Chapter 11: Progress

[General POV]

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Eli woke up as usual and got ready before heading out to meet Andre at the spot they trained at yesterday. While he would let Kubfu do his thing, he did have a bit of advice for Andre's team, recounting what had happened in their battle in the tournament. He arrived earlier than the agreed-upon time, so he just decided to let out his Pokémon to stretch a bit before Andre arrived. He decided that now that Corvisquire had gotten Tailwind and Taunt to expert rank, he wanted him to start training Protect and Roost, as the way Corvisquire and Corviknight operated was completely different; one was a speedy fighter while the other was a bulky sweeper meant to wall hits.

While Ralts was training as hard as he could, Gallade, compared to its evolutions, had a completely different stat spread as well as move pool focus; except for Teleport and Heal Pulse, he couldn't see Gallade using any of the moves after his evolution. So, after Ralts gets Heal Pulse to expert rank, Eli decided to focus on his level to catch him up to the rest of the team as well as train his body stats. Kubfu, he sadly had no idea what to do with except just try to get him to Urshifu as fast as possible. If Urshifu's move pool is not too diverse, then Kubfu's is just abysmal in comparison. Eli guessed that Kubfu would probably be the first of his Pokémon to get a move to master rank, but he did want Kubfu and all of his Pokémon to get protect to expert rank or higher. It was just too useful of a move to not have at a higher rank.

As he was planning out what to do, he saw Andre arrive with Pancham in tow. "Morning, you seem to have arrived a while ago." Andre greeted him as he asked. "Yeah, a bit, but not by a lot, don't worry, so Kubfu and Pancham spar again as we train our other Pokémon, right?" Eli asked, getting down to business as he nodded. "Alright, Pancham, get to work with Kubfu; if you have any problems, call me." Andre instructed their two fighting Pokémon as they left to spar nearby.

"Alright, good thing this is a clearing that can actually fit Onix, or it would be really awkward." Andre chuckled as he threw out two Poké Balls, out of which came out a huge rock snake and Eevee. "Larvitar should hatch by tomorrow; meanwhile, Eevee is still giving me the cold shoulder even though she has agreed to train with us." Andre explained. "Mhm, by the way, do any of your Pokémon know protect?" Eli asked, feigning ignorance so as not to reveal his secret. "Hm? Nope, none of them know Protect. Why?" Andre was confused by the sudden question. "Teach it to them; it's a really useful move at higher ranks. Also, I recommend you teach Onix a speed-boosting move like Rock Polish; he does have weak armor as I had to painfully find out after he started out-speeding Kubfu, but after he evolves, he will need to somehow increase his speed, get it to expert, if not master rank, and your future Steelix will be unstoppable." Eli gave Andre some genuinely good advice as Andre hung onto every word.

"Never thought of it like that; gotcha, next time I hit the store, I'll get those TMs, and I think we can start working on Rock Polish right now, not like I had any good ideas for him anyways." Andre replied, to which Eli shrugged, "Sure, I'm going to train with my remaining two Pokémon before leaving in the afternoon. I want to get some levelling in too, especially since Ralts is close to evolving, so I'll be cutting our training time short today." Andre didn't really seem to mind, as he also started working with Onix to try to let him learn Rock Polish, and Eevee, being ever-so-standoffish, trained Shadow Ball alone.

Eli helped Corvisquire train Roost and Protect as Ralts trained Heal Pulse on Kubfu and Pancham if they ever got too injured, while also looking at their fighting styles, mesmerised by it. This continued on until it was time to depart in the afternoon. Eli had Pokémon to hunt. Saying goodbye to Andre, Eli made his way deeper into the forest than he had ever gone. He needed the extra money as he was basically dirt poor. He came across many Pokémon, but he had the same problem as before: none were worth catching. Sighing, he knew that he had to start fighting higher-level Pokémon, but that was risky in its own right.

The level gap got more noticeable the higher the levels got, but he really didn't have any choice. As he started sneaking with the cover of the trees, he encountered a level 30 Ursaring with 4 level 13 Teddiursa near it. The mother ursaring herself had a good potential of shallow gold while all of the teddiursa were at deep silver. "Ralts use Hypnosis on the Teddiursa, Kubfu aim for the Ursaring's legs to restrict its mobility, and Corvisquire set up Tailwind and run interference and scout if any Pokémon are nearing our location.

