Lyra

Lyra as seen in Pokémon: HeartGold and SoulSilver Versions
Lyra
Species	Human
Hair color	Brown
Eye color	Brown
Height	4'11"
Weight	90.4 lbs.
Base	New Bark Town
Relatives	Day-Care Couple (Grandparents)
Voiced by	Della Saba (2019)
Debut	Pokémon: HeartGold/SoulSilver Versions

Lyra is a character who was introduced as the female player character for Pokémon: HeartGold and SoulSilver Versions and a female counterpart to Ethan. If the player instead chooses to play as the male trainer, Ethan, than Lyra instead exists as a friendly side character.

Background

As player character

Lyra originally lived in New Bark Town with her mother and occasionally performed favors for her neighbor, Professor Elm. This eventually led to the beginning of her career as a Pokémon trainer when he entrusted her with her choice of one of three Pokémon (Chikorita, Cyndaquil or Totodile) as part of an experiment to see what would happen if a trainer let a Pokémon follow them around instead of confining them to Pokéballs. Elm then sent Lyra to check out Mr. Pokémon's discovery, which turned out to be a Pokémon Egg. There she also met Professor Oak, who saw great potential in Lyra and gave her a Pokédex.

On her way back to Professor Elm's lab, she confronted and battled Silver, whom had broken into Elm's lab and stolen one of his Pokémon (the one with a type advantage over the one Lyra had chosen). He moved on regardless of whether or not Lyra had defeated him, but she learned his name in the process and told Professor Elm about it. Elm suggested that Lyra take the Pokémon gym challenge and later entrusted her with the Pokémon egg (which hatched into a Togepi). After saying goodbye to her mother (who offered to save part of the money she earned in battles for her), Lyra left New Bark Town to travel Johto. She d traveled from town to town and defeated all eight of the gym leaders to earn their badges. Along the way Lyra also met with her childhood friend Ethan several times, had several rematches with Silver (who eventually learned the errors of his ways through her battles with Lyra) and also had several battles with Team Rocket, who were trying to reform themselves despite Giovanni's retirement and subsequent disappearance. In these battles with Team Rocket, Lyra was aided by the famed dragon trainer Lance. In order to earn her last gym badge, she became the first dragon trainer since Lance to win the dragon user's challenge of Blackthorn City. Lyra then became the champion of Johto and the neighboring country of Kanto after defeating the Elite Four and Lance, who was the reigning champion.

But this was not the end of Lyra's journey, as Professor Elm had another gift for Lyra in the form of an S.S. ticket, which Lyra used to travel to Kanto on the S.S. Aqua, which sailed from the port of Olivine City in Johto to Vermilion City in Kanto. There Lyra encountered many more Pokémon creatures and also battled through the eight gym leaders of Kanto. Professor Oak was impressed by this feat and arranged for Lyra to have permission to travel to Mt. Silver, which was filled with dangerous Pokémon. There she found one final challenge in the heart of Mt. Silver, in the form of the former champion Red. Lyra was able to best Red in battle. Her later exploits remained unknown, but other challenges such as the Battle Frontier remained for her to conquer.

As friend character

Lyra was the granddaughter of the Day-Care Couple who lived on Route 34, and she lived in New Bark Town with her parents. When Ethan began his Pokémon journey, she confronted him and showed him how to catch Pokémon, then gave him several Pokéballs. She then showed up when he reached Route 34 and introduced him to her grandparents. Lyra exchanged Pokégear numbers with Ethan because she said that is what trainers did, denying her grandparents' assumptions that they were a couple.

She also met Ethan in Goldenrod City's underground tunnel, where she gave him a fashion case. Lyra was mostly found at New Bark Town during the game, where she would provide Ethan with a star for his trainer card after he completed a challenge of collecting five shining leaves. She also showed up at Celadon City to talk about the Gamefreak floor of the Pokémon Mansion and could show up as one of Ethan's fans at the Battle Hall. She also played a part in the Celebi event, in which she was teleported back in time with Gold.

Throughout the game, she was shown to have one Pokémon who followed her around, a Marill. She also caught a Rattata during the tutorial that she displayed for Ethan, and she mentioned several other Pokémon during Pokégear calls: Tauros, Bulbasaur, Porygon and Bulbasaur.

In Other Pokémon Games

In Pokémon Masters EX, Lyra and a Chikorita appeared as a playable sync pair that could be recruited at random through the game's Sync Pair Scout feature. Lyra's Chikorita could evolve into a Bayleef and then Meganium through Sync Pair Stories in which she battled Thorton and Rosa, respectively. There were also several variants of her paired with different Pokémon that were available through the Sync Pair Scout during limited time periods: the Summer 2020 variant paired with Jigglypuff was first made available in July 2020, a Sygna Suit variant paired with Celebi was first made available in June 2022, a variation using her normal outfit paired with Vaporeon that was first made available in November 2022 and a Special Costume variant (featuring her in a Team Rocket Grunt's uniform) paired with Phanpy was first made available in April 2023. Her appearance in this game was based on the non-playable version of the character, as she made reference to her grandparents and her Marill.

She was featured in her summer outfit during the "Summer Superstars" Story Event, in which she attended a music festival in with Scottie/Bettie and Steven Stone, and the three of them ended up working together to win the Pasio Superstar Competition. They were appointed as promotional representatives of Pasio as the award for their victory. She was also featured in her Sygna Suit during the Johto chapter of the Villain Arc, in which she helped in the effort against Team Rocket. She, Ethan and Kris had each obtained a Legendary Pokémon and a matching sygna suit for this effort. During the battles against Team Rocket, Lyra and Kris stayed behind to battle Ariana. Lyra later played a role in the Special Costume Event "Solve the Case", in which she took part in a special mystery game that was being hosted by Lear, only for Guzma's Goliospod to be stolen for real in the process. Once it turned out that the thief was targeting members of evil organizations, Lyra donned a Team Rocket outfit to act as a decoy and successfully drew out the thief.

Other Appearances

Other Media

• She appeared in five subsequent episodes of the Pokémon anime, where she and her friend Khoury were up-and-coming trainers from Johto who were visiting Sinnoh to observe the local Pokémon. They wound up accompanying Ash's group, and she participated in contests while also competing with the others. Lyra defeated Dawn in battle and gave her a Cyndaquil egg, but Ash and Dawn were later able to beat her and Khoury in a double match. Lyra and Khoury eventually returned to Johto and decided to become traveling partners. She is shown to have a Marill as well as Chikorita, which could be her starter Pokémon.
• In the Pokémon Adventures manga, the character of Crystal (originally created as the counterpart for the female player character form Crystal) wears Lyra's clothes during the HeartGold/SoulSilver arc, combining the two characters. The manga had done a similar route in the FireRed/LeafGreen arc to combine the characters of Green and Leaf.

Trivia

• Like all playable protagonists of the main games, her name is selected by the player. If she appears as her non-playable version, than her name is set as Lyra.
• Lyra's name seems to be a play on the musical instrument known as a 'lyre'. Her Japanese name is Kotone, in reference to the koto.
• It was also possible to choose between two gendered characters in Pokémon: Crystal Version. The female player character in Crystal had a different design than Lyra and is known as Kris. Both of them have also appeared as separate characters in Pokémon Masters.
• In the English version of HeartGold/SoulSilver, she sometimes claims that her Marill evolved into Azumarill. However, her Marill remains the same, and these statements seem to be the result of a translation error, as in the Japanese version she only talks about the possibility of her Marill evolving.