17 Dark Thoughts

After reaching the Pokémon Center, Raiden then directly went to the front counter and called for Nurse Joy.

"What?" Grandma Joy appeared with an unenthusiastic look on her face.

Where was the motivation?

Raiden placed Pikachu onto the counter.

"Can you check on Pikachu? Ah. This time, tell me." Raiden added when he remembered what happened yesterday.

Pikachu was sleeping.

He had gone through a difficult battle and his injuries could not be cured with mere Potion.

"Hmph." Grandma Joy took Pikachu in her arms and checked. She checked the pulse and pressed Pikachu all over and watched for any reaction.

She seemed like she had great skills and experience for someone who was always grumpy.

"Its all just exhaustion and external wounds. Nothing broken, nothing crushed, no severe internal bleeding." She gave her professional medical opinion in only a few seconds.

But she had an even grumpier expression.

"You made him battle even if he was badly injured? Bastards like you are what made me stay in this godforsaken place."

Grandma Joy dropped even the slight courtesy she had and just became sour.

Raiden just kept silent.

Pikachu was the one who still wanted to fight, but he didn't say this.

No matter what excuses there were, it would not change the fact that he did continue to battle.

But he was a Trainer. It was unavoidable for fights to end up like this.

That was why he made sure before catching Pikachu that he would battle together with him despite the danger.

They had a dream.

To travel the world and grow stronger together.

And Pikachu was willing to give his all to make that dream come true.

Grandma Joy just looked at Raiden for a full minute before talking.

"He will be in drip for five hours. Come back then." Grandma Joy walked Away without waiting for a reply.

Raiden ate his late lunch all alone.

It really was quite lonely without Pikachu.

The sun had already set an hour ago when Pikachu was released.

��Pika-pika!" I'm back in action!

Pikachu did a battle pose.

Raiden laughed. Pikachu was telling him not to worry.

The cuts had already healed, and the bruises had faded.

But Pikachu still needed a good night's rest.

Raiden too felt tired.

They grabbed a quick bite for dinner, before returning to the Inn.

As soon as their heads touch the pillow, they fell asleep.

=============================================

The next morning, they finally decided to take a step closer to their dream.

They would challenge and win against all the Junior Gyms in one year!

Usually Trainers would train their first Pokémon for two or three months. After all, they had to discipline their Pokémon, teach them commands, train their moves, and practice coordination.

Pokémon could only vaguely understand human speech, that's why they had to be taught slowly and properly to execute commands. They also need to be taught to correspond the name of the move to the move itself.

A dog knew how to sit, but not the word 'sit'. It had to be trained to pay attention and learn that it needed to sit when the owner told it to.

Pokémon were like the animals of Elendel. Only, they were smarter and are extraordinarily strong, and dangerous.

But Raiden and Pikachu were different. They skipped this step entirely. It was because they spoke the same language of electricity.

Raiden called it Thunder Communication. As for why Thunder, you already know.

With the continuous use of Thunder Communication, Pikachu would learn along the way the words that Raiden spoke.

And one day, Pikachu would be able to fully understand human speech even faster than others.

Raiden set himself a goal, to challenge and win against all the Junior Gyms in Lynier Fort in 1 year- no, in 6 months!

He will earn those three badges faster than Bernie!

But challenging a Gym now would be much harder than in the future.

It was because he would then have to face second year Trainers!

Gym challengers would be grouped according to the number of badges they have.

Usually most Trainers would get their first badge 8 to 10 months after they started their journey.

But there were others who lagged behind and failed.

Not everyone was like Bernie.

Some of them would try to challenge the Gym again.

Raiden and Pikachu would be competing against them.

They weaker than other second year Trainers but were still stronger than new Trainers.

It would be a lot harder than if he waited for a month or two.

But challenging your limits was the best way to get stronger and maintain a strong mentality and personality.

Raiden wanted to have a strong start, stay strong, and reach the end at the highest point.

To become a Pokémon Master.

By the way, what IS a Pokémon Master?

=======================================

Success is half preparation and half action.

As long as you prepared well, you already won half the battle.

So, Raiden did some research.

Lynier Fort was called the Eye of Azrel.

It was because of its marquise shape with a circular city in the center, which clearly looked like an eye.

And there were three Junior Gyms located in the three hearts of the fort.

One in the city, another in the plains, and the last one was in the middle of the forest.

These gyms have different schedules and duration depending on the challenges.

Raiden checked the schedule in the Pokédex on upcoming challenges.

The Wide Plains Gym will have a challenge next week, the City Hall Gym in two days, and the Forest Trail Gym in four days.

Raiden stopped to think, but only for a while.

The City Hall Gym would be crowded by the new, overconfident Trainers trying to challenge the Junior Gym.

It would be chaotic, and the difficulty would be higher as to eliminate more challengers.

So, he chose to challenge the Forest Trail Gym.

