Well, I ended up being somewhat right since Prime/Beedrill did manage to take out all 3 of his opponents, though he did end up getting knocked out in the end as well when the opponent's Electrode decided to drag Prime down with it, so theoretically the battle ended on a 3 to 1 rather than a 3 to 0.
I honestly believed Prime had done a good job, but I was not sure if he would see it that way as well since Optimus had won his battle 3 to 0 and they had that "inherited" rivalry going on. I would make sure to praise him later on and ensure that he knew that he had indeed done a good job. I'd have Parvati/Beedrill back me up, which should be enough to keep him from sulking, sorry I meant feeling down.
Anyway, after Prime, it was Kun/Azuraid's turn, and his luck was a tad bit bad since he barely managed to beat his second opponent before he quickly fell to the third one. It was honestly not surprising and I was definitely not blaming Kun. He simply drew the short stick as far as opponents were concerned. The first Pokemon Kun had to face was still okay. A Banette while a bit tricky to face was not all that bad and he managed to beat it after exerting some effort.
It was the Magnezone he had to face after that that proved to be extremely challenging due to its electric steel typing which made it extremely resistant to nearly all of Kun's moves except for Flamethrower. Kun did somehow manage to knock Magnezone out, which admittedly took a long time since Kun's main strategy for this battle was keeping a distance and dodging as much as possible, while trying to hit it with Ice Beam, Scald, and Flamethrower.
That allowed Kun to eventually take Magnezone down, but he was pretty much out of gas after that, which resulted in him getting knocked out by the Aggron that followed. I then subbed in Tyson/Machamp and he smoothly finished the battle for Kun. Tyson was also the one I chose to start with for the third battle, and he managed to beat all three of his opponents, though it was a close one with his final opponent due to the fatigue and wounds he accumulated throughout the previous two fights.
Thankfully, the Poliwrath he was facing fell before Tyson did, because I was pretty certain that Tyson would have fallen if Poliwrath had managed to hold out for another minute or two. Ali/Gallade had a much easier time during the fourth battle but that was mostly thanks to Teleport and the fact that most Pokemon/trainers had a hard time dealing with professional Teleporters.
After Ali's battle, I had to go up to the counter and inform them that I would have to leave after the next battle. I had no choice since there were less than 30 minutes until 2 p.m., and I still had to eat lunch before moving on to the next place, so Hades/Gengar's battle ended up being the last one for the day.
Hades had it as easy as Ali during his battle since his opponents were unable to deal with his shadow jumping which not only allowed him to dodge their attacks, but also take them off guard and land some pretty solid hits on them. I could not blame them since Hades' ability to shadow meld/teleport was darn hard to face, especially if one did so for the first time. The only ones I could think of who would be able to cope with that were those who were used to facing either ghosts or teleporters.
Anyway, by the time I left the Battle Club, there were only slightly more than 10 minutes until 2 p.m., so I headed straight to one of the restaurants on my foodie list for lunch. The food was tasty, and after crossing off another place from my foodie list, I headed for the Sea Ranger HQ. I had long known where it was since I looked it up in preparation for the visit, and I'd say that it was no surprise that the building was practically bordering the beach.
Granted it was a more remote part of it, but beachgoers still could reach it if they wanted. Unfortunately for anyone who wanted to do that, passing through that stretch of the beach or taking a look at the HQ building was fine, but it was prohibited to set up shop at this part of the beach, which explained why it was pretty much deserted, though I guess its somewhat remoteness from the various services offered at the usual stretch also played a role.
I naturally tried to enter the building, but as soon as I stepped inside, I was told that entry to the building was restricted. One had to either be a ranger, alliance, military, or navy staff member or have certain credentials to be allowed to enter the building. Regular civilians or trainers could not enter as they pleased and had to wait for special occasions such as an open day to get the chance to enter the HQ. Naturally, there were always exceptions, and here it was in case one had relevant/important information to share with the Rangers.
I was told that even order members could not enter as they pleased unless they were on a mission or had important information to share, so I was forced to make use of my identity as a junior professor to be let in. Thankfully, my identity as a Junior Professor was significant enough for me to get a free pass.
