122 I find your lack of faith disturbing

{With Ash}

The P1 Grand Prix finally began, and Ash was over in the bleachers along with everybody else with a tub of popcorn that nobody actually knew where he got.

"Man, it feels weird being the one watching the battles, kinda feel like a side character, is this how you guys always feel?" Ash said with his feet up on a different chair.

Everyone just looked at him, feeling like that was somehow directed at them but they just chose to ignore it.

"Do you think that guy can beat Rebecca's dad?" Yellow asked with Pikachu sitting on her lap

"You mean Giant, yeah probably, I mean I did help him out so he should be more than fine," Ash said as she threw some popcorn in the air and caught it in his mouth.

"But how can you be so sure, what if he loses," Rebecca asked.

"Well, then I guess…" Ash said reaching into his bag pulling out an empty Pringles tube and putting it over his mouth, "A new challenger must approach, the Darth Crusader the conqueror of worlds, or something"

Everyone gave him a deadpan stare, "Really, that's your plan," Misty asked looking at him.

"I find your lack of faith disturbing," Darth Ash said before taking off the tube, "Besides 80% of these things are entertainment, If I suddenly appear I doubt anyone will stop me as long as it's a good show."

Just then the announcer started speaking and the competitors walked onto the field.

—

{In the League building}

Lance was walking through the halls where there were visible bags under his eyes, as of this moment he had not slept in 46 hours, and he needed to go to an interview to try and alleviate some of the public's fears.

As he was walking he saw Damian who was leaning on a wall seemingly waiting for him, "Champion," Damian said, nodding his head as he started walking next to him.

"Damian, how have things been?" Lance asked.

"They've been better, we are getting backlash on social media like Pidgey, and Darwin is still not fully healed after what happened, most of Lorelei's modeling and acting jobs have also been canceled, but Tempest seems to be doing fine."

Lance sighed, "Great, another thing those vultures are going to use."

"You mean the reporters? I admit they have been getting a little more bold, we recently needed to upgrade security to prevent them from entering."

"Yeah and that's not mentioning the boldface lies they are spewing on the internet, like how we're 'corrupt' and we 'conspire with the Rockets'. Honestly, it surprises me how far these overgrown man-children will go when they wouldn't even say it to anyone but their body pillows in their basement."

Damian raised his brow but on the inside, he agreed, "Looks like we found out what happens when you don't get sleep, you become too honest."

Then he put his hand on Lance's shoulder, "You sure you don't want anyone out there with you, in your state I'm afraid you'll end up saying something you'll regret."

Lance rubbed his eyes, "Not my first all-nighter followed by a meeting, also not my first time getting canceled, when you're the champion everyone thinks they can do better than you, and instead of working for it they just start whining on Pidgey."

Damian nodded but still had Gengar hand him a cup of coffee, "At least take one of these, you look like you need something. "

Lance took the hot liquid, brought it to his mouth, and then fully pulled his head back as he started chugging it.

Once he was done he gave the cup back and said, "That was good, bring me 15 more, today is going to be a long day.

–

Candela was stressed, ever since that call she has been trying to figure out what to do. Her best friend was who knows where, with who knows what, and she couldn't even tell anyone due to fear of the conscience.

It got so bad that Spark and Blanche were starting to get worried about her, her battling skills were starting to diminish.

Out of the 3, she is the best at training and battling, Blanche is good at evolution, and Spark in breeding/Pokemon eggs. But when they were practicing Spark managed to beat her.

Her friends Spark and Blanche wanted to try and help, but when they would ask she would deny or completely avoid the question so they couldn't do anything but try to comfort her.

But today was one of the rare days that Spark wasn't fooling around making jokes, they were all doing work given to them by Lance to try and salvage what little they still had.

Blanche especially was the worst off since they got more than double what Candela and Spark had, Spark specifically was just doing it silently which was out of character for him but in their situation, they didn't have a choice.

Candela was the first to finish the required work, albeit it did take 5 hours, she was about to offer to help Blanche until she felt her phone buzz.

Immediately she became stunned and slowly reached into her pocket when she pulled out her phone she saw an unknown number saying only one thing.

[Come to this location alone, if you know what is good for your little boyfriend.] Along with coordinates

Candela gulped and tried sending texts, but the number never said anything else.

Candela looked at her friends and then back at her phone multiple times, torn on what she should do, she was the strongest among them but she also wasn't stupid, this was obviously a trap but she also didn't have a choice.

So with a heavy heart, Candela ran to her room put on her Team Valor jacket, and grabbed one of her teams. This wasn't her main team but it was the most versatile one with good coverage so it was probably her best choice.

Then looking back at her friends she silently escaped and started moving towards the location.

—

{Team Rocket base}

{Enid POV}

Enid was walking up to the exchange center with about 10 Pokeballs holding a variety of different Pokemon. The person at the counter started inspecting each to view their quality.

People were looking at her with some respect, as it should be after all as the Protagonist it is only natural she is a prodigy.

With her Uncle Natu, she was destined for greatness, even now in Team Rocket with Uncle Natu she could teleport to each base giving her an advantage over everyone else.

She was determined to leave everyone behind and soar to new heights, and that started with them, Jay and D. as he called himself.

As the Protagonist she saw them like NPCs with stats that she could see and explore.

Jay was a low-level NPC. He had a high charisma and vitality, but an unsurprisingly low intelligence. No threat to her.