All his Pokémon got into position as they launched their assault. The Teddiursa were quickly knocked out by Hypnosis as Kubfu rushed the Ursaring, getting a Brick Break on its right leg, dealing considerable damage, and catching the mother bear off guard. Corvisquire constantly ran interference by hitting it with Drill Pecks and Power Trips boosted by Hone Claws, while if the Ursaring showed signs of gaining back momentum, Ralts would swiftly teleport in front of it while using Dazzling Gleam and Teleport back, blinding it for a few seconds. This eventually worked as the behemoth, 5 levels stronger than his two strongest Pokémon, fell down.

Overjoyed at their victory and seeing that both Corvisquire and Kubfu, due to the potential boost, had begun leveling even faster, he thought that going to the auction was really a good plan. As he was happy over their victory, he saw Ralts glowing with a white light, signifying his evolution. Quickly, Eli got the half blood Lugia scale out of his cube as he gave it to Ralts to absorb while evolving. Ralts shined even brighter than before after absorbing the scale, and the evolution took 2 whole minutes before the light died down, and lo and behold stood his now-Kirlia.

Pokémon: Kirlia [Shiny]

Lvl: 21

Type: Psychic Fairy

Ability: Trace

Gender: Male

Potential: Shallow Diamond

Moves: Growl, Double Team, Disarming Voice,Confusion, Hypnosis, Teleport [E], Heal Pulse, Drain Kiss

(Perfect Talent) Dazzling Gleam [E] (Perfect Talent) Magical Leaf [E]

(TM) Protect

Eli couldn't be any happier. He had his very first Shallow Diamond Pokémon, and its innate talent moves had turned into perfect talent moves. From what he came to know, perfect talent moves with training only require 2 months or so worth of training to get to Master rank from Expert, which would be a godsend for training, and not only that, Diamond Potential Pokémon only showed signs of slowing down levelling when they reached champion rank.

To maximise Kirlia's potential while evolving, he had to evolve him with a Top rank Dawn Stone. Evolutionary stones could be categorised into four types:

•Poor Grade

•Medium Grade

•High Grade

•Top Grade

With top grade having the best results in raising a Pokémon's potential, there was one problem: top grade evolution stones were generally rare, and even if found in the market, they would cost tens of millions of Pokédollars, and if the demand wasn't high, they could skyrocket to how much it cost Andre to get the Larvitar egg, maybe even a bit more. How would Eli get such funds? He was already grimacing at the amount of money he needed. 'Why am I so poor?' Eli lamented before congratulating Kirlia on his evolution. "Congratulations, Kirlia; you are one step closer to revenge." Eli was congratulated as he heard a smooth voice in his head: 'We are closer to revenge, Friend Trainer.' Kirlia's voice echoed, as opposed to the static-like voice he had as a Ralts. "Indeed," Eli replied as he petted Kirlia's head.

"Ok, let's hunt some more; we will be having a new member in the family most probably; we need to make him feel welcome, got it?" His Pokémon nodded as they made way deeper into the forest. Now, with Kirlia with him, he had a contingency plan as they could just Teleport if met with a strong adversary. With this dynamic, they found many Pokémon to train on and catch to sell. By the end of it, Kubfu and Corvisquire were nearing level 29, while Kirlia rocketed to level 26, just showing how huge the gap was between gold and diamond potential Pokémon. He hoped to get Corvisquire to at least Deep Gold before evolution; he had just finished absorbing 4 of the 10 feathers; with some more items, it could be most likely possible, and Kubfu was already good to go. All he had to do now was master the scroll of waters.

As dusk set in, Eli decided that the hunt was enough as he saw what Pokémon he had caught.

•S-Rank- Ursaring

• 4 A-Rank Teddiursa

•A-Rank Venonat

•A-Rank Munchlax

• 3 A-Rank Rattata

That was the haul he had gained with the stats of his Pokémon being

Pokémon: Kubfu

Lvl: 28

Type: Fighting

Ability: Inner Focus

Gender: Male

Potential: Deep Gold

Moves: Rock Smash, Leer, Endure, Focus Energy, Aerial Ace, Reversal [E]

(Innate Talent) Brick Break [E] (Innate Talent) Bulk Up [E]

(TM) Protect, (TM) U-Turn, (TM) Ice Punch, (TM) Fire Punch, (TM) Thunder Punch, (TM) Mega Kick, (TM) Mega Punch

