Chapter 10

This forest was a little more dangerous than the last one Felix had explored. Pokemon here were a higher level in general and hunted on their own as well. The only pokemon that had actively hunted Felix rather than the other way around up until this point was a catterpie. Not exactly the end of the world, despite Felix' low level at the time.

"Alright young masta', why don't you hunt on your own for a while, in the meantime I'll go about my business."

"Meaning you'll take a nap in a tree."

"I can neitha' confirm nor deny that statement."

Felix grumbled a little more, but acquiesced in the end. Nothing good ever came out of arguing with that monkey.

The forest was a mix of slippery, mossy rocks and mud, covered by dense foliage in the form of high rising trees and bushes far larger than is typical. Before long Felix was covered in mud and an assortment of plant material. This, on top of Felix' green colour due to being a shiny pokemon, made it so that he blended into his environment. He decided his hunting strategy would revolve around stealth this time, while he searched for higher levelled pokemon.

In Felix' opinion there were two ways to level up quickly. Either hunt a bunch of mons that are low level, or a few that are a higher level than yourself. This is easier said than done, though. Felix gained three levels from his last major fight against the spearow. All of those pokemon were higher levelled than himself, and he defeated at least a dozen. Despite this, he didn't get quite as many levels as he expected.

'This is an alternate universe after all. Levels work differently here. If it was as easy as in the game, than there would be high levelled pokemon everywhere. '

A little deeper into the forest, the trees became taller and taller, while the bushes became smaller, leaving more space and letting Felix see further. In a patch of moss stood a delphox, waving her wand around, trying to set fire to a poliwhirl. Both were looking pretty beat up, so Felix settled into a charging stance, ready to take advantage of the fight to defeat two pokemon at a higher level than him. A moment later, an opportunity arose. The poliwhirl used seismic slam, and grabbed onto the delphox, jumping into the air. This made them an easy target.

'DRAGON BREATH!'

Sure enough, the purple gout of flame hit them cleanly. A cloud of dust appeared when the two combatants landed back on the ground.

'DRAGON BREATH!'

Felix launched another attack, to make sure both were dead. Sure enough, when he focused his 'sight', both remained there, laying still. Felix didn't hear a heartbeat with his phenomenal hearing, so both must be done for.

Like this, Felix continued his hunt.

A few days later, Felix was still hunting. He had come across multiple ongoing battles, finding very few pokemon that were actually resting or eating. No, they were all fighting to the death. Sometimes Felix interfered to take the exp, sometimes he didn't. He came across several fights were both parties were almost certainly using concepts. Interfering in such a fight would mean certain death for Felix, while other fights were a good source of easy exp.

A few times, Felix did find a healthy mon on their own, which he would usually defeat. Most of the fights went smoothly. An oddish who used poison powder gave him some trouble and a tailow that somehow knew boomburst had forced him to run, but overall, it had gone well.

At night, Felix had holed up in little natural burrows or hollow trees, sometimes having to fight for a spot. He came across plenty of berries for sustenance, so all in all, it had gone well.

As a result, his level had also risen.

Ding! Congratulations on reaching level 14!

...

Ding! Congratulations on reaching level 16!

HP 47(+7)

Atk 30(+5) [+35%]

Def 25(+3)

Spec Atk 26(+4) [+35%]

Spec Def 22(+3)

Spd 22(+4)

Felix had blown his grandfathers expectations out of the water. With a day left of his little levelling excursion, he had a dilemma to face.

'Do I return home now? But I also want to find out why this forest has been so rowdy? How did all the wild pokemon get so incensed as to fight one another to near extinction?' he asked himself.

In the end, pragmaticism lost out to his curiosity. To be fair, the cause of this madness in the wild mons might be something beneficial for Felix. And so, he left, heading deeper and deeper into the ancient forest, in search of adventure and to find treasure. Near the centre of the forest the trees seemed to reach into the clouds. There was no underbrush to speak of now. No bushes, saplings or dead trees, only muddy expanse in between the trees. Felix started to sneak from this point forth, not willing to draw the ire of a concept founding mon, which would guaranty its level as above 30.

Eventually, he started hearing the sound of battle. Not just the sound of battle, but the sound of war. As he came closer and closer, he went from tree to tree, to keep some obstacles between him and whatever pokemon that were fighting.

After a while, he had reached his destination, and the supposed source of the unrest in the forest.

