The sun was setting as the twilight approached. The soft glowing light over the horizon cast an orange hue across the sky. Celadon City, at this time of the day, was lively with the crowd strolling along the street, talking about the battles during the day.
Apart from the local trainers, there were also a few trainers from Hoenn and Sinnoh that participated in the tournament. Seeing new kinds of Pokemon brought great enjoyment to them. It seemed the tournament was a success for Celadon Game Corner.
...
Central Park Street.
"Hisoka, let's eat here. This restaurant serves tasty southern dishes. Suzie and I have tried it twice. They are really good," said a woman with auburn hair. Her hand was pointing toward a restaurant at the corner of the street.
While Hisoka and Ran were walking in the street to find something to eat, he ran across Maggie and Suzie. Both of them were out shopping in the city.
After not seeing each other for quite some time, Maggie looked much more mature than before. She was wearing a white nurse uniform and kept her hair to her shoulders.
Suzie was still the same as he remembered. A soft smile on her face showed her easygoing nature.
"Looks good. I haven't tried southern food yet," Hisoka replied.
As they walked into the restaurant, two waitresses welcomed them into the shop.
"Welcome to Mikki's Southfood!"
They sat at one of the empty tables and placed their orders. While waiting for their food to arrive, they resumed their talk.
"Hisoka, did you really become a gym leader of Dark City?" Maggie asked curiously.
Hisoka smiled and nodded, "Yeah, I have been a gym leader since two months ago."
"Why didn't you tell me earlier?" Maggie pouted.
"If Ryoichi hadn't come to the store, I wouldn't even know that you are a gym leader now."
Hisoka didn't know how to answer that and could only smile in embarrassment.
At that time, he was busy with a lot of stuff. When would he have the time to meet her?
Seeing the awkward situation, Suzie decided to butt into the conversation.
"By the way, you haven't introduced her to us yet. Who is she? Your girlfriend?" she asked, looking at the blue-haired girl beside Hisoka.
Ran blushed hearing that.
(⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄)
"No," Hisoka shook his head.
"She's just my gym trainer."
Ran took a deep breath, summoning her courage, and smiled.
"Hello, I'm Ran. It's nice to meet you," she extended her hand to Suzie and Ran.
"Hello, I'm Suzie," Suzie shook her hand with a smile.
After that, Maggie also accepted her handshake.
"I'm Maggie," she nodded.
'Phew! I thought she was his girlfriend,' she thought in relief.
'No! I can't leave them alone,' she secretly narrowed her eyes at Ran.
She quickly made up her mind. After she completed her studies and obtained her breeder certificate, she would join Hisoka as soon as possible.
...
Munch!
Munch!
"It's delicious! The food here is really good! You gotta try it, Harrison!"
Morrison held two chicken drumsticks in his hands, talking to Harrison with his mouth full of food.
Harrison was embarrassed by his friend's manners.
"Harrison! You're disturbing other guests," he said in a low voice.
In the entire restaurant, their table was the loudest. He had seen many people sending them several scornful glances at them.
Maggie felt a twitch of annoyance at the constant chewing noise from another table.
(＃`Д´)
She quickly turned and saw a fat young man in a kimono munching on a large bucket of fried chicken.
"Hey! You! Can you keep it down? We can't eat because you keep making loud noises," she snapped.
Seeing that, Harrison quickly got up and said, "Miss, I'm really sorry. We'll leave now."
He tugged his friend's cloth and motioned him to leave. If he knew this would happen, he would find a less crowded place to eat.
"What? That girl? Pfft! Don't care about her, Harrison," Morrison waved his hand dismissively.
"You!"
Maggie wanted to rebuke, but seeing as she was causing a scene, she could only stew her anger in silence.
'Harrison?' Hisoka thought.
The name sounded familiar to him.
'Ah! I remember it now!'
During the day, he had heard a couple of people talking about a trainer from Hoenn who had a cool-looking Pokemon with him.
Something suddenly clicked in his mind. Although he didn't watch much Pokemon anime in his previous life, he still remembered some of the important plots.
'If I remember correctly, that guy should have a Blaziken. Is he participating in the Johto League Conference next year? Hmmm. It seems his Blaziken was injured during his battle with Ash and lost in the semifinals. Looks like we have a strong competitor,' he rubbed his chin, deep in thought.
...
Later that night.
Ran was lying on her bed staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep.
She felt she was too useless as Hisoka's partner. During the matches, she could only rely on Hisoka's strength to beat the opponents. It was as if she was here to hitch-hike on his wins.
She grabbed the bank card on the table beside her and looked at it. It contained 300,000 dollars that Hisoka gave her yesterday as her bonus. At first, she wanted to buy some new clothes with this money.
However, she changed her mind. She knew it was a pipe dream to expect her Ponyta to evolve soon. So she decided to use this money to buy a strong Pokemon to enrich her lineup.
In fact, she didn't know that it was simply impossible to buy the Pokemon she wanted with just that sum of money. Even if someone was willing to sell her a strong Pokemon for 300,000 dollars, that person must be a liar, or there were some issues with the Pokemon.
...
The next morning,
Hisoka woke up the next day as usual. After taking a shower, he went out for a morning jog.
Central Park,
A brown figure was hopping around the park happily. Hisoka stood on the side watching it.
He suddenly raised his hand and threw a small yellow ball toward it.
"Catch!"
Buneary, who was running around, suddenly saw the ball flying toward her. After she landed on the ground, she quickly jumped and caught the ball with her hand.
"Bu!"
She raised the ball in her hand toward Hisoka with a big smile.
