Ch.19

As we were traveling through the wilderness, we found the slightly dangerous route through the nearby mountain called 'The Rock Tunnel'. It connected to routes nine and ten, which connected it closer to Silver Town if you were in those areas. However, it was used by trainers only due to it not being regularly patrolled and made sure to be kept safe for the general public. 

When we passed by I could see a trainer entering The Rock Tunnel with his Pokémon. We just ignored them and continued on our way to Lavender Town slowly but surely making our way there. The wilderness here though was relatively empty as we saw very few Pokémon. However, we did notice it was because Ghost Type Pokémon would come out at night wandering around and attacking anything in sight. 

However, a few Pokémon charms that I bought before coming this way made the Ghost-type Pokémon avoid our camp area. I did make shifts for someone to keep watch during our resting time. I would usually take the first watch, then Leo would take the second, and Mankey would do the last one since he was an early riser anyway. Thankfully the charms worked very well making the Ghost Types avoid our area like it was cursed to them. 

On our last day in the wilderness before reaching Lavender Town, Leo was finally able to completely absorb the Arcanine clump of fur. I checked his stats and they skyrocketed again, and almost completely caped out at his max rank. Some were only a few points away from caping out, and I didn't want to waste the other King Item before evolving Leo. So, instead, I hope they have something in Lavender Town I can buy that will be just enough to bring Leo to the max before evolving him. 

"Leo, seems you easily took the number one place again. No offense Primeape, but you will keep getting stronger too," I say to them as Leo puffs his chest out in pride while Primeape grunts in annoyance. 

"Just a little more Leo and we can evolve you," I say to Leo who barks excitedly thinking about evolving finally after all these years. 

I did notice the closer we got to Lavender Town the less wild Pokémon were around which was usually normal. But the increase of Ghost Types at night increased almost tenfold. Like a small army of Ghost Type Pokémon wandering around the outskirts of the almost abandoned town. Thankfully the charms still were able to make the Ghost Type Pokémon not want to get too close. 

Both Leo and Primeape were also becoming restless with the increase of Ghost Type Pokémon wandering around. We all just were on high alert as we finally entered Lavender Town. My first stop was to see my Dad's best friend and like an Uncle to me, Mr.Fuji or Uncle Fuji to me. 

Just like in the games and anime from my past life, this was the smallest town in the Kanto region. The population only seems to get smaller every few years, as currently, only just over a hundred people live here. Which was more than the anime or games but still very few people considering most towns have an average of two thousand and the cities in the tens of millions. 

Just walking around and only seeing a person or two once every ten minutes was weird due to my being used to more populated places. Just shaking the weird atmosphere off we continued on our way to see Uncle Fuji. I arrived at his house, though I had already told him I was coming to the town and should be there in a few days to drop by. 

His house was a very long rancher and the yard took up most of the south of town, as it had a huge open field with several different species of Pokémon going about their day. As we walked up to his house I could see the different Pokémon that were going about their day stop and look over at us before ignoring us. Though some still watched us with a curious and suspicious look. 

I then knocked on his door, before hearing a young woman's voice say she was coming. Then a few seconds later the door opened showing me a green-eyed, short blonde blonde-haired young woman looking the same age as me. She was wearing tight black yoga pants with a light green t-shirt and a yellow jacket. Her face was very beautiful too as it had sharp features for her cheekbones and red soft looking lips. 

"Ali? You are here too?" I say since I know her too, she is the only child of Uncle Fuji and like me grew up with minimal contact with other people. Though we were friends growing up and didn't talk as much the past few years I focused more on being a trainer while she focused more on being a Pokémon researcher like her Dad. 

"Lucas?" Ali says as we both stare at each other not expecting to meet the other one here today. 

"Uhm, yeah I talked with Uncle Fuji earlier he knew I was coming to drop by for a bit," I say to her as she nods her head while looking at me with surprise. 

"Oh, ok, come on in," Ali says as she moves out of the way in the front door with Leo and Primeape coming inside too. 

"Leo! Hey how are you?!" Ali says as Leo barks at her and she begins petting him. 

"Ev-eevee!" a small brown dog like Pokémon calls out as it runs into the living room where we are currently. The starter of Ali and one of Leo's friends as the two used to play together when we were younger. 

Eevee runs over to Leo greeting him as he greets Eevee back and the two appear to be catching up. Primeape is just standing beside me with his arms crossed while looking around at everything. I patted Eevee on her head too as she greeted me seeing me too. 

