The moment I saw the smile appear on the Grumpig's face following my question I experienced a feeling I should not have felt and would have never expected to feel while talking to a bunch of Grumpig. At that brief moment, I felt as if I was not standing in front of the smart and responsible wild psychics from before but a group of sleazy businessmen. Thankfully that bewildering feeling only lasted for a fleeting moment or I might have decided to just leave the search to luck and Horus/Xatu as well as the other flyers.
Was it a bit hypocritical of me to think like that when I was the one going around everywhere luring wild Pokemon to Utopia using food and sweet words? Well, maybe, but everything I did or said was true and of high quality, so I had nothing to truly feel bad about on that front. Besides, expecting stuff from others while doing exactly that or the opposite depending on the situation was something that humans were always good at. Not to mention that I was actually doing the Pokemon a favor by letting them join Utopia since the place was practically a paradise for wild Pokemon.
Anyway, the Grumpig shared a look before one of the two leaders spoke up and declared that they knew a few spots where Spoink and Spinda could be found, but instead of straightforwardly telling me where those places were, Grumpig asked me what I was willing to pay for the information. At that moment, I could not help but think 'Ah, so that's why I felt like that before', and I could not help but snigger a bit. I honestly did not mind paying for the information if it was truly useful, so I declared that I would plant another berry tree of their choice for every spot with Spoink or Spinda, provided that there were more than just a handful of my targets in the places they led me to.
The Grumpig shared another look at that before they nodded and agreed to my offer. Seeing no reason to waste any time, I told them to lead the way straight away. They once again shared looks, and after a few moments, the 2nd leader stepped forward and declared that it would guide me/us while the others would remain here with their Spoink. I simply nodded at that since I had not expected to travel with their whole group anyway since that would have been too cumbersome and bothersome on top of most likely slowing us down. Just thinking about traveling with a group of bouncing little piggies like that while searching for wild Pokemon had me reject the notion.
There was looking for uncommon Pokemon the regular way and then there was hard or even hell mode, which the addition of a large number of Spoink definitely counted as. Hence, I simply bid the Spoink a temporary goodbye, which they reciprocated by wishing me good luck before I asked the Grumpig to finally lead the way. Grumpig nodded its head before it began to walk ahead, and after ambling after it for a few moments I could not help but ask if it could speed up a bit if possible since it was walking at a slower speed than my usual travel pace which was already pretty slow.
Grumpig turned around and gave me a teasing smile, showing that it was just teasing me, which my emotion sense quickly confirmed, making me mentally grumble that these Grumpig behaved nothing like the solemn and serious psychics they were supposed to be. Nonetheless, Grumpig sped up considerably after that, switching to a fast trot, causing me to follow suit. Now going at a speed that forced me to jog lightly, roughly somewhere between 50 and 60 km/h, we covered ground pretty swiftly.
I noticed us brushing past quite a few Pokemon, but as far as I could tell none of those required me to stop and check them, so I chose to ignore them though I continued to keep an eye out to avoid possibly missing out on any Pokemon worth checking out. It took only slightly more than 5 minutes of uninterrupted travel for Grumpig to slow down before it eventually stopped altogether. Grumpig waved its hand, motioning ahead before declaring that a group of Spinda called the area ahead of us their home as far as their dove knew. It told me to go ahead and see if I could find what I was looking for so that we could move on to the next spot.
I nodded and moved past the Grumpig who obviously had no plan to accompany me any further. It took just a few steps before I saw the Spinda that Grumpig mentioned, confirming that it had indeed been right. I was able to spot roughly 20 of them at first glance, but I was able to notice more of them relaxing/lying on the ground. The Spinda noticed me as well, but all they did was give me a friendly wave upon noticing me stepping onto their turf. I knew that Spinda were generally pretty chill and nice but not being thrown any wary or cautious looks threw me a bit off since that was pretty much what I was used to.
Still, it was a refreshing change of pace, though it did not change my initial approach, which was to project a friendly and honest aura as I moved closer. I did make sure to wave back first and give them a smile without teeth before I began walking closer. Other than more of the Spinda peeking their heads out of the grass or trees they were relaxing in or behind, the Spinda showed no other reaction to my approach. Once I was just a few meters away from the closest Spinda, they actually moved to meet me and cheerily asked me if there was something I needed from them, which had me instinctively nod before I caught myself. I had to laugh at that for a bit since its approach was so relaxed and friendly that I got dragged into its pace.
