Chapter 6

'...' for thoughts

"..." for speech

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Early the next morning, Jasper and Magby stand at the east exit of Nimbasa City and wave goodbye to Joshua after he dropped them there.

Shortly after Elesa, Cynthia and Skyla arrived with Elesas mother. After saying goodbye to Veronica the three girls greeted Jasper enthusiastically and all 4 made for the Citys east exit, towards Route 16.

"Hey Jasper, what Pokemon do you think we'll encounter?" Elesa asked excitedly.

"I hope there will be cool flying-type Pokemon." Skyla chimed in.

Jasper stroked his chin and answered. "I looked that up last night, Minccino, Gothita, and Solosis are commonly found on this route. Liepard and Trubbish are a bit rarer to find but the hidden gems so to speak are Audino, Cinccino and Emolga, these are really rare!"

"Oh wow, Emolga!" Elesa and Skyla shouted as one with a starstruck look on their faces.

After that Elesa and Skyla devolved into bubbling fangirls, praising Emolga to high heavens while Jasper, facepalming, stood next to Cynthia who only had a wry smile on her face.

Luckily for Jasper and Cynthia, the two girls calmed down after leaving the city.

The four of them and Magby paused and admired the nature in front of them. To their right was the official route 16 path that would lead them to the Marvelous Bridge. To their left was nothing but pure nature, a deep forest, bright flowers, and the odd Pokemon like Gothita or Pidove, which can be found on pretty much every route in Unova.

"Nature is really beautiful." Cynthia murmured and the others could only nod along.

"Okaaay, let's go!" Elesa shouted, grabbed Cynthias and Jaspers hands and ran towards the thick underbush, Skyla followed closeby.

But after just a few steps they heard the sharp sound of a whistle and the barking of a Pokemon. Shortly thereafter, a man and a Pokemon blocked their path.

The man wore a gray uniform with a gray cap and was holding a whistle in his hand, the Pokemon was covered in fur and walked on four legs, the fur on its back was blue and although it had a sort of mustache on its face it came across as pretty intimidating.

After the five stopped, Magby jumped in front of Jasper, ready to defend him against the other Pokémon, which Jasper recognized as a Terier a normal-type Pokémon. But before any kind of fight could break out, the uniformed man spoke to the children. "I'm a police officer, you can call me Daniel. Please show me your Youngster-Licenses or I'll have to escort you back to the city and your parents will have to pay a fine.

Jasper and the others showed Daniel their licenses and he let them proceed without any problems, but warned them to let their Pokemon out before entering the forest, since aggressive wild Pokemon can also be lurking behind the treeline.

The teens knew Daniel's warning was only logical, and Elesa, Skyla, and Cynthia quickly summoned their Pokemon. Jasper only had a smug smirk on his face since Magby was already next to him. But as soon as the shapes of his friends' Pokémon became visible, his grin changed from smug to intense curiosity.

The Pokemon Cynthia summoned was dark blue with a red belly. It had a large fin on its head that extended to its back. It has very small arms and legs, but a huge mouth with razor-sharp teeth that makes up most of its body. This Pokémon is known as Gible, a dragon- and ground-type Pokémon.

The Pokémon summoned by Skyla is covered in light blue feathers and its beak and legs are colored yellow. It has two wings and a small piece of down on its head. This Pokémon has the water- and flying-typings and has the name Ducklett.

Elesa called forth her already known Elekid.

"Woah, you really have a Gible!" Jasper exclaimed with stars in his eyes and all but jumped onto Gible who took two cautious steps back.

Following that Elesa tried to keep Jasper from fussing over Gible who had no idea whats going on. On the side Magby was facepalming, Cynthia was smliling wrily again and Skyla was laughing her head off.

After a while, Magby finally deigned to help Elesa, and together they yanked Jasper off Gible, who immediately fled behind Cynthia, and Ducklett just watched it all with his eyes wide open and his head cocked to one side.

"Aren't you interested in Ducklett at all, Jasper, isn't he super cute?" Asked a pouting Skyla, with her Ducklett in her arms, after she managed to stop her laughing fit.

"I find him super cute!" shouted Elesa and rushed to hug both Skyla and her Pokémon.

