Ch.22

After the celebration, my Dad had to head back home, and we all quickly fell asleep. The next few days I spent catching up with my Uncle Fuji and Ali, while also coaching my Pokémon on their daily training. I also gave Leo the last item I had before he evolved the part of the shell from a King Ranked Golem. Afterward, I decided it was time for us to head back on the road. Hopefully, this item I got from the dead Haunter can help Primeape eventually reach his final evolution. 

Instead of spending a lot of time in the wilderness, we just beelined it to Silver Town and then to Saffron City. It took us a few days since we rested between walking while sticking to the main roads. Once in Saffron City, I had to decide whether or not to head to Celadon City or Vermilion City first. 

"You guys want to fight grass types or electric types next?" I asked my team as we ate in a restaurant in Saffron City. 

"Arcanine," Leo says while shrugging and eating his food. Ever since his evolution, he has drawn much more attention with people constantly looking at him and taking pictures. 

"Prim-primeape," Primeape says while giving me a look of indifference but excitement at battling either way. 

"Swin-swinub," Swinub says with indifference too. 

"Very helpful everyone, thanks for the input," I say with a sarcastic voice and sigh. 

"Then we'll leave it to a coin toss," I say taking out the Guts Symbol I got in Silver Town and flipping it. 

"Celadon City it is," I say seeing I got 'heads' and then putting the symbol away. 

The next day we headed to the west side of Saffron City to Route Seven which would lead us to Celadon City. However, we would be spending around another month or two in the wilderness to help train Swinub so he can possibly help challenge the gym too. 

I also noticed that doing regular exercise no longer increased Leo or Primeape's stats. This means to increase them further I would need to buy or find items for them to absorb to further increase their stats. Showing that it is difficult to become a strong trainer without some backing and money. 

'Seems money makes the world go round in every world,' I think to myself after having discovered Leo and Primeape's stats are remaining the same no matter what I have them exercise. 

"Seems we are going to have to venture further into the forest to find items to help you Primeape. Though that means Swinub you need to stick close and listen to every instruction," I say as Swinub is small enough for me to carry him around while we are in the city or he sits on Leo's back as we travel long distances. 

"Swinub," Swinub says nodding his head while he walks beside me. 

"Primeape can you scout ahead, Leo stick close to us for now," I say with Primeape nodding his head and jumping from tree to tree to scout ahead. 

While Leo's presence is a boon and nuisance as it keeps weaker Pokémon away, that also has made finding weaker Pokémon hard for Swinub to fight against. After several days of traveling through the wilderness, we finally reached the part of the forest recommended for 'Experienced Trainers' which I am ranked below at a Proficient Trainer. 

'We should be fine considering Primeape and Leo are much stronger now. Plus Leo can outrun most things now, so I can withdraw Primeape and Swinub to escape with Leo,' I think as we finally enter much deeper into the wilderness. 

As we continued on the way Primeape informed me he came across something ahead of us. Leo confirmed it with his sense of smell. Primeape waited for us in the trees while waiting for what he found. Despite his new size, Leo was still very stealthful, like a lion he crouched down to sneak up on the area. While Swinub was still being carried by me not making a noise either. Sneaking up to the area we see a Ninetales laying down in a small cave with several Vulpix running around the entrance.

'Let's leave, I don't want to mess with a family,' I say to my Pokémon through our link. Just as another Ninetails enters the area, the mate of the one lying down in the cave it seems. 

After seeing the Ninetails and their offspring we didn't come across much other Pokémon in the area. Finally, a few days later we came across a small group of Primeapes and several Mankey relaxing in the trees. However, much to my Primeape's disappointment we left them alone too as I did not want to fight a group of his kind. 

Then after spending a little over a month in the wilderness not finding anything good, with most of our time spent helping Swinub train. Just as we finished packing up and preparing to walk, we all heard a Pokémon fight break out further in front of us. From the sounds of it, it seemed like two bears fighting or Ursaring in this case. Sharing a look with my Pokémon we silently and cautiously made our way towards the noise. 

Arriving at the area we see a larger-than-normal green-furred Ursaring having beaten a normal-sized and looking one that ran away. Shinies in my past world world sought after by everyone and just like my old life they are sought after in this one. So catching this Ursaring would fetch me a lot of money and I could possibly trade it for an item to help my Pokémon instead.

'Primeape, we are going to catch this green Ursaring. So prepare your opening moves and then land a surprised Focus Punch if that fails fall up with a Cross Chop,' I say to Primeape who begins preparing his moves. 

