Botulinum knew there was only one thing that truly affected General Darkling.

Boredom.

Unlike pain, boredom was something Darkling simply couldn't tolerate. It gnawed at him, stripped away his constant amusement, and left him restless in a way that even violence could not fix.

Botulinum had tested this once.

He had locked Darkling inside a completely empty room—no furniture, no windows, no sound, nothing to entertain him—for an entire day.

At first, Darkling had laughed.

Then he had started talking to himself.

After several hours he had begun pacing like a caged animal, kicking the walls, humming random songs, and attempting to sleep simply to escape the emptiness.

By the end of the day, when Botulinum finally opened the door, Darkling had looked more exhausted than after any physical punishment.

It had been… surprisingly effective.

Darkling knew this too.

So when he heard Botulinum's earlier warning, the wide smile slowly faded from his face. For the first time since the meeting began, he actually looked a little cautious.

Botulinum noticed the reaction but didn't comment on it. For him, the matter was already settled.

Realizing he could finally begin the meeting properly, Botulinum shifted his gaze toward the last general in the room—the only one who had remained completely silent until now.

The man was still wearing his mask.

Even though everyone present already knew what he looked like.

"Phantom," Botulinum said calmly, his voice echoing through the quiet chamber."Give me the monthly report."

General Phantom inclined his head slightly, the pale mask hiding any possible expression. Even in a room full of dangerous people, he had always been the quietest presence among them.

Phantom, Unlike the other generals made no move to remove his mask as he answer.

Everyone in the room already knew what he looked like. The mask served no real purpose among them, yet Phantom continued to wear it at every meeting after the "incident". No one questioned it anymore. They had all heard the story.

months ago—before he became a general—Phantom had been known for being a bit unusual even among the Company of Toxin's Commanders.

Back then, he wasn't "Phantom." He had another name and another life. He had been a skilled trainer who specialized in ghost-type Pokémon, and his reputation had grown quickly in the darker parts of Hoenn's underground.

He was talented, calm, and frighteningly effective but he had one mistake. He trusted someone he shouldn't have.

During an operation in a coastal city, one of his closest partner and friend betrayed him for money. Phantom was ambushed inside an abandoned warehouse by a group of trainers who had been promised a large bounty for his capture.

Even before he became a general, he was one of the strongest commanders and was hunted by the Alliance almost as much as a general.

They didn't want him dead. They wanted his information about the Company of Toxin, so that they torture him and try to break him mentally.

The Trainers used several Pokémon to hold him down while they interrogated him for information about the Company of Toxin's activities.

When he refused to speak, They carved into his face. Not deep enough to kill him, but deep enough to make sure he would carry the reminder forever. It's not that theis trainers thought he would have a life later on anyway.

And in order to break him better, the trainers decided that his old friend should take on this task.

Long, deliberate cuts meant to leave permanent scars and pain.

The trainers thought they had broken him but they were wrong.

Phantom eventually escaped. No one ever found out exactly how he did that, but when the Company of Toxin later investigated the warehouse, they discovered the bodies of every hunter who had been present that night.

None of them had died quickly. Especially the body of his "old" friend was treated very cruelly.

By the time Phantom returned to the organization, his face had already begun to heal—but the scars remained. He could have healed them, but he didn't want to.

They ran across his face in thin, uneven lines: one cutting diagonally across the bridge of his nose, another tracing down from the corner of his right eye to the edge of his jaw, and several smaller marks along his cheek.

The scars were very unsematic and ugly to look at. They looked like a picture of a kindergarten child drawing randomly on a piece of paper with a colored pencil.

without these scars he still looked like a relatively handsome man—tall and slender, with sharp facial features, pale skin, and straight black hair that fell neatly to the back of his neck, but the scars changed the impression his face gave.

Phantom himself didn't hide the scars because he was ashamed of them. He hid them because they reminded him of a time when he was more like a normal human.

"No problem, Leader Botulinum."

"Our control over the black market has strengthened slightly this month, but it appears that our aggressive stance has begun provoking increasing hostility from the Sisterhood of Salvation."

"Furthermore, it seems that the Judgment Team has recently started investing far more time and resources into activities within the black market."

"Our intelligence network has also discovered that the Hunter Guild, the Sisterhood of Salvation, and the Judgment Team have held numerous private meetings over the past month—far more frequently than usual."

"If our analysis is correct, these three groups may soon attempt to form an alliance unless we reduce our level of aggressiveness."

Botulinum had already expected that his more aggressive strategy this month would create exactly this kind of reaction, so the report did not surprise him in the slightest.

He leaned back slightly in his chair before speaking in a calm, almost indifferent tone.

"That doesn't matter. These three organizations are far too different from each other to maintain a stable alliance for long."

After a short pause, Botulinum began issuing orders to Phantom and Oleander, who were responsible for managing the black market operations.

"Pause our expansion in the black market for now and focus only on defending our current territory."

Oleander and Phantom immediately agreed without hesitation.

Phantom then continued reading from the report, which contained information about several influential power players in Dawn Hurst Town and the surrounding cities and towns.

"Furthermore, it appears that the genius trainer Alex will indeed remain permanently in Dawn Hurst Town. Our investigation has confirmed that he recently became the new owner of Elite Entertainment and has also purchased an extremely expensive villa within the city."

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