Jasper answered Skylas question while watching Elesa and Skyla hugging. "It's not that Ducklett isn't interesting, I find all Pokemon interesting after all. It's just that Ducklett is a quite common Pokémon and native to the Unova-Region, so I have enough time to research it in the future while Gible is a super rare dragon-type Pokemon that isn't native to this region and its evolution, Garchomp, isn't even a normal dragon-type Pokémon, but a super mighty pseudo-legendary Pokémon!"

"A Pseudo-Legendary Pokemon?" Skyla said confused, to which Cynthia replied. "Pseudo-legendary means that a Pokemon is an Apex Predator, it is at the top of the food chain, only Legendary Pokemon are above them, that's why they are called that. If there are no Legendary Pokemon, they are like Legendary Pokemon, therefore pseudo -legendary, like legendary, but not quite.

"Exactly," Jasper continued. "And there are very few pseudo-legendary species, just one, two at most per region. Garchomp is Sinnoh's pseudo-legendary, Unova has Hydreigon."

"Wow, so Cynthia and Garchomp are going to be a lot stronger than us in the future? This is so unfair!" Skyla exclaimed while Elesa shook her head. "In nature it probably would be, but our Pokemon have the benefit of having trainers, we can unlock their full potential and overcome the natural strength of pseudo-legendary Pokemon, it's not easy, but it's doable."

Skyla punched in the air. "I'm fired up! Let's go training, gogogo!" And marched into the woods. The others followed closely.

After entering the forest, they slowed down, careful not to be ambushed by Pokémon.

They walked for about ten meters before the first Pokémon showed itself, it was a Minccino, a small, gray and fluffly Pokémon with a long tail. It came out of a rustling bush.

"A wild Minccino, I'm going to battle it, go Magby!" Jasper excitedly sent Magby into battle.

Magby burned with the same battle spirit as its trainer and squared itself in front of Minccino. "Magby-by"

Minccino recognized the challenge, got battle ready and attacked without any signal with a Pound.

Jasper was a little surprised to be attacked without a "go" or something, but realized that such things didn't exist in the wild. 'Stupid.' He scolded himself. But he quickly recovered and told Magby to prepare for his attack.

Just then Minccino, who luckily wasn't very fast, came up to Magby and attacked him with his pound.

"Magby, counter with Mach Punch, aim for his stomach!"

And before Minccinos attack could connect with Magby, Magby's right arm, his fist clenched and on fire, shot out and caught Minccino square in the stomach.

Minccino was then catapulted away, collided with a tree behind him and remained unconscious. It just laid there with swirling eyes and a large patch of singed and missing fur on its stomach.

Skyla and Cynthia were just gawking at the one-sided battle, while Elesa just shook her head with a knowing smile. "I told you, his Magby is a monster, these weak Pokémon stand no chance against him."

A few minutes later, when everyone had calmed down, Skyla clung to Jasper and questioned him about his attack. "Was that a Mach Punch, since when can Magby learn Mach Punch, how is it even faster than normal and how can Mach Punch burn, look at that Minccino, he clearly took fire damage."

Cynthia visibly perked up and listened closely when Skyla finished her question-barrage.

Jasper answered these questions calmly. "Magbys physique is super strong since we train his body daily, that's where the power of this attacked came from, aside from the fact that Mach Punch, a fighting-type move is super effective against Minccinos normal-typing." "Mag-Mag-By" Magby interrupted Jaspers Monologue by flexing his arm muscles and exclaiming to emphasize Jaspers statement, Jasper then cleared his throat and continued.

"As for why Magby can use Mach Punch, it's because it's Magbys egg move, and the Mach Punch is so fast due to the fact that we combined it with the martial arts move one-inch punch, a technique to launch a super fast close distance punch, but it has not much power. For that we trained Magbys Fire Punch so much that it became instinctual, it worked because of Magbys innate body-heat control, so now every close combat move of Magby has a Fire Punch imbued in it."

Jasper finished his answer and took a deep breath after talking so much while Skyla was just stunned and had no idea what to say, the calm Cynthia spoke up. "What a marvelous strategy and training, truly genius, you really showed me just how much can be accomplished by training Pokémon and thinking outside the box. I'm truly inspired!" "Gible-ble" Gible agreed with her, a fire burning in her eyes.

Jasper and Magby practically swelled with pride, but before it could get over their heads, Elesa grabbed his hand and dragged him deeper into the forest while waving at the others. "Hurry up girls, stop inflating Jasper's ego. There is much more to explore and learn here, let's go!"

The others shouted their agreement and followed the pair deeper into the forest.

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