"Okay gang, it's time to get ready for moving on." I tell everyone, there was a bit of protest, but we all were starting to get sick and tired of the reporters; aside from Mawile who actually liked posing in front of the cameras they'd bring.

  We had been staying in Vermillion for 13 days since Mawile evolved and at this point I actually felt comfortable with travelling with her. Due to her still being a newborn she isn't allowed to be in her pokeball for more than an hour but that'll change once a couple more weeks have passed.

  I'm gonna miss being able to hang out with the whole team, but I really did need to start moving again. I did the spring online tests, taught Tabitha Curse from a TM, met up with those weird Eevee researchers who would house Leaf temporarily while they researched why exactly she could do what she does, and managed to teach Pearl how to move with her new body.

  Currently, the ones that are gonna go with me are Chardon, Woody, Lupa, Marshmallow, Pearl, Mawile, and I finally decided upon Ralts since Beedrill still needs to learn Toxic Spikes from Tabitha. The first three were obvious since I will be using them against Misty and the next three were because they either were new to their bodies or were new to being my Pokemon. Ralts is coming along because I learnt my lesson about not bringing a full team wherever I go and because we still needed to finish that mind speaking thing.

  Vali and the gang have all done their gym battles and all of them got a badge so I was happy for all of them and decided they should celebrate with some hotpot from this neat place that me and the team ate from while exploring the city. Anne and Vali were also kinda bummed that I was leaving in the other direction from them but since we were all trainers it didn't really matter because there was a high chance that we would see each other again.

  The team helped pack everything we were gonna take before I returned them all to their pokeballs, aside from Mawile and Dee-Dee, and then I headed over to transfer Tabs, Beedrill, and Leaf away. The researchers sent a really weird emoji showing that they received Leaf while Professor Oak shot a message confirming that he has Tabitha and Beedrill. That done, I headed over to the reception to hand over my key to my room over to Nurse Joy.

  I felt sad leaving the place, but it was always gonna be a temporary thing anyway; the fact that I would be coming back home soon and rest in my actual bedroom with the team helped.

  I took a step outside the Pokemon Center and was surprised to find Vali and the gang outside and waiting for me.

  "You've been talking about leaving Vermillion for the past two days," Anne answered "of course we were going to wave you off."

  "Oh, uh, thanks. You guys didn't really need to though, trainers are always moving around."

  "Vali suggested it." And then Vali became all flustered that Anne revealed that.

  I couldn't help but giggle at that, Mawile sticking by my side as the others began walking northward with me.

  We had a fun chat about battling and what we were gonna do when this was all over. Evelyn was hoping to travel to a place called Paldea to see the sites while Anne and Adrien were both gonna go to Unova to stay with their family. Will wasn't sure and Vali said she wanted to head over to Kalos to see about mega evolution which was pretty cool. I was on the same boat as Will and wasn't really sure what I'd do once the Kanto conference finished; that surprised the group more than I think they should have been.

  Eventually, we reached the end of the city and came across the road that would take me to Saffron.

  "Well, it's been fun hanging out with you guys, but I've really gotta go now." I tell them as I send out Dee-Dee and Ralts while carrying a sleeping Mawile.

  We all did handshakes, other than Anne who pulled me into a side hug, and we said our goodbyes before I started walking away.

  This time the walk was a bit sad, and my two psychic types noticed, but I didn't stay sad for long because this was just the regular life of a trainer; saying hi to someone and then saying bye when you leave. I'll get over.

  To take my mind off the walk I decided to continue with Ralts' telepathy training.

  "Okay so let's try saying 'bird' to me." I spoke

  "Ra" she spoke

  '-ir-' She sent

  This was some major progress beyond just sending emotions, maybe after this we could do images so that I could see what she's seeing during a battle.

  Dee-Dee also decided to try the exercise just for the fun of it and has been learning from Ralts how to send emotions to me. It's been working; I've been feeling duck lately from Dee-Dee's efforts. I didn’t even know that duck was a feeling, third biggest travesty of my life.

  I should probably also talk to her about what she wants to do now that Mawile hatched... which also reminds me that I've gotta come up with a nickname for Mawile as well if she even wants one. Ralts and Dee-Dee are both of the opinion that Mawile will not want a new name for herself which is pretty surprising since Mawile hatched under my care and already knows that almost the entire team have nicknames while Dee-Dee herself now has a new nickname because of me.

  And this went on until I got into a battle with another trainer on the road.

