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Sato arrived at the public market just after 10:00 AM, which was the busiest time of day for the market. After spending about 20 minutes walking around all the stalls, he had made a full round of the market.
Unfortunately, despite thoroughly exploring the market, Sato couldn't find what he was looking for. It wasn't surprising, though. After all, who in Team Rocket would bother to sell Pokémon battle DVD's? Moreover, the particular Pokémon he was after was extremely rare, so it made sense that it wouldn't be available in the public market.
"If nothing else works, I might just have to spend a hefty sum of points to buy one from the exchange system. It's a shame I can't check its potential; otherwise, spending extra points would be worth it," Sato thought with a hint of disappointment after browsing the last stall that sold Pokémon.
In his training plan, Sato aimed to train Zubat to dodge attacks—actually, this would apply to all of his Pokémon's evasion training in the future. He wanted his Pokémon to practice evasion by facing real attacks, believing this would help them understand various Pokémon moves. That way, in battle, they wouldn't be caught off guard by unfamiliar moves.
From Sato's perspective, the one Pokémon that could use a wide range of moves was Mew. He remembered that Mew possessed the genes of all Pokémon, enabling it to use virtually any move.
However, the problem was that Sato, as a rookie trainer, aiming to catch Mew was as unrealistic as a toad wanting to eat a swan. Even if he became more powerful in the future, capturing Mew would still be extremely difficult. Team Rocket had already expended vast resources and manpower without success.
Therefore, Sato set his sights on another Pokémon: Smeargle. Thanks to its Sketch move, in theory, Smeargle could learn any Pokémon's moves.
But Sato wasn't entirely sure how Smeargle worked in the real world. In the games, Smeargle could only learn new moves every ten levels, and only then could it copy another Pokémon's move through Sketch.
If Smeargle in the real world functioned similarly, then, based on actual theory, Smeargle could only master a maximum of ten moves, which was far from what Sato wanted.
Finally, Sato considered another Pokémon that, theoretically, could also learn a wide variety of moves. That Pokémon, as many might have already guessed, was Ditto. Ditto had the ability to transform, and in the games, it could change into any Pokémon and copy the exact moves of its target.
Of course, in reality, it was unclear whether Ditto could acquire the moves of the Pokémon it transformed into. However, Sato wanted to give it a try. Even if Ditto couldn't do exactly what he hoped, its inherent value would still be immense to him.
Although Ditto's base stats made its combat power quite poor, its ability to transform into countless different forms was invaluable. If used well, Ditto's transformation ability could greatly enhance a trainer's chances of survival.
For instance, take the ability to disguise. If a trainer had Ditto, their ability to blend in would dramatically improve. By sticking to the trainer's face and transforming into a human mask, Ditto could alter the trainer's face. Add a change of clothes and a shift in posture, and they could become an entirely different person.
Without any special skills or abilities, it would be nearly impossible for the average person to see through such a disguise.
Right now, Sato was still weak, and although he had a steady stream of points coming in thanks to the PokeBlocks he produced, his position in the cutthroat environment of Team Rocket remained dangerous. If he could use Ditto's transformation ability to take on a different identity and handle risky tasks, it would undoubtedly increase his safety significantly.
In fact, Sato didn't want to stay with Team Rocket forever, following this dark path for the rest of his life. His ultimate dream was to control his own destiny and live happily in this world, not to spend his life like a rat in the shadows.
At first, Sato joined Team Rocket out of necessity (being undocumented and powerless), as he had no other way to get a good start on his dreams. If he could have joined the League through normal means, he would never have joined Team Rocket.
Now, if Sato could get his hands on a Ditto early on and train it well, it would give him a significant advantage when he eventually left Team Rocket.
Unfortunately, it seemed that no one in the public market had caught a Ditto. But this was to be expected. After all, wild Ditto were incredibly rare, and with their ability to transform, they could easily disguise themselves as something simple, like a small rock, making it almost impossible to find them.
In short, as long as Ditto doesn't want to be seen, unless you have a special tracking method, even the best Pokémon hunters wouldn't be able to locate it in the wild. This is why so few Dittos are ever captured.
However, Team Rocket, with its massive dark influence, was far beyond the capabilities of most lone Pokémon hunters. In Sato's memory, there were indeed rare Pokémon like Ditto available in the points exchange system.
The problem for Sato was that Ditto came with a steep price in the system: it required 6,000 points to exchange, 1,000 more than what was needed for one of the Kanto starter Pokémon.
More importantly, the Pokémon in the points exchange system were given at random. Sato's system wasn't powerful enough to bypass this process and check the Pokémon's stats before the exchange, which meant that he wouldn't be able to assess Ditto's quality until after acquiring it.
Based on Sato's understanding of human nature, who would be foolish enough to put a high-quality Pokémon in the points exchange system? Team Rocket, after all, was made up of ambitious individuals, and core resources like Pokémon would definitely be snatched up by the higher-ups. The ones left in the system were likely average at best.
Not having enough points for Ditto and being unable to ensure its quality were the two main reasons Sato was hesitant about acquiring it.
'I'll wait a bit longer on Ditto,' Sato thought to himself, sitting on a public bench. 'Maybe one will show up in the public market in the future. Right now, while I have a steady income from selling PokeBlocks to earn points, I'm still tight on points, and I can't put myself in danger for the sake of a small gain. I need to pace the sale of PokeBlocks. It's better to earn fewer points and ensure my safety.'
Just as Sato was about to leave the market, something on his way back to the exit caught his attention—a new stall he hadn't seen before.
At this new stall, the vendor was carefully arranging his merchandise, which consisted of round Pokémon eggs.