After Oak left, I spent some time bonding with the Larvitar. I even ended up naming him Kenpachi. It just felt fitting. He had almost nothing in common with the Bleach character but that's the name I chose so that's the name he had. He also loved the name. He was quite a bit older than Igneel, so he definitely wasn't the baby of the group.
The weakest member, for now but definitely not the baby. After bonding with him for a bit, I released the Kirlia. I felt her mind reach out to mine the moment she left the pokeball and I gladly welcomed her in. Thankfully, Donnell had been trained to keep psychics out of his mind from a very young age so Kirlia would be the only psychic I'd let in. She was an astoundingly powerful psychic since she was able to get up to speed after a minute or two of being in my mind.
The information of me being from a different reality was carefully locked out of her reach. I had told none of my pokemon about that, and I probably never would. She picked out her own name from the list of options I fed her, Ino. It was a fitting name for a psychic pokemon, so I was pleased with her selection. I had Broly, Kisame, Quicksilver and Igneel give us a bit of space before starting their battle royale. I then had Ino perform all the moves she knew which was a surprisingly short list. She made for that by being very good at those moves though.
From what little she'd told me of her life before now, she had been trained almost exclusively by Oak's Alakazam along with another member of her species. Oak wanted a Gardevoir to study and the other one happened to evolve first so Oak had no issue leaving her with me. It was quite fortunate for me, but I could tell that Oak's abandonment had caused some self-esteem issues along with a compulsive need to please me.
It's a good thing she was a psychic type. When she needed reassurance, all she had to do was reach into my mind and get it. You couldn't lie in the realm of though, so she had little to no room for doubts about my satisfaction with her.
Two new pokemon meant I had to lengthen this training trip by quite a bit. Oak's warning about eyes on me also made me weary about leaving this forest before my pokemon got strong enough. I had so many rare pokemon that there would be very few people who wouldn't do something to me and claim my pokemon as their own.
I could just imagine waltzing into Giovanni's gym with a Kleavor. He was no rock type master but the link between rock and ground was probably strong enough that he'd have rockets after my head and my pokemon on his belt by the end of the week.
The only issue was my supplies were only designed to last for another month and few weeks. I'd have to dip back into town to resupply. Not now though, that would just be procrastination. I'd worry about the supplies when I needed to worry about the supplies.
For now, I'd work on a training plan for my two newest pokemon. Kenpachi wasn't ready to begin training. I was loathe to rely on Oak's advice, but he was the authority on pokemon. I'd increase Kenpachi's rations and wait a few weeks before training him.
That meant that my focus for now would be on Ino, Broly and Igneel. The others were far along enough in their training that I only needed to be on hand to give tips and advice here and there. I was only a trainer not a pokemon. The pokemon knew their bodies best. I was here to give direction and inspiration.
With Broly, we'd have to work on creating an entirely new fighting style and increasing the severity of his gravity training. Both he and Quicksilver had maxed out the settings on their gravity braces a while ago, but we just had the luck of adding a psychic type to our team.
With Ino, I'd start with teaching her the move gravity. It shouldn't be too hard considering how quickly psychic types learned psychic type moves. We'd also work on her teleportation and reflect. After some more thought, I added teaching her protect to the list. All my original four pokemon knew the move already so it was going to quickly become a staple for my team.
With Igneel, we'd be focusing on his power and teaching him more fire type moves. I'd only taught him flamethrower in his Charmander stage and perhaps spent more time than I should have working on his physical skills. His physical skills were, don't get me wrong, absolutely exceptional. They were what allowed him last more than 20 seconds in the battle royales, but they weren't enough.
I'd do more gravity training with Quicksilver, and I needed Kisame to work more on the power of her water type moves. I named her after the tail-less tailed beast, and I'd done her a disservice by not preparing her to bring that kind of environment changing power to the table. We'd start with surf, and I noted down a reminder to buy a TM for blizzard when I next went into town.