  This time the travelling was less boring because there were actual people on the route that I could just chat with whenever Ralts needed a break from training.

  Plus, I get to show Mawile how the rest of the team, aside from Dee-Dee, battle. She was starstruck by Ralts' Double Team into Disarming Voice and her jaw practically hit the floor when Chardon managed to make three different Beat Up clones of Woody, Lupa, and Pearl all converging to destroy a poor Graveller.

  The days went by pretty quickly thanks to this.

  Of course, I then experienced a problem.

  I could only gently pet Pearl in commiseration "Sorry Pearl, we're fresh out of blood for you to drink." I told her.

  She merely looked at me unamused.

  The other Pokemon never had to experience this problem on account of me always bringing along some extra rations just in case we walk longer than expected. I just assumed that when the map said that it would take five days to walk to Saffron that it would only take five days not nine dang days.

  "Lesson learned, make sure to bring extra blood next time. Pearl, if you need to drink blood then maybe you could go to the river and drink from some Slowpoke or a Magikarp or something. I dunno." Because I really didn't.

  Honestly, I was kind of expecting Chardon and Lupa to hunt in the wild like the times Shadow would run off and come back with his fur all bloody from hunting some Pokemon or something but since both of my buddies previously belonged to people and were under human care, I guess their instincts just kinda stopped because they would have everything already available to them. It was actually supposed to be normal if I let the team go and hunt for their meals instead of preparing all of it myself and I was pretty sure that someday it would happen; I just wasn't expecting Pearl to go out and find some poor water type for a meal.

  Pearl was just as unenthused about the current predicament as I was, but she was fine with going to the river with me to find a Magikarp she could take a little drink from.

  "Keep the stew warm Chardon, we’ll be back shortly."

  Thankfully, Mawile was sleeping so she and Dee-Dee would stick with Chardon and Lupa while I would be going to the river nearby with Marshmallow, Ralts, Woody, and Pearl.

  It was an easy walk with Pearl acting as my scarf as she's prone to do now that she has a long and stretchable body, though I could do with a whole lot less tickling from whenever she moved her tail; we both knew that she does it on purpose, but I can't prove it just yet.

  We came to the river pretty quickly since I specifically made sure to rest near it to refill my water bottles, so I poured some water in them while Pearl slithered off me and went into the moving water.

  Marshmallow decided to stick close to the rest of us and we all decided to play eye spy. I was finally getting good enough that I could more often than not actually understand what color the three would talk about... or it was just really easy because the answer to Marshmallow's turn was always a tree and Ralts would try to help me by telling me bits of the word that the three would say.

  Woody won, no surprise there since he's always been the best at spotting stuff with his eyes.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  At some point, Pearl managed to snag a Magikarp downriver so I made sure to call out to her to bring the water type to me so that I could check it over and Woody could use Heal Pulse that he mimicked off of Dee-Dee. What? I wouldn't just leave a defenseless Pokemon out in the wild with a hole in its side like a monster.

  It was actually really fascinating to see because my research into type energy also led to some research on this weird thing called aura that all living things have in varying amounts. The basic gist of battling is that aura protects a Pokemon until they sustain too much damage and then get knocked out; the only reason a Pokemon would bleed would be if they overtax themselves so that they deplete their protective aura and still fight, if they experienced piercing attacks, or if the other Pokemon has an insanely large amount of aura.

  In this instance, Pearl is so much stronger than the Magikarp and deliberately aimed to pierce her flesh, so my Gorebyss was able to do it. It would probably be a different story if she tried it on a really strong Pokemon, like a well-trained Slowbro or a Gyarados.

  The Magikarp was a good sport after getting spooked and used as a beverage, she accepted the berries and was just so cute that I couldn't help but catch her.

  The others looked at me with exasperation and amusement, exasperation was from Ralts while the others looked amused.

  "Okay guys, I promise not to catch any new Pokemon starting now." I told them

  I was also known to be a liar when it suited me, the number of times I pretended I wasn't a part of a prank made sure that my team knew never to trust me again. As they shouldn't for I was evil incarn- and Ralts was now laughing at my inner monologue; just as keikaku.

  We all began heading back to the group back at camp but got stopped by another problem.

  A rampaging Ursaring.

  Since we had nothing better to do, we headed over to the giant normal type to see what was wrong.

  The Ursaring was protecting a Teddiursa from a Rhydon. Obviously, the first course of action is to break the fight up, so I made Pearl use Shell Smash a couple times to buff herself up while Ralts used Psychic to pull the battling Pokemon away from each other.