"Good job!" Hisoka applauded.
Due to the orb, Burneary grew up much faster than other Pokemon. Even though he hadn't trained her yet, she was able to learn three moves on her own.
Hearing that, she ran toward Hisoka and jumped into his arms joyfully.
"Let's go back. What do you want to eat?" he rubbed her head with a fond smile.
"Bu!"
...
"The trainers here don't look that strong."
A purple-haired boy looked at the opponents on the other side, muttering under his breath.
"Paul, do you still remember what I taught you?" A man with a ponytail glanced at the boy. He had the same hair color as the boy.
"As a Pokemon trainer, you shouldn't underestimate anyone."
Paul pouted, but since he didn't dare to refute his older before, he could only nod his head reluctantly.
"Yes, brother Reggie."
He and his brother had fought a few matches yesterday, but they hadn't come across any trainers that could make his older brother go all out. And it seemed their current opponents wouldn't be a problem for them either.
"Drapion! Use Poison Fang!" Reggie gave an order to his Pokemon.
Unwilling to be outdone, Paul also shouted toward his Pokemon, "Skorupi! Pin Missile now!"
...
'Pokemon from Sinnoh?' Hisoka sat in the stands, watching the battle on the field.
Buneary was standing on his shoulder, watching the people around her curiously.
His match would be held later in the afternoon. Since he had some free time, he decided to watch a few matches while taking Buneary out for a stroll.
Drapion was quite notorious in Sinnoh. He saw a couple of news on the internet about the cases of Drapion attacking people. A very aggressive Pokemon that would attack anything that entered its territory. It also tended to go on rampages and caused havoc on anything in its way.
Most of the trainers participating in the competition came from Kanto and Johto, followed by Orange Islands. There were only a small number of trainers from Hoenn and Sinnoh.
As for the other regions? Well. They were too far away.
Suzie and Maggie said they would come to see his match in the afternoon. Recently, their business was quite good due to the Game Corner tournament.
As for Ran, she was probably in the black market. The girl had asked him in the morning about how to get to the black market in Celadon City. As a hunter, he certainly knew where it was.
The forces behind the black market in each city were quite complicated. Aside from the wealthy families and several poacher groups, there were also a few League executives among them. Unless it was some kind of major accident, the League would usually turn a blind eye.
...
"The winners are Reggie and Paul from Sinnoh!"
The referee announced the result of the battle.
The brothers smiled at each other and left the arena amidst the crowd's applause.
When they walked past Hisoka, they couldn't help but curiously stare at the familiar Pokemon on his shoulder.
"Brother! Look! It's a Buneary!" Paul said, a little excited.
He ran toward Hisoka and stood in front of him.
"Are you from Sinnoh? My name is Paul. I'm from Veilstone City!"
'Paul? Interesting,' Hisoka mused.
It seemed Paul had just turned twelve years old this year. He had not yet turned into a broody kid that he was familiar with.
His older brother was still at the peak of his trainer career and hadn't experienced the debacle at the Battle Frontier, where he lost and decided to become a breeder.
Reggie stepped forward and smacked his brother's head.
"You're being rude," he admonished.
Then, he glanced at Hisoka and bowed slightly.
"Sorry for bothering you," he said apologetically.
"It's fine," Hisoka shook his head with a smile.
He looked at Paul and said, "I'm not from Sinnoh. I'm from Kanto. You must have misunderstood because of this Buneary. I got her as an egg in a tournament a few months ago."
"I see," Reggie nodded.
Buneary was pretty common in Sinnoh. It wouldn't be surprising if some of the eggs somehow got into other regions.
"I've seen your battle just now. It was amazing," Hisoka changed the topic.
Paul might still be a little immature, but his brother Reggie would definitely be a formidable opponent in the next round.
Without waiting for his brother's reply, Paul jumped in first.
"Of course! My brother is a strong trainer. He was among the top four in Sinnoh League Conference," he spoke with his chin up.
"Haha..."
Reggie could only smile in embarrassment.
...
"Maggie, hurry up! Hisoka's match will start soon!"
Suzie's voice was heard outside the door.
Maggie quickly sorted her clothes and put on a pair of shoes.
"I'm coming. Just a sec!" she shouted.
...
45th arena,
The referee glanced at his watch and turned to look at Hisoka.
"Trainer Hisoka, I can only give you five more minutes of extra time. If your partner still has not arrived, you will be disqualified," he reminded loudly.
Hisoka nodded at that.
"My partner will arrive soon!" he replied.
Then, he turned his attention to his opponents. They were dressed in loose brown robes. Large beads necklaces hung around their neck.
His opponents were actually a pair of monks this time.
"Amitabha!"
Seeing his gaze, the monks bowed slightly to him.
...
When Maggie and Suzie were walking in the park, a person bumped past them.
"Hey! Watch it!" Maggie yelled.
"Sorry!" The person shouted but continued to run ahead as if in a hurry.
Suzie looked at Maggie in concern.
"Are you okay?" she asked softly.
"I'm fine," Maggie replied while rubbing her aching shoulder.
Suzie smiled in relief and said, "Let's go. The match will start soon."
...
'Hurry! Hurry!'
Ran repeated the thoughts in her head as she ran toward the arena.
'Damn! If it wasn't for that shopkeeper, I wouldn't be late now!' she cursed secretly.
Time slowly passed by. The referee glanced at his watch again and shook his head regretfully. Just as he was about to raise his flag, a blue-haired girl ran into the arena.
Ha!
Ha!
"I'm not late, am I?"
Ran panted as she looked at the referee.
...