I honestly was a bit surprised about how strict the entry rules were since the previous Ranger HQ I had been to in Kanto was not as strict as this one, and when I shared that with the security guards/rangers at the entrance, they told me that most ranger stations were open to the public, but they already had an office open to the public here in Lilycove City for anyone simply interested in the Sea Rangers. The HQ on the other hand was reserved for serious business only since sometimes distractions could mean more damage and/or lost lives.
When they said it like that, I put away my relaxed look and put my game face on instead. If anyone was surprised by my shift, they did not show it, which I appreciated. I approached the help desk and got straight to business. I informed them that I needed information on the habitats of certain local Pokemon for one of my research topics, without going into detail about what kind of research that was supposed to be and which species I was interested in.
I once more had to show my credentials before they asked me to take a seat and that someone would come to address my request as quickly as possible. It only took two or so minutes before a ranger approached me and asked me to follow her, which I naturally did. She brought me to what looked like an IT room and asked me to take a seat before she began to question me about which species I needed the information on. She did add that certain information would be restricted even to me/junior professors, so if my request fell into that category they would not be able to help me unless I came with the proper documents granting me access to that kind of restricted information.
I accepted that, but I was pretty certain that the information I needed did not fall into that category. If I had been interested in something like the location of the Relicanth habitats that might have been different, but I wasn't, so I did not believe I would not be able to learn what I came here for. My assumption was confirmed when I asked her for information on the habitats of Tentacool, Clamperl, Qwilfish, Remoraid, Wailmer, Corphish, Feebas, Mareanie, Wooper, and Carvanha within 500 km of Lilycove City.
She directly pulled up the information I wanted, though she requested that I adhere to certain regulations when I visited the Qwilfish and Mareanie habitats. Apparently, their numbers were low enough around these parts that they were being monitored and overcatching/fishing was forbidden. When she shared that I decided to limit myself to a small sample group for those two species since they were not that important to me anyway aside from proving that the Pinkan research applies to them.
Once the ranger was done pulling up all the information I wanted, she asked me if I wanted her to print it out for me, but I declined and asked her to show me the information instead. I also asked her to point out the general areas of those habitats on a map of the area around Lilycove City, which she did.
I memorized all the information and thanked her for her help before leaving the HQ. Given their no-nonsense rule, I saw no reason to stay there longer than necessary since simply hanging out there seemed unwelcome, and because of that, I ended up finishing my business at the HQ in less than 20 minutes.
Since I was already in the area, I went ahead and visited the sand art area to check up on my sand model. While I would only be able to pick it up tomorrow, there was nothing wrong with checking out in advance that everything was okay with it, and once I made it there I saw that it was just like I left it. Happy with that, I went to the Beach Club and asked them at what time exactly I would be able to pick it up since I had the Gym Challenge at 3 p.m., so it either had to be before that or 2-3 hours after 3 p.m.
They told me that I could come pick it up after 1 p.m. and that they would keep an eye on it for me until 6 p.m. if I wanted them to. Seeing no reason to leave the matter until after the Gym Challenge, I told them that 1 p.m. was just fine and that I'd come to pick it up sometime between 1 to 1:30 p.m. After hashing out those details, I went back to the sand art area and walked around the place, looking at the other pieces before leaving.
Well, all this took much less time than I thought it would and we barely had 3 p.m. I briefly considered whether to go to the Psychic House, but I honestly did not feel like doing that, so I didn't. Instead, I decided to go back to the Battle Club to work through my gold list some more. I stayed there until 6:18 p.m., and 5 more of my golden Pokemon got the chance to battle within that time, leaving slightly more than half of them for another day. At least now I was sure that I would be able to go through the rest of them within a single visit, so that was good news.
After leaving the Battle Club, I headed to a secluded spot before entering Utopia. I greeted the ones who hung out at my place before I began to prepare dinner. Once dinner was ready, I called everyone over to eat and we talked about what everyone had done while I was gone. Then after everyone had eaten and we had cleaned up the place, I began taking out the party stuff to finally celebrate Ferrus/Ferreon's evolution.
Today was the last day of the month and in my opinion, a party was a great way to tie up the month. Similarly, a Gym Challenge was a great way to start a new month, especially one that promised to be as special as the 19th month was slated to be. We had the Gym Challenge on the first day, the visit to Mt, Silver for the Larvitar exchange on Grouday, and my birthday on Dialday of week 2 (the 10th). Those three were already significant enough, but all that took place during the first two weeks. Who knew what else could happen during the rest of the month?
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