343 CH110 (340), One Trip After Another
I spent the following days focusing on everyone's training and letting them spar against each other. This, along with the training they did by themselves during the competition, and the battles they participated in, plus my massage and grooming sessions, helped them advance one by one.
Thanks to their hard work, everyone's parameters rose by one or two values, and the ones with the most notable increase were the Sinister Six, simply because they now had all completed the second round of limit breaking. Ryujin/Gyarados even managed to raise his strength to SSS.
As for Stan/Gyarados, I could feel it in my bones, his Energy Capacity was about to upgrade to SSS as well, which would signal the completion of his limit-breaking training. Not much longer and he would be my third gold-stage Pokemon.
While it would be happening a bit later than I had hoped, since I had been hoping it would have happened during the competition, there was not really any reason to complain since that had been a bit over-ambitious anyway, pulling out 3 gold stage Pokemon for the final.
It would have been impressive though. Still, I reckoned that would have been more than cruel toward my opponent, so I might have not pulled it off even if Stan had broken through at the time. *Sigh* I was just too nice like that.
Anyway, the mass improvement of all my Pokemon over Palkiday and today aside, Mr. Cameron called me during the evening and informed me that the talks with the first habitat had been completed and that I could visit the habitat tomorrow at 10 a.m.
I simply had to come to his office, so that his Gallade could bring me there. The first habitat to accommodate my visit ended up being the Ralts habitat, so that was nice I guess.
The next morning, I bid my parents goodbye after we finished our breakfast together, and went to Mr. Cameron's office. Mr. Cameron called out his Gallade after some small talk, and he teleported me to my destination after greeting me.
We appeared at the same place we arrived at the last time, and a short moment later a Gardevoir and Gallade came out to receive us. They felt familiar, but I was unsure if they were the same pair that welcomed me during my last visit. At least that was the case until they spoke up.
'Welcome back young one. We are happy to see that you are well,' the Gardevoir said in open telepathy, and well that did not leave much doubt that she was the same Gardevoir.
"Thank you, it is great to see you as well," I returned out of politeness.
Mr. Cameron's Gallade chose that moment to speak up, officially handing me over to them before he wished me luck and left, leaving me alone with the duo.
'We have been informed of your success as well as wish, and have decided to grant you the chance, but you have to fulfill two conditions,' Gallade said and I just nodded while thinking that Mr. Cameron had said nothing about any additional conditions.
He better be ready to refund my points if I fail to even enter the habitat. Still, I obviously kept that for myself even if the duo seemed to know what I was feeling since I could feel their amusement. They probably openly showed their feelings since they could feel mine.
"Alright," I began with a nod, "I'll do my best to fulfill the conditions."
'That, we do not doubt,' Gallade answered.
'We first would like to take a look at the young one that went along with you during your last visit and talk with him,' Gardevoir stated their first condition.
"Sure, no problem," I said full of confidence. I knew that this was a test, more so an open one, but I had no problem with that since I was confident in our bond and his progress, so I called out Ali/Kirlia and the duo began to converse with him.
I stood at the side like some extra decoration for the next 5 or so minutes, but I did not mind it all that much. Okay, maybe I felt a bit bored, being ignored like that, but, I simply chose to spend that time manipulating a bit of aura into different shapes.
When the elders turned their focus back to me I was making a little aura stickman perform a break dance on the palm of my right hand. I was pretty focused on the exercise since it was a pretty hard one. Well, that and I was having fun, so I got startled when I suddenly heard an 'impressive' from the Gardevoir.
Yet, I managed to keep the performance going until the stickman finished with a bow, which earned me another impressive, this time from Gallade. I stopped my little exercise and focused on them, and the duo went straight to the point.
'We are impressed by the strength of the bond you two have managed to cultivate in the short time you have been together. More so, since we can sense that you have quite a few bonds at the same intensity.
Ali has only praises for you, and his progress is indeed impressive, especially since the energy readings we are getting from him are already equal to a silver-stage Kirlia despite him still being at the bronze stage,' Gardevoir announced and I was not surprised they knew so much.
I mean, with them being psychic types 4 stages ahead of Ali, I was not surprised they could detect that much, so I simply thanked her for the compliment.
'There is no doubt that you have passed the first condition, so let me share the second one with you,' Gallade began and I nodded.
'This is something we want you to do once you enter our haven. You are not to leave the relaxation area to persuade anyone to join you,' he began elaborating, and before I could ask how I was supposed to choose a partner that way, he already answered.
'We have already informed every member of our kin of your accomplishments and the purpose of your visit, so anyone truly willing to consider joining you will approach you to talk to you.
We have set no restriction on either age, stage, or maturity for this, so anyone can approach you as long as he or she wants,' Gallade finished and I agreed to their condition.
"Sure, no problem."
Not like I could do much else if I wanted to enter the habitat. Still, it was not as if the condition was to my disadvantage, I practically got to choose from anyone willing to talk to me on his or her own.
"Wanna stay outside?" I asked Ali and he said yes. The duo did not mind, so we finally made our way inside, and they directly led us to the centermost relaxation area.
Unsurprisingly, many if not all tribe members that saw me the last time remembered me. They were after all psychic types, so that much was to be expected, or at least that was what I thought.
They naturally also recognized Ali as the fellow that left with me, so we were quickly greeted by some Ralts and Kirlia. We talked a bit before I decided to make an announcement.
*cough* *cough* I cleared my throat to gain some attention.
"Excuse me, everyone," I began, "I just want to share something with all of you before I begin conversing with anyone about possibly joining me and Ali. Ali has already settled on becoming a Gallade, so we are hoping for someone that wants to become a Gardevoir to join us.