The plan was rough and vague, just how I liked it. I liked the idea of planning but one thing I'd learnt about myself was that I was bad with sticking to detailed plans. I mean look at me now. I had only one of the pokemon I'd originally planned on catching. Was my team balanced? Hell no. But I loved them either way.
It wasn't about the destination. The journey was the 99%. It was that realization that made me cancel training for the day and spend the rest of it lazing around with my pokemon. I had no idea how to manage such a large team but luckily, they did most of the managing for me. Kisame and Igneel paired up to do god knows what while Broly took Kenpachi off my hands and took him to Quicksilver. They were the dads of the team and since Igneel had grown up quite a bit, they enjoyed having a new baby to play with. That left me with Ino. She just lay beside me while I drifted off into the sweet abyss of sleep with my legs hanging off the tree stump I was laying on and a feeling of contentment swirling in my chest.
THE POKEMON HUNTER
The Salamence was a truly impressive specimen. Sure to set a high price for its talent and power. I'd been chasing it for close to an hour now. It probably sensed my pokemon on me and had the good sense to flee after surviving the first attack.
It was all futile though. It just didn't know it yet. Not a single quarry that I'd ever set my sights on had managed to escape. I'd been doing this for 12 years and that alone was an achievement. Hunting and selling rare pokemon was the kind of business to leave you with few friends and a legion of enemies. Everything was out to kill me. The wild pokemon, the league, even my customers at times chose to try doing things the hard way.
In my 12 years, I'd learned a lot and survived even more. Everything wanted me dead, but I rose above that. I rose above all of that. I and my team had gone from league failures to the most feared criminals in all three regions.
I crested the hill I was on and found my prey nursing his wound, probably believing himself to have escaped my reach. I released Pyro, my starter and had him prepare to take it down.
"Dragon rush" I ordered to start the battle. Pyro took a deep breath that sent goosebumps rushing all through my body before he took off in a blur of red scales. He crashed into the salamence with an earth-shaking roar that smashed it into the mountain it was resting on.
The Dragon didn't give up and tried to wrestle with Pyro. Pathetic. A true waste. Pyro pinned it down with a roar of exertion. I thought it over before the dragon sent a hyper beam straight into Pyro's midsection that sent him flying off it. The dragon wasted no time in springing from his prone position and charging up a move I knew well. Draco meteor. I ground my teeth in annoyance before releasing my next pokemon, Psycho.
"Use protect to keep me safe from that move" I ordered. Draco meteor was indiscriminate in its range and targets. By far the most powerful dragon type moves but rarely seen in battle because of how difficult it was to master. To think a wild pokemon knew a move like this. The meteors came crashing down in a glorious fury while I calmly waited it out from the safety of Psycho's nigh impenetrable defence.
The move eventually ended, and my eyes found Pyro. He was worse for wear, but he had taken the attack well. He started charging up a blast burn before I shouted up at him. "We're supposed to take this one alive, remember?" His annoyance was clear to see but he did dismiss the attack to crash into the exhausted pokemon with another dragon rush. It went down and didn't get up again. Knocked out.
I allowed Psycho teleport me to the Dragon's unconscious body before throwing a pokeball at it. The ball flew true but the pokemon wasn't captured. It was a trained pokemon then. My luck smiled on me when an old man crested the other edge of the mountain shouting about his pokemon. I'd found the trainer then. He saw me and released a pokemon with a speed that belied his age.
It was another Salamence. What kind of idiot trained two of the exact same pokemon? Pyro wouldn't be able to take on another Salamence after tanking a draco meteor. I returned him and released Cyro. The old man gasped at seeing her before shouting in shock "You can't have one of those. It's illegal".
I laughed at the utter ridiculousness of this interaction before I gave my first orders. "Ice beam" I commanded. The salamence was fast enough to dodge the first two blasts but the third clipped its leg. I had psycho use protect to shield me from collateral damage as the Salamence fired a hyper beam in retaliation. The attack hit Cyro on her shell which made it ineffective.