'Leo, watch our backs in case that other Ursaring decides to come back. Swinub, try not to move too much so I don't drop you' I say to them just as Primeape launches himself at the unaware Shiny Ursaring. 

Primeape pushed himself off the tree branch he was on making him fly like a rocket at the shiny Ursaring. Primeape's fist was shining with reddish energy showing his Focus Punch was fully charged. Just as the Ursaring turned to the noise of Primeape launching himself, Primeape's fist connected with Ursaring's face. 

The shiny Pokémon grunted in pain as its face was smashed into and stumbled backward from the hit. If someone used a slow-motion camera I'm sure Ursaring would have a very surprised and flappy face from the punch that Primeape landed. However, that hit was not enough even after being injured from its last fight. As Ursaring gave out a roar of challenge seeing Primeape land where it was just standing. 

'Primeape, do your best to dodge the attacks while landing as many Low Kicks or Cross Chops as you can,' I say to him and we three are still hidden in case the other one comes back with Leo needing to step in. 

Primeape then like a boxer begins doing small bounces back and forth between his feet while putting his hands up and staring down Ursaring. Ursaring then charges forward trying to land Slash after Slash with its clawed hand-like paws. Primeape doing the boxing techniques that come naturally to him and having learned from a manuel I bought to help teach him proper techniques, dodges all the strikes from the Ursaring. 

Ursaring is becoming increasingly angered at Primeape dodging everything as it begins charging up a Hyper Beam. Primeape uses this moment to land a Low Kick making the Ursaring fall down and release the Hyper Beam into the air as the very powerful beam of energy gets shot out at nothing. Primeape using the moment from the stunned Ursaring which was pushing itself up, lands a Cross Chop on the head of the Green Pokémon. 

With a loud bang, the Green Pokémon slams into the ground making a small crater where it hits the ground with its head. A small dush cloud puffs out too as Primeape jumps back while still staring at the Ursaring and watching it closely while in his boxing stance. When the small cloud of dirt and dust disappears we see that Ursaring is not moving and looks to be knocked out finally. Taking this moment I throw a Pokéball at the downed Pokémon which catches it without issue. 

"You did an amazing job Primeape! Goes to show that our training in boxing techniques was not for nothing! Maybe I should buy you a Kickboxing one and a jujitsu manual next…," I say while praising Primeape who celebrates his perfect victory. I then hand him a small bag of dried bananas as a victory snack. 

"Uh, funny," I say seeing the stats of Ursaring after catching it though not registering it to me. Ursaring's potential was Green just like its fur, while its stats were between Primeape and Leo's level. 

"This was a great find, though we should probably head to Celadon City now. Swinub should be able to atleast help at the gym," I say while Swinub grunts excited to finally battle a gym like my other two Pokémon have. 

After another week of walking to the city, we finally reached the outskirts of the city. By this time Leo absorbed the last item I had for him. It raised his stats even higher, while Swinub leveled up a few times in the wilderness while increasing his stats slightly. Primeape slightly increased his moves master. 

I felt confident enough to have Swinub be the first one to battle against the Gym here. Then Primeape can have a go, with Leo being the Ace of our team as he most likely could solo the entire gym at the level of my Trainer Rank. Unless my Dad pulled another fast one and asked the Gym leader to go all out at some point. 

"OK, we will relax and walk around the rest of today. Tomorrow we will challenge the gym," I say to my team as we enter the city. Primeape and Swinub have an excited look to battle the gym, with Leo being stoic about it just nodding his head. 

We then slowly made our way to the gym to book an appointment to challenge it. However, it seems more people are challenging this gym, as our time slot is in the afternoon. We will most likely be the last ones to challenge the gym tomorrow. Then we head to the Pokémon Center to turn in the Shiny Ursaring. 

"Once you get the price for Ursaring, is it possible instead to maybe trade it for an item of equal value?" I asked the male nurse who took Ursaring's Pokéball from me. 

"Sure, though it might take a day or two for the item to arrive or even be available. I will let you know when we get offers for him and you can choose what item you want," the male nurse says to me as I nod my head and leave the Pokémon Center. Afterward, I walked around the city with my team. Swinub is being held by me with Leo and Primeape walking right behind me. 

Just as my Uncle, Dad, and Ali thought I became much more 'famous' after beating Lance. Plus Leo now sticks out even more with people looking over at us and taking pictures from afar, with a few braver ones approaching us to ask me for a picture or autograph. It becomes very tiring after an hour of dealing with this, so Primeape at my request begins giving people the stink eye to keep them from approaching anymore. We eventually decided to turn in for the day and go to our hotel room.