[attr="class","newworldimg2"]

this is just a whole lot of fancily-worded backstory for why the heck lance is taking a nap in the middle of? old veherna? look, he feels really bad about imum, okay. he feels really bad about a lot of things. his narcissism-to-guilt scale has been tipped in the favor of the latter for a while now. *nods head sadly*

It was not his ere. Truly, in a heartbeat, Lance would have denounced the monsters who had taken up his former mantel, would have aided in the fight as he had against the Rockets back in Johto all those years ago; the blood of their crimes did not stain his hands, and the repercussions that would follow could not be placed on his shoulders. It was not his ere. And yet, despite it all, he could not help but feel compelled to atone for those mistakes had had not made, justify the crimes he had not committed. In small ways. Big ways. Whatever could be done. An onlooker may have thought that it made him all the more suspicious (for to onlookers, mentalities were not so easily changed, and who more likely to do evil than the man who had defined it eleven years prior?), but a second spared thought should have banished such doubt. The people to blame would not try to justify their wrongdoings. Not yet, anyway. He know that with certainty, the kind that only first-hand experience could afford, and while he would be quick to forgive a change of heart in the misguided a year, perhaps two from now, any “change-of-heart” now meant nothing past the lips that spoke them. They would not make up for their joint role as executioner. That was precisely why it fell on him to do it for them. In a way, he had inspired them, no matter the fact that he had no meant to by any stretch of the imagination, and for that alone, some burden of responsibility was to be beared. More importantly, however, was that human refugees were far from the only sort that littered Lyeant's shattered face. The Association could only do so much to spare the straggling Pokemon who had lost their habitats, their homes, to iradication in their name that they had never asked for. Whatever they couldn't, then, he would in their place.[break][break]

Due punishment. A burden he would shoulder gladly.[break][break]

The problem lied in that, while there were injured and needing Pokemon out there in the rubble numbering in the hundreds, perhaps even the thousands, there was only one him. The aid of his own Pokemon was well-needed and well-appreciated, but underdog stories only worked out well in the end in fiction (or with PokeDex in hand), and one-turned-seven did not tilt the odds much more in their favor. The Dragon Master had helped many, no doubt, but it had taken its toll – and it still wasn't enough. Too many left wounded, starving, scared. Fatigue dragged at him like water logged, but it was little more than an itch in comparison to that which was faced by the Pocket Monsters of the region. He could see them, in his mind's eye, and the powers bestowed on him by the Viridian Forest weren't necessary for him to feel their suffering as his own. So he pushed, and he pushed, further than most would dare -[break][break]

And eventually he collapsed, as those who push themselves past their limits do, a bundle of black clothe and carmine hair toppled over in the ruins of Old Veherna. Lady Luck afforded him the company of his Dragonite and Dragonair prior to his world being swallowed in black – the former of which stayed to keep watch and the latter of which took to the air to find aid – but such company was hard to enjoy while taking an unintended “cat nap” in dangerous territory. At best, he'd wake up sore and no less exhausted; rubble for a bed tended to have that effect.