I don't have the time for this, I thought. "Use Blizzard. End it quickly". The old man shouted orders at his pokemon, but it was much too late. The ice type move took effect, and an ice storm ravaged the mountain top we were on. I had Cyro fire multiple ice beams at the slowing Dragon type and when it finally went down, she ended the move.
"Good girl." I returned her. Psycho snapped the old man's neck with a blast of telekinesis before he could take out another ball. I walked up to him and broke all three of his pokeballs. The third pokemon would be lost to me but I highly doubted it would be anything rare or powerful. Two salamences was an anomaly. He couldn't possibly have three.
I captured both dragons in my own unregistered pokeball before I had psycho teleport me to my base.
I walked into the speakeasy and was shown the back room. There was a woman there. Pretty with pink hair and wearing a crop top and thigh high skirts. Cute, but not my type.
I dropped the two pokeballs and collected my reward in an expanded briefcase. There was no need to count it. Only a fool would cheat me, and these people were no fools. I turned around to leave but the guard at the door blocked my way. Did they suddenly develop foolishness?
"We mean you no harm. My boss just has a proposition for you and would like you to hear him out."
I nodded and took the seat she gestured at but kept my hand on Psycho's pokeball just in case. She turned to a television in the room that turned on seemingly of its own accord to display a face shrouded in shadow.
"Mr. Alexander Pierce, you do not know me, but rest assured I know you. I know what you truly desire. Why you have taken up a life as a pokemon hunter. It's not about the money. You have enough of that already. No, you desire revenge. Revenge against a society that saw you lose something dear to you. Join me, join the team and I will help make your dreams a reality"
"Nice speech bro, but the only person that will make my dreams come true will be me. It's been nice doing business with you and do feel free to call if you have any more requests but sadly, I will be unable to join your illustrious organization." I spoke in a mocking tone before releasing Psycho. He let out a blast of psychic energy that knocked out the lady and the guard before grabbing onto me and teleporting me out of the room. I caught one last look at the figure shrouded in shadow as I left the room.
Name; Donnell Oak
Age; 15
Hometown; Pallet
Next of Kin; Samuel Oak
Account balance; 31,050 Pokedollars
Pokemon;
· Kleavor (Nickname; Broly)- Male. Bug/Rock type
Moves; Signal beam, agility, fury cutter, quick attack, slash, swords dance, protect, stone axe, and rock throw.
· Pidgeot (Nickname; Quicksilver)- Male. Flying/Normal type
Moves; Brave bird, aerial ace, steel wing, agility, roost, hypervoice, gust, whirlwind, U-turn, protect and thunderbolt
· Milotic (Nickname; Kisame)- Female. Water type.
Moves; Brine, ice beam, hydro pump, dragon breath, dragon pulse, water gun, protect, recover, and bubble beam.
· Charmaleon (Nickname; Igneel)- Male. Fire type.
Moves; Ember, dragon breath, scratch, bite, growl, metal claw, flame thrower, protect, and dragon rush.
· Larvitar (Nickname; Kenpachi)- Male. Rock/Ground type.
Moves; Rock throw, stone edge, and dark pulse.
· Kirlia (Nickname; Ino)- Female. Psychic type.
Moves; Psychic, teleport, reflect, confusion and detect.
Having a psychic type on my team was a unique force multiplier. Ino made explaining moves to my pokemon as easy as thinking. She connected our minds with growing ease. Even a month ago, she would have struggled to do this. Things were different now. she conveyed my thoughts and imagination to Kisame exactly as I thought them.
What we were working on was creating a new move by manipulating surf. I based it on the water prison jutsu. She wrapped the water around herself in a dome and used the control of the water to move around. It fell apart in less than a minute but that proved it could work. All we had to do was train it, and training was something we were good at. The eventual goal was to have her perfect Kisame's water prison shark dance jutsu from the anime. That was a long time away though, so I didn't dwell on it too much.
After Kisame, Ino and I moved on to our next teammate, Igneel. He had grown even more in the last month. At this point, he was almost my height. He was already close to evolution which was a huge surprise. The Charizard line wasn't as slow to evolve as their more draconic cousins. That didn't make them fast evolvers though. The average time it took a trained Charmander to evolve into a Charizard was about a year. He was practicing a move I'd come up with. A fireball.