  The two were surprised by the interference so I came out from behind the trees with the team and asked what the heck was going on.

  Through a lot of pantomiming and my Pokemon translating to me what was going on, I was able to figure out that these two were having a fight about territory. Rhydon had recently evolved after being released from a trainer on the route that I was travelling and wanted some land as his territory, the ground type then challenged Ursaring who isn't actually the leader of the territory but was the actual leader's mate. Rhydon at least had the sincerity to apologize for doing an unnecessary fight and I asked if he wanted to be sent to the rangers who would either relocate him to the mountains since forests are not where a Rhydon usually decides to nest or let him partner up with a ranger if that's what he wants to do.

  One pokeball throw later and I now walk back to camp with some berries in my arms and a confirmation that the rangers received Rhydon.

  The stew that night was delicious thanks to the berries I got from Ursaring and the team agreed, we did experience a bit of a spook when Ursaring came over with her mate but the two were there to merely thank us for helping solve their situation.

  The next morning had me rush to Saffron and skip training the team for the day since I needed to get some blood packs for Pearl. Mawile was fine with the pace I was setting and happily skipped along while I was jogging so I began skipping with her and found it more fun. I probably look pretty weird skipping along the route, but it's pretty fun and that's what matters the most. It was also good exercise for Dee-Dee since she still needs to regain a lot of the muscles that she lost from not getting enough food back in Hophophop.

  At some point a glint of metal appeared on the horizon which made me prompt Mawile to start running to the quickly unfolding city. We took a short break because I hadn't made breakfast and was hungry and exhausted, so I did an executive decision to make Ralts teleport us the rest of the way. Blipping from place to place and spooking the nearby pedestrians was hilarious and I brought out Pearl so that she could enjoy all the startled gasps.

  Finally, we reached Saffron, and I walked to the nearest Pokemon Center within the city to give my team a checkup while I went to the store. Mawile was already used to going with Nurse Joy, so she didn't complain when I left her and the others behind.

  I came back to a commotion led by some weirdo in a jacket complaining about the fact that Nurse Joy hadn't returned his Pokemon to him yet.

  "I'm sorry young man, but the state of your Pokemon imply that they need further medical care. They will stay in the observation ward until their injuries have healed to a sufficient enough level that they are deemed fit for discharge."

  "But there's a tournament right around the corner! Winning the damn thing will give me a fortune with those sponsors looking at it!"

  "I apologize for the delay but there is nothing that can be done."

  "Just spray them all with some potions and give 'em to me already." His group of friends chiming in with similar remarks.

  Poor guy still hadn't learnt that you don't mess with Nurse Joy. Honestly, I just zoned him out and moved past him to enquire about my team, something the guy really didn't appreciate.

  "Your Pokemon are all in good health, though they didn't appear to have breakfast today?" she inquired leadingly.

  "Yeah, I ran out of blood packets for Pearl, my Gorebyss, so we had to book it extra early today so I could buy some." I brought one out to show her.

  Nurse Joy then pulled out a tray with eight slots while a Chansey brought Mawile on another tray "Well, I am happy to discharge such well cared for Pokemon." Jacket guy clenched his teeth from the dig but huffed and left the Center, the rest of his posse going with him.

  I retrieved everyone and decided to head to the cafeteria since I was too tired to cook. Apparently, Amy was in the city, so I messaged her about meeting up since she and others split off to go to different cities. Mirielle decided to head off to Celadon while James headed off to the poorly named Lavender town; I say poorly named because lavender is relaxing, and a town filled with ghosts and ghost types is anything but relaxing.

  There was also a ton of stuff I need to do like checking with James' and Amys' Lycanroc's that evolved into midday and midnight forms respectively so that Lupa could come to a decision about his own evolution, plus all the research I'll need to do for Mawile and Magikarp if either of them wants to battle, and I'm still waiting for answers from the different Professors and scientists that I've sent messages to about different team members, not to mention that email to the league about how that 'shadow' Charizard was doing.

  For now, I was checking out the tournament jacket guy had complained about. It was a classic tournament between those with four to six badges, though really the rules stated that you needed to be at the four to six badge level which I was actually a part of since my rank advancement so if I really wanted then I could enter it. I wasn't going to since I needed to go home and get grounded, but it was a nice option all things considered.

