CH5 (66), 4th Birthday (1)

Today is my birthday, but we won't hold the birthday party today, because today is a Mewday, and that means the only friend I currently have, which is kind of sad, has to go to school since Mewday is a weekday. My birthday party has been postponed to Kyoday, because of this. Still, my parents told me that we would hold our own little birthday celebration today and that we would celebrate again on Kyoday with Rose and her parents. I naturally had no problems with having two celebrations and agreed. My father took the day off to celebrate my birthday and we have just finished our breakfast. "Son, since we are going to celebrate your birthday on our own today, and then again with Thorn and his family on Kyoday, we decided to divide your birthday presents into two groups." My father said, but before he could go on, my mother cut in. "That's right. We will give you some of your presents tonight, and the rest on Kyoday. Yesterday we asked you to think about a few places you want to visit after breakfast. Have you already made up your mind?" She asked me. I nodded at her question, I had indeed thought about which places I wanted to visit today.

"I did decide on a few places that I want to visit. I heard on the radio that there is an ongoing exhibition on the Royal Pokemon of Kanto in Hope Town. I want to learn more about the Royal Pokemon, so that's the first place I want to visit." Was my answer. My parents slightly smiled at that.

"There is indeed an exhibition being held in the Town Hall, so we should be able to visit that place. I just have to look up when the place is open for visitors, but I see no problem with your request." Came from my father.

While I showed a happy smile at that, I heard my mother speaking.

"We should have enough time to visit one or two more places after the exhibition, so do you have any more places you want to visit?" She asked me. I go over my mental list of places in Hope Town that I heard about somewhere and that I want to visit someday. I decide on one place that should match time-wise. "I heard someone talk about a store called Curries Curious Curiosities during one of our trips. They said that the store sells many things that are mostly unidentified and that one can hit the jackpot if they manage to find something that is actually valuable. I think that place sounds interesting." That was what I told my parents. My parents looked quite happy at my choices.

"We should have no problems visiting those places. I think going to both should take up most of the day.

I just looked up the opening hours of the exhibition and it opens at 10 a.m, so we have about an hour until then.

Also, let's have our dinner at a restaurant, this way your mother won't have to cook." Answered my father.

"That's a great idea, darling." My mother agreed with my father.

Having decided on the places to visit we separated.

My mother started to clear the table and my father helped her.

In the meantime, I went to my room to change into appropriate clothes for a trip outside. While changing into my clothes, I thought about the only noteworthy event that happened in the last month. My Xatu managed to fill in the last 1.1% he had missed and promoted his potential to blue. He had truly come a long way, since the time they had met, from the little (low) iron-stage Natu with yellow potential that had his potential increased to light green by my space to a (high) bronze stage Xatu with blue potential and all that in less than 2 years.

I was happy with the progress of all my Pokemon because I knew that their progress was nothing short of impressive. Anyway, after I was done changing my clothes I went downstairs and waited for my parents to be done as well. Once everyone was ready we departed and at around 9:45 a.m we arrived at the Town Hall. "Should I buy the regular tickets or the ones with a guide? Do you want someone to tell you stuff about the thing displayed Mikail?" Came the question from my father. "The one with a guide, please." Was my immediate answer. I was hoping to learn something new by listening to the guide. My father nodded at my request and went up to the register to buy our entry tickets. He returned smiling. "We were lucky. There is a tour that starts directly at 10 a.m, so we won't have to wait like I assumed we would have to." He informed us. 5 minutes later we entered the Town Hall. Once inside we walked up to a person that was talking with 3 others. We assume that the woman was our guide, because she looked the part, and thankfully she was. It would have been really embarrassing if she had been a regular visitor as well. Our guide took a look at the time and at exactly 10 a.m she started talking.

"Hello, everyone. I am Anne, and I am going to be your guide for this tour around the exhibition. Before we begin with our tour I have to caution parents to make sure that their children don't touch the showpieces, because once they are moved an alarm goes off, so please spare us the trouble." She said. I had a feeling she was targeting us with the second part, probably because I was the only child in our group. Still, it was good I know that the place was booby-trapped. Anne continued with her speech. "Bulbasaur, Charmander, and Squirtle are the 3 Royal Pokemon of Kanto." She said while pointing at the pictures of the 3 Pokemon that were displayed at the entrance of the exhibition. She walked, and our group followed her, towards a display that showed the Kanto starters along with their evolutions. "The Royal Pokemon of Kanto are recognized as such because their lines belong to one of the strongest Pokemon species most prevalent in the Kanto region that belong to the grass, fire, or water type. While they can be found outside of Kanto as well, they are the most numerous in our region. Every single one of them can be trained by even starting trainers into true powerhouses, as long as they do an adequate job at training them. They also belong to the more amiable species, especially during their first stage, as even Charmander, the most demanding among them, would get close to its trainer and follow his/her lead as long as they get taken care of well enough and receive the respect they deserve. As long as the trust is established between Pokemon and trainer evolution is not a problem." She passed her for a bit before she continued.

"The grass(/poison) type Bulbasaur, with its evolutions Ivysaur, and Venusaur. The fire-type Charmander, with its evolutions Charmeleon, and Charizard. The water type Squirtle, with its evolutions Wartortle, and Blastoise. All of their species belong to the upper echelon of Pokemon.