Hear me out, I knew that wasn't the most original of ideas. But it surprised me that the move didn't already exist in the pokemon universe. It's pretty much the OG fire move. Right now, Igneel was working on the Great fireball jutsu, like what Sasuke and Itachi could do. It was a giant ball of fire. He still found it difficult to concentrate that much firepower into a dense ball. Constant practice had at least made the move usable. It was a long way from being battle ready, but we'd get there.
The end goal was to teach him the phoenix flame jutsu. Smaller balls of fire that curved and moved to hit their target. That was going to be more difficult though. I theorized that He would have to learn swift first. Then figure out how to combine properties of swift with his fireball jutsu. He was also a long way from that but he was on the way there, and that's what mattered. After checking up on him and giving some tips, we moved on before he decided to jump on me with a hug. Those had been cute when he was a little Charmander but now, they were life-threatening.
From Igneel, I moved on to the next teammate. Broly. He had somehow managed to grow even bigger in the month since his evolution. Now, he was bigger than me and my head went up to his chest. He was practicing a rock-type move, but not an original one at least. His skills were substantial but even he couldn't master a new type without any help in a month. He was getting there though. As I got closer to the section of the forest he practiced in, I had Ino form a telekinetic shield around us.
Broly was practicing ancient power. A move that was more like earth bending than anything else. He used it to manipulate the rocks around him, floating them in circles. He'd moved on to forming concentric circles two days ago. As I saw a boulder soar towards us, I almost had a heart attack. It got caught by Ino's telekinesis, and I thanked Arceus for psychic type pokemon. I checked on Broly and made sure he wasn't experiencing any difficulties with his practice.
From there, we moved on to Kenpachi. I'd cleared him to begin training a week ago and he took to training with a unique energy. His usual practice took place next to Broly. My starter had taken some form of paternal role over the young rock/steel type. Broly's practice was too volatile and dangerous at the moment for that.
Kenpachi was running an obstacle course that Kisame and Igneel prepared. My dragon was proficient at carving things up with metal claw. Kenpachi was wearing Igneel's old gravity brace and practicing with a unique fervour. He finished a lap and moved to the next one without ever stopping to take a breath.
Watching everyone train while being unable to do so ignited a hunger to improve in the young pokemon. I watched in pride for almost half an hour while shouting tips and encouragement at him. Whenever he tripped or fell while working through the course, I acted like I had to resist the urge to step in. I stayed there for half an hour before I moved on.
Quicksilver was next and I had Ino teleport me to his training location. He was on top of the highest hill in the zone. What I had him working on would be a gamechanger. I had him trying to create a vacuum. My understanding of the physics was incomplete, but he seemed to get the gist of it when Ino conveyed the idea to him.
I appeared in a flash of light and watched him in deep concentration. He was trying to manipulate the air around him to remove the remove air molecules from an area a few feet in front of him. It blew up after a minute, but this was good progress. A week ago, he couldn't even manage the first step. All he needed to do now was practice, which seemed to be a common thread with my team today. I gave him some encouragement before I had Ino teleport me to a more isolated section of the zone.
She wanted to do something without an audience. I didn't understand why she was so adamant about evolving out here with no one except me watching. She looked at me and I sent her as many feelings of reassurance as I could. She smiled and then erupted in bright light. Her evolution was as sudden as it was majestic. She came out of the light as a Gardevoir. She'd more than doubled in size. Her previous miniskirt-looking skin covering had transformed into a flowing gown. Her hair had also grown and now covered one of her red eyes.
A beautiful and majestic fairy type. Her growth was massive. Not only in physical size. Since the moment we connected after I released her, her presence in my mind had been constant. I felt that constant presence grow as she evolved. It expanded beyond my wildest dreams. She was powerful as a Kirlia, but now, that power seemed like a drop to the ocean she now possessed.