After all, they were already here.

…

For the next few days, they were training.

Pikachu still lacked control of his electricity.

Pikachu's accuracy was terrible. Thundershock and Thunderbolt would most of the time miss.

It would sometimes either strike at a random direction or suddenly curve in mid-air.

Even if he had tried to attack a sleeping Snorlax, there was still a chance he would miss.

Other Pokémon have used their moves for a long time, but he had only learned to use it just recently, and barely by instinct.

But Pikachu's accuracy with Thunder was quite good.

Thunder is activated by a Thunderbolt to the sky and let it gather electricity.

But this Thunderbolt was thicker than usual so it wouldn't easily curve.

Thunder wouldn't curve as it struck straight down, so if Pikachu could predict the opponent's path and the Thunderbolt was straight, it would be a direct hit.

If Pikachu mastered Thunderbolt, then Thunder would be his trump card.

If, and only if.

Sigh.

Raiden had also practiced with his Thunder Control. He would constantly gather electricity from the air into his palm and kept compressing it.

He would get exhausted very fast, but when he recovers a few hours later, Raiden could feel his power getting stronger ever so slightly.

As they thought about what difficulties they would face during the Gym Challenge, they trained hard.

And even harder.

…

Four days flew by like the wind.

Raiden and Pikachu were walking deeper and deeper into the forest.

They had a calm aura of concentration and had great confidence.

And the results of their training?

… Somewhat okay.

Pikachu could now at least have 60 percent accuracy on still objects and the remaining times were a little closer. It increased by 10 percent!... which is not much.

But it was the best Pikachu could do.

Normal Pikachu had about 95% of accuracy. Pichu who were known to have no control of their own electricity had accuracy of 75%, which were quite good compared to…

Anyway.

Four days of training could not cover the four years of life Pikachu had spent without electricity.

The younger you were, the easier it was to learn something. Pikachu had long passed that stage.

But there was also good news. Because Pikachu was great at calculating and predicting the trajectory of projectile objects, his accuracy stayed the same no matter how fast the opponent was.

If Pikachu could attain 100% accuracy, he would be unstoppable.

But maybe in the far, far future.

Right now, Raiden and Pikachu were in the midst of the tall and towering trees.

What they were concentrating and felt confident about was that they could travel through the forest without getting lost.

During their walk, they could see an increasing number Pokémon.

Aside from the ever present Caterpie and Oddish, there were many he hadn't seen in person yet.

Foongus, Shroomish, Morelull, Paras…

Why were they all mushrooms?

He could even see a Deerling in the distance!

He was stunned for a while, but the Deerling saw him and took off running.

They were hard to find because they were overhunted by their seasonal flavor-changing meat.

… Is it time for a stew?

Raiden and Pikachu enjoyed the sight of Pokémon living together.

This peace was something that humans had created for themselves.

Outside the walls…

Its best not to think dark thoughts.

They continued to travel while admiring the Pokémon.

There were Ledyba crawling on a log, a Kakuna hanging by a tree, a Wurmple…

Wait!

A Kakuna!?

Raiden suddenly stiffened.

As Raiden carefully looked, he saw there were tens and dozens of other Kakuna hanging in the trees nearby.

If there was this many Kakuna, then there were also Beedrills.

And there it was. Lying on the top of a tree.

It was hard to know if it was awake by looking at its eyes.

It doesn't have eyelids. But he knew it was asleep because it wasn't trying to kill him.

Raiden slowed down his breathing and tried to make no noise.

Beedrills were dangerous. Not just because they kill on sight anyone big enough intruding in their territory. It wasn't also because they were very strong.

Most Bug Types were weak and kinda dumb, so not many would choose them as their Pokémon.

But they were horrendously large in numbers.

They were more in number than all the other types of Pokémon added together.

Beedrills move fast and in swarms so by the time they notice a weak human like you, you would become a sieve spilling blood like squeezing a tomato-

Dark thoughts. No dark thoughts.

Pikachu braced in tension. It had known the horrors of a Beedrill swarm back in the wilderness.

If they were attacked, Pikachu couldn't stop them all.

Raiden slowly walked through with no sudden movements. He was sweating as he left the area. He didn't see any more Kakuna but he wasn't taking chances.

After walking for a few more minutes, He released all his stored breath and could feel his back dripping in cold sweat.

This needs to be reported to the authorities!

Raiden then hurried to the Junior Gym.

The Gym Leaders were those who got 8 Junior Badges but failed to become a Senior Trainer or had already given up.

Nevertheless, they were still strong, and they were the ones who protects the fort from dangerous or Ferocious Pokémon and swarms.

Raiden continued moving quickly but steadily. There was no reason to panic and tire himself when he wasn't in danger anymore.

He just hoped that there were no casualties.

As he stepped out from the last group of trees and into a clearing, he breathed a sigh of relief.

He had finally arrived at the Forest Trail Gym.