A hidden realm

Time slipped by little by little. The sun had begun sinking in the west, and everyone gradually stopped battling and started pitching their tents, preparing somewhere to sleep that night. Xiao Ran, however, slipped away from the group, found a secluded corner, changed into his swimsuit, and followed Popplio and Froakie down toward the bottom of the lake.

"Popplio? It's not far, right? I can't hold my breath for very long!" Xiao Ran asked with a hint of worry before entering the water. He hadn't brought diving equipment on this impromptu trip. With his normal lung capacity, five minutes underwater was about his absolute limit. Fortunately, since they were camping beside a lake, he had brought a swimsuit.

"Arroo!" Popplio kept gesturing, and after watching for a while, Xiao Ran roughly understood.

"It's close? Then it should be fine." Xiao Ran nodded, put on his goggles, and jumped into the water.

With Popplio and Froakie leading the way, Xiao Ran descended quickly. Before long, however, his brows furrowed. The two Pokémon soon led him into an underwater cave, where he could distinctly feel water surging out. He tried tasting a little, and its saltiness made it unmistakably clear where the seawater in Sweet Spring Lake was coming from.

With seawater pouring out from here this forcefully, it should spread through most of Sweet Spring Lake. No wonder the water throughout the lake has changed, Xiao Ran thought, studying the cave's position in relation to the entire lake.

But this looks like an enclosed cave. Where is all this seawater coming from? As Xiao Ran studied the cave, his gaze was suddenly drawn to a symbol on its wall.

Hmph! So they really were behind this. There's definitely something strange going on in here. Xiao Ran snorted and, without lingering, motioned for Popplio to continue deeper inside.

Popplio and Froakie had already been inside this cave, so Xiao Ran wasn't worried about an ambush by the Hall. Otherwise, they could hardly have let a starter Pokémon like Popplio leave unharmed.

Once he entered the cave, everything went pitch-black. There was already little light underwater, and even less inside the cave. Fighting the powerful current, Xiao Ran rounded a bend and was about to take out the underwater flashlight he had prepared when the sight before him left him stunned.

At the end of the cave stood something like a mirror as tall as a person. On the other side lay an azure world, with churning, swirling seawater pouring continuously through the mirror. Clearly, the world beyond it was beneath the ocean.

"Glub!" Xiao Ran choked on a mouthful of water and abruptly snapped out of his daze. He beckoned to Popplio and Froakie, then let the current carry him swiftly back out of the cave.

Splash! "Cough, cough!" Breaking the surface, Xiao Ran clung to the shore and coughed for quite a while. That brief lapse in attention had made him choke on several mouthfuls of water. Yet even after he recovered, the thought of what he had just seen left his heart racing.

A hidden realm. A completely new hidden realm that no one had ever discovered. Every hidden realm meant limitless resources and wealth, and one had appeared right beside him.

No wonder people from the Hall showed up here. Nobody would readily let such a lucrative prize slip away, Xiao Ran thought.

Everyone knew that Pokémon hadn't originally lived in this world. They had a world of their own, but after nearly a thousand years of reproduction, they had become no different from Earth's native creatures. There was no dispute whatsoever about where Pokémon had first come from: hidden realms. All the first Pokémon had emerged from hidden realms, which could be understood as other, genuinely existing miniature worlds.

Nobody knew how hidden realms formed, and their appearances followed no pattern. There were many theories about them. One held that the Pokémon's original world had suffered catastrophic destruction and ultimately fragmented into countless smaller worlds. Few people accepted this theory, however, because beyond a world lay the endless starry sky, whereas beyond a hidden realm lay storms of nothingness. Touching them meant death, and even the strongest Legendary Pokémon dared not cross them lightly.

Another theory held that these hidden realms were trapped within a space-time passage, locked at particular space-time nodes, which explained the endless void storms outside them. Then, whenever a node briefly connected, an entrance to a hidden realm would form on Earth, allowing creatures from both worlds to pass back and forth. As for why these space-time passages always appeared on Earth, it was because Earth had been the original destination of the entire Pokémon world.

Whatever the theory, one thing was certain: the Pokémon's original world had indeed been destroyed, and that world must have had some connection to Earth. It might even have been trying to flee to present-day Earth, only for some unknown accident along the way to prevent it from arriving as intended. Instead, it had been destroyed during the journey.

"Froakie, go find Lingling," Xiao Ran said after taking a moment to recover. Sweet Spring Lake was enormous, and the spot where he had climbed ashore was some distance from the class campsite, making him difficult to spot.