Pokémon: Corvisquire

Lvl: 28

Type: Flying

Ability: Keen Eye

Gender: Male

Potential: Gold

Moves: Peck, Leer, Power Trip, Hone Claws, Taunt [E], Fury Attack

(Innate Talent) Drill Peck [E] (Innate Talent) Tailwind [E]

(TM) Roost, (TM) U-Turn, (TM) Fly, (TM) Protect

Pokémon: Kirlia [Shiny]

Lvl: 26

Type: Psychic Fairy

Ability: Trace

Gender: Male

Potential: Shallow Diamond

Moves: Growl, Double Team, Disarming Voice, Confusion, Hypnosis, Teleport [E], Heal Pulse, Drain Kiss

(Perfect Talent) Dazzling Gleam [E] (Perfect Talent) Magical Leaf [E]

(TM) Protect

This was staggering progress, and Eli was confident enough to blitz the gym challenge after Andre left to train in Paldea next week. He would have wished to start right after the rookie tournament ended, but with how things turned out, he was glad they turned out this way. Donning his Wilbur Bon Vide disguise, he went into the black market to begin yet another aggressive bargaining session with Magnus Vanguard, who finally came to the deal of 30 million P. While he did make huge deals with the guild, he did realise that he was still a D-rank hunter as he didn't really do any missions on the missions board, not like he wanted to do them; he only became a member to sell Pokémon as it was a prerequisite.

Making his way out of the criminal underworld, he changed out of his disguise as he made his way to buy all the items he'd need for the egg once it hatched. He bought Moomoo Milk enough to last until Fuecoco grew out of his toddler stage, as well as a few TMs he missed for his team last time. For Kubfu, he bought Substitute as a safe way to set up Bulk Ups in battles, as well as Low Sweep to bring down behemoths like Onix the next time he found them. For Corvisquire he bought Air Slash as to have a ranged option in fights as he only had Drill Peck as a reliable offense, he didn't need many moves just yet as he had to train his main Combat System as Eli had started dubbing it, which relied on Tailwind, Roost and set up at a safe distance before chipping away at the opposing Pokémon and finally for Kirlia as he wanted him to be an all round support before he evolved into a Gallade decided to buy him both the screen moves Light Screen and Reflect, as well as Confuse Ray to be more annoying to the enemy team and since he realized that he would have Kirlia for a while if he would be waiting on a Top Grade Dawn Stone he decided to get him Psychic and Shadow Ball for good offense too.

Teaching his Pokémon all these moves, he made his way back to his room as he saw the egg in the incubator had some cracks in it, a sign that it would soon hatch. As he got ready, he saw the egg cracking apart as he saw two tufts of yellow hair from the cracks until lo and behold, a bipedal crocodilian Pokémon with a mostly red body and a white stomach and face emerged, with black eyes and triangular nostrils, and its mouth having three teeth, with one in the upper jaw and two in the lower jaw. It had stubby arms and large feet, with two black toes on each foot. Fuecoco had yellow square scales on its stomach, back, tail, and the soles of its feet. All in all, looking adorable.

"Hey there, little guy, are you hungry?" Eli asked as he gave the crocodilian a bottle of Moomoo Milk, which it quickly devoured before requesting a second one with pleading, which Eli obliged to. While it was eating, Eli decided to scan it.

Pokémon: Fuecoco

Lvl: 1

Type: Fire

Ability: Unaware (Hidden Ability)

Gender: Male

Potential: Gold

Moves: Tackle (unusable), Leer (unusable), Ember (unusable)

(Innate Talent) Flamethrower (Unusable) (Innate Talent) Slack Off (Unusable)

Fuecoco was an all-around good Pokémon, especially with Innate talent Slack Off and Unaware completely invalidating set-up sweepers. He would be a hard Pokémon to get off the field if he got it to master rank. Although the (unusable) part was new to Eli, he figured it was until Fuecoco left his toddler stage. "Alright, little guy, I think you are tired too. Why don't I catch you, then we sleep? What do you say?" Eli asked, holding a Poké Ball out, which Fuecoco pressed with his snout before being caught and coming out again, snuggling near Eli before falling asleep quickly. 'Warm' Eli noted as he took Fuecoco to bed as Kirlia also joined, but Kubfu and Corvisquire were too 'Cool' to join in as one slept leaning against the wall while the other slept on his perch.

With the warmth Fuecoco was sharing with him, Eli also quickly fell asleep in bed as he was happy with what had transpired. Not only did he get a new Pokémon, he also got a Shallow Diamond Pokémon; he couldn't have asked for a better day.