"Not that I care you are here, but why are you here? I know you started your journey a few months ago since Dad sent me some of your battles your Dad sent him. I figured you wouldn't come here due to the small town having no real attractions in it," Ali says to me as we sit in the kitchen with her handing me a cup of coffee as it is still morning around ten. 

"This might be a small town, but I wanted to see if I could explore around it to find anything interesting. Plus I went to Silver Town last month and figured I might as well come here to say hi to Uncle Fuji. It's been forever since I was last here anyway, I kinda forgot it was such a small town," I say to Ali as she nods her head. 

"What about you? Why are you back in town? The last I heard you got into the Kanto Researcher University, congrats by the way," I say to Ali who smiles and gives me a thankful nod while looking happy at getting into the very selective and prestigious University. Professor Oak is the founder of the university and gives a speech to each graduating class. 

"Thanks, and I came here since I am on break right now from school. Plus I am curious about Ghost Types, that is the area I want to specialize in for research. Especially since they are the least known Pokémon and each one is very special in their own right. So, I knocked two Pidgeys out with one stone, got to come home and see Dad, plus start gathering data to help support my theories for my Doctorate," Ali says to me with a glint of excitement in her eyes at getting to find more out about Ghost Type Pokémon. 

"Well, I'm glad you get to do what you love," I say to Ali who nods her head smiling at me as we continue to catch up. 

"Lucas! How are you?" I hear Uncle Fuji say to me as he enters the kitchen from the backyard wearing some dirty jeans, boots, and a dark blue t-shirt. There also seemed to be a pair of work gloves sticking out of his pocket. 

"Hey Uncle Fuji, I've been good, and you?" I say to him as he is about to walk inside before Ali looks over at him with an annoyed look. 

"Dad! Take your boots off! I just cleaned the kitchen floor!" Ali says with an annoyed face as her Dad was about to step inside with his muddy boots. 

"Oops, sorry... I've been good. The usual of taking care of those Pokémon who've been abandoned," Uncle Fuji says to Ali and then me while taking his boots off. 

"That's good," I say to him nodding my head. 

"Your last few battles have been amazing to see. Especially the one circle all over the place of you beating Lance Chevalier. Everyone thinks he is going to be the best trainer of your generation, but you showed them that is not the case!" Uncle Fuji says to me with a laugh and patting my shoulder. I can see he is proud to call me his nephew. 

"Thanks," I say with a smile as we all sit down and catch up. 

After a couple of hours of catching up and eating Lunch, I decided to go outside to see all of the Pokémon my Uncle takes care of. I walked around helping him, as Leo was running around playing with Eevee, and Primeape was sitting in a tree nearby napping. 

"You've got a lot of different species of Pokémon here," I say as we walk around filling up feeding areas and changing out water. Along with greeting the few Pokémon that came over to see my Uncle.

Most of the Pokémon, unfortunately, avoided me as most did not trust or like unknown humans having experienced harshness from their previous owner. Many would wait until I left the area to come over to eat or drink. My Uncle just gave me a small smile as I didn't take the lack of trust personally. 

My Uncle then went inside to take care of a few other household chores which I offered to help but he just told me he'd take care of them. Ali was walking around outside her Dad's large open field using some sort of technology while writing down whatever data she was getting. I decided to lean against the tree Primeape was napping under just relaxing and enjoying the quietness of the outdoors. 

As I was resting my eyes, I felt something nudging me and it seemed I fell asleep for a bit. I looked over to see a small porcine Pokémon that was dark brown and very fluffy looking with all its fur. The only thing you could see was its almost closed eyes and pig-like snout sniffing my pocket which had some of Leo's and Primeape's treats stuffed inside. The Pokémon was called a Swinub. 

"Hey, little guy," I say moving my hand slowly to pet the very fluffy-looking Pokémon. It made a pig grunting noise and jumped while backing away from me in fear seeing me awake now. 

"Sorry! Uhm, here," I say quickly taking out some of the treats while tossing it over to the small Pokémon and holding out my hand if it wanted more.

The small Pokémon quickly ate the ones I tossed to it, before sniffing the air and giving me a very cautious look before very slowly walking over to me intending to eat the treats from my hand. Though it seems the dried bananas that Primeape loves woke him up as he looked down seeing me holding some and dropped down right in front of the Swinub. 

"Swin–Swinub!!" Swinub says jumping in fear again having not noticed Primeape who suddenly appeared while quickly grabbing the treats from my hand and gobbling them down. 

"Primeape! You are scaring the little guy!" I say as Primeape gives me a confused look before turning to see a now shaking in fear Swinub.