But D. was an oddball, she couldn't see what made him so special, almost like everything about him, High intelligence and high wisdom, along with good Luck. but she couldn't see anything else, it was implied that charisma was probably low but she was unsure.

Nonetheless, it was beneath her, even though he was above her for now that would change, but one thing did ring in her mind, there are some characters that are destined for greatness, not as great as her the Protagonist, but still high nonetheless.

Maybe he would be worth keeping around, not as a lover or rival, but maybe as a pet, one she could cultivate into a loyal servant.

Suddenly just as the man was coming back she saw the man in question, D. She hadn't seen him since the Bike shop, he probably also came to exchange Pokemon, probably not as many as her.

The person at the counter gave her her total, then she stepped aside to watch D. fail in front of her.

As he walked up he reached into a bag he had on him, everyone in the room expected him to pull out a few Pokeballs, but instead, he grabbed the entire bag and put it on the counter, revealing that it was full of Pokeballs.

Everyone was stunned seeing the sheer amount of Pokemon the person at the counter Hurley started inspecting them.

Enid was shocked but she convinced herself it was only full of weak Pokemon like Magicarp and Caterpie, the first was a Grimer, then another, and another, and another.

An entire bag full of Grimer, which was impressive in of itself, but Team Rocket had a preference for poison types, it wasn't a hard rule but they had facilities to help with them so most grunts preferred them.

After everything was calculated his total completely dwarfed her's, then without saying anything he just walked away. Enid didn't know why but that just seemed to irritate her more.

Natu was hiding and could sense the entire ordeal, so he just sighed seeing that this was going to get annoying for him.

–

{Ashtwo}

Ash finished exchanging everything he wanted, he got a pretty good reward after he came back from Sayoko, and he exchanged the weakest of the Grimer, he gave the stronger ones back to his Grimer to absorb back into one.

And he went ahead and exchanged 3 more IDs under the guise that they attacked him, and best of all the mints he planted started bearing their metaphorical fruit, and he was able to exchange them for 2k each and he gave a few.

So overall he was doing well, he grabbed the Modest and Adamant Mints for now and went off to something he was interested in, the Eggs.

Any player worth their salt remembers that Team Rocket runs a few daycares where they breed Pokemon that are brought in then take the eggs and return the Pokemon, what is less well known is the scale, they have massive influence in Kanto and Johto, some in Hoenn, and a few in Sinnoh and Unova.

With all that and tourists every now and then there should be at least a few things that might catch his interest.

When he arrived at the spot he met with 2 guards behind a locked door who stopped him.

"If you are here for the Eggs, here are the rules, the eggs are in a cold room to prevent them from hatching as such there are no cameras, but you will leave all bags with us and you will be patted down. And no Pokemon for obvious reasons. And just in case we have the eggs counted if you try smashing them or moving them around."

Ash nodded and gave up his bag, then he gave up his singular Pokeball into a locker they had, followed by a pat down, once everything was settled he was allowed in.

The room was bigger than it looked, it was also cold but not unbearable, there were 3 sections with prices under them

First, there was the cheapest, a random Pokemon egg that they couldn't identify, next eggs from a specific region, and the last one was specific eggs, each one had different prices for each depending on the Pokmeon and the parents of said Pokemon.

He took glances at them and was definitely interested in them but they were more than he was willing to spend for the good ones.

He then took his dex and started scanning the random eggs and they were total scams, but he also got an Idea, so he grabbed two random eggs that he didn't care about and walked out.

Once he got out he checked with the people at the front and paid for the eggs, 1k each. Then he got another pat down before he got his stuff returned to him.

As he was adjusting his bag he noticed a Grunt walk out of a side room with a bunch of eggs walking by so before anything he spoke up, "Wait, what are all those for."

The lead guard looked at the eggs in the cart and shook his head, "They are eggs that are unfertilized, took severe damage, or are just dead."

Ash nodded and got a second idea, "Can I have them?"

Everyone looked at him like he was a weirdo, "Why do you want duds, just a warning you can't eat them, believe me, I've tried."

"I just always wanted to see what one looks like dissected, I used to want to be a doctor so I guess old habits die hard,"

They still looked weirded out but also understood, "Yeah sure, some of these were higher quality but they are duds so might as well put them to good use, how about 2k for all of them?"

Ash put his hand under his scarf and acted like he was thinking, "I mean, they are duds, so I feel like that's a bit steep, how about 1,000."

"Some of these were high-valued Pokemon with high-valued parents, 1,750."

"Fine 1500, but that's it, they are still duds, not like being high quality saved them."

"Alright, kid, you gotta deal," The grunt said, holding out his hand as Ash took it and shook it.

After Ash gave the Credits he took the cart holding eggs and went away to his room as all of them thought that they scammed him, little did they know.

Once Ash managed to get to a secluded room he pulled out his dex to see what was inside the eggs, when suddenly a ding ringed.

[Congratulations on obtaining the desired amount, the reward will be given after the quality of the Pokemon is checked please stand by.]

"Wait, that counts, no,no,no,no,no Cancel,Cancel,CancelCancel, Where is the B button!?" Ash said as he frantically started pressing buttons in hopes of stopping it, but it was too late.

[Quality of Pokemon checked status Poor, user will not have a choice in reward, the reward will be given in a moment]

"Noooooooooo!"

--

Ok, I am finally done with tests, and I just want to sleep for 16 hours

Some stones to dry my tears?