She looked at me and spoke to me in my mind without even the need to translate thoughts into words. She sent her thoughts into my mind in their barest raw form and I understood them. Rather, she sent the understanding of them to me. It was hard to explain. All I knew was that she was happy with her evolution and felt immense pride.
I remembered her previous feelings of shyness and shame about her slow evolution. The contrast between that and what she was now was staggering. She felt confident in her power at this moment and I knew her new form would be a surprise for today's battle royale.
She spent some time floating about and levitating some rocks to get used to her new power. When she got bored of that, she teleported us back to the camp clearing. From there, I sat down to meditate and wait for the rest of the team to join us for lunch. They'd since learnt to tell when the time for lunch arrived and would wander in on their own. Quicksilver came in first. He had gotten even faster. I had no idea if it was the increased gravity training with Ino or his improved control over the air itself.
After he arrived, the rest of the team crawled in across the hour. They all congratulated Ino on her evolution once they came in and saw her new form. Ino had to teleport to find Kenpachi and the image she shared with the rest of the team had us all 'awwing' in unison. He had fallen asleep in the middle of the obstacle course. He had fallen off a log and laid asleep at that position.
Ino brought him over. The team was supportive of his efforts, and he ate lunch with the rest of us. A meal of pokefood and rare candies for the pokemon and a single nutrient bar for me.
We lounged around waiting for digestion to take place. It was more like we were procrastinating to rest a bit. It was unproductive but I saw no need to stop. We were working hard, and we had time- we were way ahead of schedule. My original plans had me having a completely different team, a weaker team at that. I didn't expect to have any teammates at their final evolution at this point apart from Quicksilver. That wasn't the case though.
After resting for another hour, we moved to the beachfront. We had moved our battle royales again as Igneel got more powerful and the rest of the team grew bigger. They all arranged themselves in a loose circle before starting at a signal only they knew.
While the adult members battled, Kenpachi and I sat down and cuddled up. I should be having him do some more training, but I didn't feel up to it. We had time and even if we didn't, I couldn't bring myself to push him into more training. My team was strong, and that should be enough to please me.
An hour later, Kenpachi seemed to have had enough resting and forced his way out of my grip to continue training. I sighed and stood up to join him. If he wanted to train, who was I to stop him?
We started with rock throw. It was a very simple move for every rock type and one he knew already. The problem was he was slow at ripping boulders off the ground and throwing them. His aim also needed work. There wasn't much stone to work with but rock-type energy seemed to allow him to gather sand into sand boulders. I'm sure if he was stronger, he'd be able to turn them into full-blown rocks but we'd get there.
I had him throw one boulder as far as he could without caring about the accuracy. I then had him spend the rest of the evening throwing rocks and trying to hit that first boulder. He missed, a lot but when he got it by luck, I had him do the same thing again.
I looked towards the battle royale and had to marvel at how strong my pokemon were. At this point, Kisame was using her control over the ocean to fire continuous blasts of water at Ino. Ino was using two moves at the same time, a massive surprise. Reflect to block Kisame's water blasts and gravity to slow down Broly and Quicksilver.
Broly had powered through the gravity to engage Igneel. The effects of the move kept him slow enough for Igneel to have a fair shot. Quicksilver was sweeping through the lake to attack Kisame.
He was crawling through the air. I wasn't surprised when a wave of water rose up and swallowed him, sending him into the ocean. Ino shifted focus from him and concentrated the increased gravity on Broly. He became even slower. This gave Igneel enough time to disengage and send a giant fireball screaming at my starter.
While forced to the round, Broly pulled up a wave of sand he hardened into a rock wall and then sent flying at Igneel. Kisame was not content to remain ignored and sent a giant wave of water toward the pokemon on land. Broly dug into the sand to escape. Igneel surrounded himself in a fire spin to escape the wave by evaporating the water. The tactic was as effective as I expected it to be- Not at all. The water breached his makeshift shield in a few seconds. A few seconds later, his roars of pain turned into roars of victory. A bright light came from his previous location and my fire type came out as a Charizard.