All of you are naturally still free to approach us if you want to talk, but that is our condition for those that want to join us. Thank you for listening to me," I finished before sitting back down beside Ali.
I pulled out a few bags full of snacks I had made with the Ralts line as the target. They were all Ali-approved, and I did not doubt that the tasty treats would help raise the other party's interest in me by a few levels, so I handed out treats to anyone that approached me.
The age-old adage did say that the way to a Pokemon's heart went through its stomach after all. Truly wise words. I spent a few hours simply like that, handing out snacks and talking with those that were interested in me.
Among them were obviously a lot of Ralts, but also a considerable number of Kirlia, and surprisingly, or rather unsurprisingly, there were a not-so-small number of male Ralts and Kirlia that were planning to evolve to Gardevoir.
This was a bit unfortunate since I had originally been planning to only check the females. You know, because the goal was a Gardevoir and Ali was already a male.
I even went so far as to ask Ali to observe the others during this time to see which ones he thought he could spend a long time together since that was what would happen after the newbie joined our family.
All so that they could get along well in the future. Umu, harmony, and compatibility were important factors after all. I saw a few interesting candidates, but I was going to wait until the last moment before I decided anything.
Anyway, around 2 p.m, I began pulling out my cooking stuff and began preparing some curry. I was planning a repeat performance of my cooking feat at the Riolu habitat, and it seemed that tales of my stunt had reached them as well since the Ralts and Kirlia around me became excited when I began pulling out my cooking utensils.
Ali assisted me while I was cooking, and together we spent close to two hours catering to what I assumed to be nearly the whole tribe's population. Well, the elders helped and all four of us used our psychic abilities to speed up the handover. I was pretty sure that we handed out a more than a thousand portions of curry.
Among those that enjoyed our food, there were not only Ralts, and Kirlia, but also Gardevoir and Gallade, including the elder duo that took a portion for themselves at the end. They also helped me and Ali with the cleanup after everyone was done eating while praising our culinary abilities.
Anyway, after that lunch episode, the talks resumed, and our little stunt really proved its worth. During the next 3 hours, before I was asked to make a choice, I was approached at a much higher frequency than before, and this time around even Gardevoir were among those that came up to me to talk.
That surprised even me, but they told me the elders had reminded everyone that the younger Gardevoir might approach me as well if they were interested in my offer, and more than 10 had decided to take up the offer.
When the elder duo approached me to inform me that my time was running out and asked whether I had made a decision, I had a few options in my head that I was still considering.
All of them had received Ali's approval, so the rest was left to me, but I had a hard time deciding on whom to choose. My list of candidates ended up having 2 Ralts, 2 Kirlia, and 1 Gardevoir.
'Species: Ralts
Gender: Female
Type: Psychic, Fairy
Potential: Deep Blue
Stage: Bronze-stage (low)
Genetic variation: None
Abilities: Synchronize, Telepathy
Talents: None
Affinities: Psychic, Fairy'
While neither of the Ralts had any unlocked modifiers or talent, I chose them because of their high potential compared to their stage.
'Species: Ralts
Gender: Female
Type: Psychic, Fairy
Potential: Deep Blue
Stage: Bronze-stage (mid)
Genetic variation: None
Abilities: Synchronize, Trace
Talents: None
Affinities: Psychic, Fairy'
There were others with talents that had approached me, some even had similar potential, but I was not really satisfied with the talent they had, so I chose these two instead.
'Species: Kirlia
Gender: Female
Type: Psychic, Fairy
Potential: Blue
Stage: Silver-stage (low)
Genetic variation: None
Abilities: Synchronize, Trace
Talents: Refresh
Affinities: Psychic, Fairy'
I obviously chose this one because of her talent. Refresh worked perfectly with her Synchronize ability. The moment Kirlia got inflicted with a status condition and in turn relayed it to her opponent due to Synchronize, Refresh kicked in and she healed from the status condition. Her slightly lower potential was no problem considering the usefulness of her talent.
'Species: Kirlia
Gender: Female
Type: Psychic, Fairy
Potential: Deep Blue
Stage: Silver-stage (mid)
Genetic variation: None
Abilities: Synchronize, Telepathy
Talents: None
Affinities: Psychic, Fairy'
The other Kirlia was simply chosen due to having the best potential among those that Ali approved off. The main reason why I chose her was that she was a blank canvas and I did not like the talents of the others.
This only left the final candidate and the one that was making me waver all over the field.
'Species: Gardevoir
Gender: Female
Type: Psychic, Fairy
Potential: Deep Blue
Stage: Gold-stage (low)
Genetic variation: None
Abilities: Synchronize, Telepathy
Talents: Emotion Manipulation
Affinities: Psychic, Fairy'
Obviously, she was already at the gold stage, so that was pretty impressive. She had no modifiers but that was no problem. Her potential was not bad at all, even if she missed out on a few limit-breaking bonuses, as well as an evolution bonus.
With deep blue potential, Utopia's initial optimization, and a round of limit breaking or two, she could make up for that in the future. The reason I was considering all this even though the Kirlia and Ralts were much better if I only looked at the situation from the potential front was her talent.
Emotion Manipulation is the evolution of the Ralts line's inherent ability to detect the emotions of those around them. It relied on their inherent ability and Telepathy ability to tweak the emotions of their targets.
While Aura Guardians could do something similar with our aura, or other psychics with their abilities, her natural talent was much more superior in that aspect and much more subtle. Honestly, this was an extremely powerful ability that could be useful in a wider range of situations.
If taken to the extreme she could stop and cause tides on her own, so I was seriously wavering whether I should just choose her despite her missing a few rounds of limit breaking, and probably missing the perfect evolution point by a bit.
Yet, there was no way to guarantee that one of the others would awaken a similarly powerful ability, hence my dilemma.
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