"Froak!" Froakie answered, then turned and jumped back into the lake, swimming toward Ye Ling. Meanwhile, Xiao Ran's thoughts remained fixed on the hidden realm he had just seen.

He didn't care how hidden realms formed, but the benefits they offered directly concerned him. The most immediate advantage was that Popplio could train in genuine seawater. It was a marine Pokémon, after all, and staying away from the sea for too long was bad for its growth. Xiao Ran was even planning to get a Dive Ball when he had the chance, to solve the problem of Popplio's everyday living environment.

Besides the ocean, every Secret Realm was equivalent to a small world. Even setting aside all the resources that could have accumulated over so many untouched years, the new land alone offered enormous profits through development. There might even be entirely new, unknown Pokémon inside that had never appeared before.

I'd better send Dad a message. After thinking it over, Xiao Ran took his Pokédex out of its waterproof pouch and sent a message to his father, who was far away.

A Secret Realm like this wasn't something a handful of high school students could keep to themselves. Once the Alliance's people arrived later, the place would surely be taken over in no time. Without making preparations beforehand, they could very well end up empty-handed, having done all the work for the Alliance for nothing.

Concerned that his father might not receive the message, Xiao Ran decided that wasn't reliable enough and sent messages to his mother and maternal grandfather as well. His mother worked at the breeding center in Nancheng, while his grandfather was an authority at a research institute. With them making preparations ahead of time, nobody else would easily snatch away the prize already within his grasp.

"Little Ran? How did it go?" By the time Xiao Ran finished all that, Jiang Cheng and the others had arrived.

"Ummm... it's a bit serious. You brought your phones, right? Get ready to message your families!" Xiao Ran said helplessly once they reached him.

"Huh? It's so serious we need to get our families involved?" They looked astonished. They had never seen Xiao Ran consider going to his parents when something happened.

"Cover your mouths, and make sure you don't make a sound, no matter what you hear! Lingling, be ready to shut them up at any moment!" Xiao Ran said gravely.

"Okay!" Ye Ling simply nodded without another word, raising her hands slightly, ready to clamp them over the other two's mouths at any moment.

"So mysterious..." Jiang Cheng muttered, reluctantly covering his mouth. But the moment he heard what Xiao Ran said next, his eyes widened.

"What did you say? A..." Before Shen Yue could finish, Ye Ling had already covered her mouth. Jiang Cheng received the same treatment on the other side, except Froakie simply slapped him.

"Ow, go easy! Little Ran, are you sure you didn't mistake it for something else? It really is a... you know?" Jiang Cheng no longer even cared about the pain in his face. His eyes were filled with disbelief.

"Exactly! It's unbelievable. There's actually..." Even after calming down, Shen Yue's little face was flushed. She could barely imagine something like this happening.

The number of Secret Realms around the world was known. Apart from the eight super-sized Secret Realms considered world-class, every remaining realm, from miniature to small, medium, and large, had a number and a record. Over nearly a thousand years, only around a thousand Secret Realms with stabilized passages had appeared in their country. On average, that meant just one new Secret Realm appeared nationwide each year. Yet now, a completely new one had appeared right before them. The odds were even lower than winning the lottery.

"I didn't go inside, but the exit on the other side is underwater. The opening is about as tall as a person and as wide as someone's outstretched arms. As for how deep in the ocean that Secret Realm exit is, I don't know, but it probably isn't very deep," Xiao Ran explained quickly.

"You were able to keep your footing, so the difference in water pressure couldn't have been large," Ye Ling quickly reasoned.

"Exactly. That's what I thought too. So, do you think you need to message your families now? I've already notified my grandfather and my mother. I also found the Hall's symbol at the entrance to the Secret Realm, so I messaged an Alliance Investigator as a precaution," Xiao Ran said calmly, seemingly already certain of how things would unfold.

"Whoa... yes! Absolutely! Yueyue, you send one too!" After hearing Xiao Ran's explanation, Jiang Cheng dropped his joking manner and spoke with a serious expression, even reminding Shen Yue beside him.

Coming from a merchant family, he naturally understood why Xiao Ran wanted them to notify their families. This wasn't the time to act on emotion, nor was asking their families for help like running home to their parents after losing a fight. In the adult world, interests were what mattered. Now was the time to use their family backgrounds to secure the greatest possible benefits for their families.