  Once we all finished eating, I decided to book a room for us to stay in for the next couple of days since James messaged that he was already on his way to Saffron after catching a ghost type.

  Once everyone was finished eating, I began to stand up while holding Mawile so that we could all go to my room and relax there. I wonder if Mawile's favorite cartoon is on today, I didn't bother checking the network schedule so I might have to download an episode on the nav so that she can wat-

  Dee-Dee froze.

  I look back to her and she's stuck in her place looking to the side. My eyes follow her path, and they end up on jacket guy... wait.

  "Dee-Dee, was that dude your previous trainer?"

  She flinched when I addressed her, which kinda stung for some reason, but ultimately nodded.

  We were blocking the way to the cafeteria, so we accidentally caused a commotion which meant that people sitting looked up at us even if it's just a glance.

  Which meant that jacket guy looked up and locked eyes with me before moving them over to my team, stopping on the only purple humanoid form with horns.

  ...I didn't need to be psychic to see the clear disgust on his face. But Dee-Dee was one, so she got front row seats to jacket guy's emotions as she paled considerably.

  "Chardon with me. The rest of you head back to our room, Ralts'll show you where it is." And after giving Woody Mawile, I began walking up to jacket guy's seat in the cafeteria, Chardon scooting the guy sitting opposite of him away before I sat down right in front of him.

  Like any normal person, I introduced myself with a normal amount of cheer "Hi, my names Evandros and I'm the new trainer of the Indeedee you just showed your disgusting mug to." Jacket guy looked surprised so I continued "Her name's Dee-Dee now, thanks for asking. Anyway, I'm here in Saffron for a couple days to meet up with some friends buuut I just had the brilliant idea of entering that competition you were so rudely telling Nurse Joy about. Between you and me and the frankly idiotic training you made Dee-Dee do; I'm inclined to believe that it'll be a cakewalk for me if you and I match in there to battle."

  Jacket guy snapped out of it at that point "Listen here brat, it wasn't my fault that Indeedee couldn't listen for shit. I'm surprised you were even willing to catch that lump of tard after it lost me battles time and time again. But don't you ever disrespect me, I've already got six badges and I'm going to win the damn thing this year."

  I couldn't help but snort which jacket guy didn't like so he tried to grab me.

  *Shink*

  Too bad my latest scarf just so happens to be a Pokemon. A Pokemon that was aiming her very sharp mouth at the guy's chin as Chardon growled menacingly. Jacket guy wisely sat back down, and I realized I wasn't gonna be able to do anything meaningful until the tournament happens.

  "Nice chatting with you, I hope that once I leave Saffron, I'll never see your face again." And I headed off with Pearl and Chardon back to the others.

  Once we left the cafeteria and the watchful gaze of jacket guy's posse, I decided to address something with the two with me.

  "Are you guy's upset that I made us enter a competition I just told you we weren't gonna do?" They didn't actually look upset, instead they made noises and affirmations that I'm doing the thing that they wanted me to do.

  "Alright then, if we're gonna do this then we need to bring our A game. The tournament is in six days, so we'll do heavy training for five days and then light training on our last day. We'll have the entire team here in the city, and we'll rent out a special training room just for the team to practice and spar against each other. Anything you might want to add?" I asked them.

  Chardon looked thoughtfully before making Pearl shoot some water over him as he used a low powered Flamethrower.

  "Okay, practice fire type moves in the rain and water type moves in the sun. Got it. Anything else?"

  Pearl ruffled through my bag and held a Cheri berry in her mouth that she wanted me to see.

  "Alright, stockpile some extra berries and medicine. That it?"

  The two looked at each other before nodding to me.

  "Okay, we've got a tournament to win, and we'll have to seriously punch up. Gotta fight smart so this time we won't fight with type disadvantage, we've also gotta find the right evolution for Lupa and then we'll be set."

  We could do this. I knew it the second Chardon roared and Pearl made bubbling fishy noises, now I just have to tell Professor Oak and mom my plan.

  They were both surprisingly on board, the most trouble were actually the Eevee researchers who said they still needed to run some tests on Leaf, but they were willing to hand her back tomorrow which was all I really needed.

  The team was surprised by my deciding to enter the tournament, but they all agreed they'd participate aside from Mawile, Magikarp and Dee-Dee who were not going to participate if I could help it. Dee-Dee was silent the entire time that I made a game plan with the team but I think it was more from shock than anything else.

  Watch out tournament, I'm gonna be making a big splash.