In the middle of a large clearing, there were two giant pokemon fighting. A tortunator the size of a house was fighting a poliwrath of similar size. They were going at it, sending huge fireblasts and hydro pumps at each other, throwing each other into, sometimes through the redwood trees.

'Are these two kings of the forest? Maybe they're fighting over territory?'

Felix had a hard time deciding what to do now. There was little room to benefit from two unrelated mons fighting, and interfering in the fight for exp would be far too dangerous. Felix doubted that his attack would deal any damage in the first place. Trying to profit off off the smaller fights going on in the surroundings would almost guaranty that all of the other wild pokemon would focus on him, leaving no room for escape.

There was just one thing which caught Felix' eye. On the outskirts of the skirmish a scyther was fighting a scolipede. The scyther had a small stone attached to a necklace around his neck. Something that made Felix' eyes light up with proverbial dollar signs.

'An ever stone! Score! If I can get that, my defence will rise immensely! My evolution is still a long ways away anyway! I have to get that, no matter what. But how?'

Felix started planning, with the intent to get his hands on the prize. He didn't have much time, and there was only one workable plan he could come up with. The scyther seemed to be losing, so he would need to play this smart. Wild mons can't exactly speak, so acting like he was part of the poliwrath's gang, and therefore on scyther's team shouldn't be that hard.

First, Felix interfered in a lower level fight, helping out his 'teammate'. Then, he saved one of his new teammates by bonking him out of the way of a sneak attack. By this point, Felix was positioned behind the scyther, seemingly coming from the side where the rest of his team was. Right as the scyther was about to be knocked out, Felix rallied some teammates with a cry and ran towards the duo. Just as the it was about to be hit, Felix slammed him to the side, while his teammates all jumped on the scolipede, keeping it busy. Meanwhile, Felix brought his teammate to the treeline, where he laid the scyther against the tree. The wild mon was just barely conscious. Without hesitation, Felix nabbed the ever stone and ran deeper into the forest.

Everything seemed to have gone off without a hitch, when five or so minutes later, he heard a cry.

"SCRCHCHCHCH"

'A scizor! No, that scyther? It can't be! He didn't have a metal coat! Damn you, alternate universe logic!'

The cry came closer and closer, until eventually, Felix decided to take a stand. With the everstone around his neck, he might have a fighting chance. In the middle of a smaller clearing, a small ways away from the bigger battlefield, Felix confronted a now fully healed scizor. It looked positively murderous.

'Alright, let's do this, bug!'

Felix gave a battle cry as the scizor charged forward, a fury cutter charging up in the process. Felix ROAR'ed, using a move that would normally make a wild pokemon run away in the games to distract the opponent, making it veer of course. Felix dodged the attack after that, and backed up a little, launching an attack of his own.

'Dragon breath!'

The bug dodged most of the attack, launching into a metal claw in the process. Felix braced and met the attack head on.

'Head smash!'

Somehow, Felix came out with the advantage from that exchange. The scizor was positively launched into a tree. Felix could hear small cracks as the bug made impact. Clearly, he had done some damage. Felix' wounds, on the other hand, were bearable.

'The advantage of an ever stone to defence can't be underestimated.'

The opponent wasn't down for the count yet, though. Despite it's grievous wounds, it charged forward one final time, using fury cutter. Felix prepared to counter with a dragon breath, but the gout of flame glanced off. As the scizor approached, Felix noticed that it had changed it's attack into a metal claw. Clearly, the fury cutter was a feint!

Felix attempted to dodge or counter but failed. This time it was his turn to be launched. He flew through the air, and rolled on the ground to get control back. With a slight smirk, Felix decided to use it's own tactic against it.

First, Felix created a large 'Dragon breath' to keep it's vision limited. Because of echolocation, Felix could still 'see' just fine, despite the smokescreen. Then, Felix charged out of the fire, despite the burns he accrued in the process. He charged forward, going on the attack.

'HEAD SMASH!'

Felix cried out as he hit his opponent and caught the scizor unawares. The pokemon flew through the air, crashing into a rock and finally coming to a stop. The battle was over.

Ding! Congratulations on reaching level 17!

HP 49(+2)

Atk 32(+2) [+35%]

Def 27(+2) [+50%] (everstone)

Spec Atk 27(+1) [+35%]

Spec Def 24(+2) [+50%] (everstone)

Spd 23(+1)