried in his heart.
"Lingling! Lingling!" His unconscious murmuring never stopped.
Only when Ye Ling was taken away, only when that light illuminating the night sky appeared again, did Xiao Ran jolt upright.
"Lingling!" Xiao Ran shouted. Only after seeing Ye Ling unconscious beside him did he gradually calm down.
Only then did he realize how quiet his surroundings were, broken only by the occasional moan of fear.
"What...?" His earlier memories gradually returned, and he immediately understood what had happened.
Darkrai sends people into endless nightmares, but inducing nightmares is merely a defense mechanism. It's unconscious behavior, not something deliberate.
*So the problem lies with that wisp of black mist. Giratina's black mist provoked Darkrai, forcing it into a defensive state where it