Still, that was fine, so I directly told Spinda that I was interested in capturing a few more Spinda because I was interested in seeing if I find a way to help Spinda evolve. I hid nothing and told them that I already had 4 Spinda that I was keeping an eye on for the project but that I decided to expand the group which was why I was here. I could feel interest and curiosity from all around me and after letting my gaze wander for a moment I saw that most Spinda were looking at me with interest, though there were some who just kept chilling. Regardless, their reaction was overwhelmingly positive, so I was not surprised when the Spinda told me to go ahead when I asked if I could examine them to see who could best help me with my idea.
Even the ones that seemed relatively uninterested in me and my claims cooperated fully. They even called out a bunch of Spinda that I had not noticed before. I was definitely surprised when the Spinda in front of me called out and more Spinda poked their head out from the foliage of the trees around us, with some poking their heads out from holes in other trees or the ground. All in all, the initial high 20ish to low 30ish Spinda turned into 44 Spinda, and after checking all of them I was a bit startled when I realized that 31 of those had deep orange potential or higher.
Honestly, that was quite a bit more than I expected. Even I thought that recruiting all of them without bringing along the few that remained would be a bit much, so I admitted that 31 of them were eligible and that I was interested in recruiting all of them but that I would be willing to take in the rest as well to avoid leaving anyone behind. I mean I could close an eye to adding a bunch of really low potential teddy bears. Once Utopia was done with them the worst one would have orange potential anyway which I could tolerate since they were cute enough. Due to Utopia's measure, they would not pass on their low potential to the next generation anyway unless they managed to somehow improve extensively.
Obviously, there was always the possibility that the majority of Spinda would simply refuse to join in, but that was not the case here. The chill bears gathered around and talked for a few moments with each other before accepting my offer. I was honestly surprised how easy the whole thing had been since I had not even mentioned my usual lures of Utopia's utopian environment or all the food I had to offer there and in exchange, though the latter became superfluous since everyone ended up joining anyway.
Not wanting to make Grumpig wait more than I already did, I brought out 44 PokeBalls and swiftly balled all Spinda before placing them inside Utopia. I then went back to Grumpig, who gave me an impressed look, before asking me to follow it again. We ended up jogging for another 10 minutes before Grumpig stopped once more. Grumpig told me that this was the only other Spoink group in this direction that they knew about. I naturally wondered if Grumpig could act as my reference to make things easier for me, but Grumpig said that that was not a good idea before admitting that their groups did not really have any contact aside from knowing each other's existence.
I had trouble believing that but Grumpig just shrugged and said that it was due to a disagreement between one of the previous generations, which explained why it thought its involvement would be detrimental instead of helping. I agreed with that and asked it to wait while I went ahead and approached the Spoink and the three Grumpig overseeing them. I gave them the same offer I gave the other group and I ultimately ended up adding 10 more Spoink to Utopia. After the berry trees had been handed over I returned to guide Grumpig's side and it asked me if I had someone that could Teleport us back to its group since the Spinda and Spoink groups it knew of on this side were done and it would be quicker if we continued walking from their place.
I nodded and had Mothra/Butterfree Teleport us there. Grumpig showed some of that psychic smartness when it asked me to take out and plant the 2 Payapa Berry trees I promised for the 2 groups I met so far first before it continued to lead me to the other groups they knew of. We did three more such trips and Grumpig had me plant the trees each time before starting the new round. I did not mind doing that since the three trips allowed me to add another 40 Spoink as well as 132 Spinda to Utopia, and all that in less than 90 minutes. Horus/Xatu and the others had joined me 5 minutes into the second round, but I asked them to wait until I was done with the Grumpig tour.
Except for that one rather unusual meeting with the 3rd Spinda group, the other meet-ups went pretty much all the same. I ended up recruiting each Spinda group in its entirety, including the outlier group, and added either 10 or 20 more Spoink to Utopia per group. The Grumpig droves got their berry trees and the Spinda joined for free. Well, at least the two chill groups did. The outlier group insisted I meet their best in a dance battle first, and I meant that in a literal sense. Having no one who really focused on dance moves aside from Mothra, who knew a lot of them because she was Mothra, I chose to face the Spinda myself since Mothra would have been much against their silver stage dance champion.
Heck, even I was a bit too much, but needs must and all that. The fight itself was rather funny since the battle had to be performed entirely while dancing, and while the Spinda used a bunch of dance moves as well as regular moves it performed while wobbling/dancing around, I reinforced my body with aura and used a bunch of attacks that probably looked like a mish-mash of Capoeira and wannabe Drunken Boxing to beat the shit out of the Teddybear. I won simply because I was stronger and the Teddies then crowned me dance king before agreeing to join me. It was honestly fun if not a bit weird, especially when compared to the other Spinda groups I caught.
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