Still, there are a few of them that gain access to another stage, that allows them to surpass even the likes of Dragonite." She said while pointing towards pictures of their Mega-Evolutions. While she did not comment on how one would go about evolving their Pokemon to these forms, her speech showed that the existence of Mega-Pokemon was public knowledge. They walked towards another display that showed multiple pictures of the starter Pokemon. The special thing about them was that the Pokemon in the pictures all looked different compared to each other. "Just like with most other Pokemon species variants of the Royal Pokemon have been discovered as well. These variants are extremely rare and we only have pictures for some of them available.

The others have been confirmed but no pictures are available for the public yet. Please note that only the variants whose existence has been confirmed are part of the exhibition. There may be other variants out there that have yet to be discovered, but those are irrelevant for us right now." She indicated towards the group of Bulbasaur first.

"For Bulbasaur 4 variants with a single typing have been discovered, those types are Water, Ice, Ground, and Rock. Furthermore, 3 Variants with different secondary typing have been confirmed as well, those being Grass/Water, Grass/Ice, Grass/Ground." She explained before pointing at the picture of the different Charmander. "Like with the Bulbasaur, variants have been found for Charmander as well. The number of confirmed variants for Charmander is the highest among the Royal Pokemon.

5 variants with a single typing have been discovered, those types are Poison, Ground, Rock, Dragon, and Dark. Another 4 Variants with a secondary typing have been confirmed as well, those being Fire/Poison, Fire/Rock, Fire/Dragon, and Fire/Dark." She said. Anne pointed at the last picture showing a group Squirtle. "Just like the others, Squirtle has type variants as well. 3 variants with a single typing have been confirmed, those types being Grass, Ice, and Ground. As for those with a secondary typing, 4 have been confirmed, those being Water/Grass, Water/Ice, Water/Poison, and Water/Steel." She said. I was impressed with the number of known variants.

I especially like the look of the Grass/Water Bulbasaur, the Fire/Rock Charmander, and the Water/Ice Squirtle. The shape of the Bulbasaur's body remained the same but instead of having dark green spots on its skin it had deep blue spots, additionally in place of its bulb, it had a few red, purple, and green corals. Charmander kept its general body shape as well, but its body was partially covered in stone plates at its legs, arms, tail, and scalp. It kinda looked as if it was wearing parts of stone armor on its body. The color of its skin was Burgundy (a darker shade of red) instead of orange. As for Squirtle, its skin color was an arctic blue, and its shell was the other difference. The upper half looked like a miniature iceberg, while the lower half still looked the same just dark blue.

After showing them the different variants Anne continued showing them around while explaining things when necessary. Useful care tips, their preferred diet, what to take note of before and after evolution, the best behavior in case of a wild encounter, and some simple training exercises were some of the things they were told. There were not only pictures but also videos that illustrated what was being explained. There were naturally also parts of the Royal Pokemon on display, like the shell of a Blastoise or the Fangs of a Charizard. Overall, it was a very informative as well as awesome visit and I would definitely recommend it to anyone interested in Pokemon.

By the time we left the exhibition nearly 4 hours had gone by, and we decided to eat lunch at a random restaurant before visiting Curries Curious Curiosities. It was around 3:30 p.m when we entered the store.

The store was not that big, but neither was it small. If I had to guess I would say it was approximately 100 sqm big. There were quite a few shelves with random stuff on them and a few display cases showcasing things as well. We kept walking around looking at the shelves to see if something stood out to any of us, but anything we recognized was already labeled and priced accordingly. If we wanted to find a good bargain, we needed to find something valuable that had not been identified as such yet. While we were looking around, we slowly started getting separated, which was no problem since everyone was in observing distance. Nonetheless, I was focused on finding something useful among the unidentified merchandise. I obviously made liberal use of my observe function but most of the unidentified items I checked until now were useless. I found my first jackpot while checking out a magnifying glass. It turns out the thing was used to make the invisible visible, this included ghosts, and other ethereal things as well.

'Name: Invisible Scope

Type: None

Class: D

Faults: None

Uses: The Invisible Scope can be used to make the invisible visible.

It reveals anything that is in an intangible, ethereal, or otherwise invisible state.

This scope is limited and can only show things that are invisible due to the influence of an individual of Stage 3 or less.'

The Invisible Scope would look normal to anyone who did not know what it was, as long as there was nothing for it to unveil. Due to this, it was only priced 50 Poke, which was still expensive for a magnifying glass, but cheap as dirt for the Invisible Scope. I took the magnifying glass in my hand and continued my search, hoping to land another jackpot. Unfortunately, an hour later I still had found nothing useful like the scope.

I had found two or three items that were worth something but I ultimately deemed them unnecessary, so I ignored them. Just as I was about to stop I found my second useful item.

'Name: Warding Talisman

Type: Ghost/Dark

Class: E

Faults: Does not discern between ally and foe.

Uses: The Warding Talisman can be used to keep out Ghost and Dark Pokemon in a radius of 10 meters from the talisman.

Passively charges itself from the environment and can sustain an active use of up to 2 hours.

If attacked the duration reduces according to the aggressor's strength.

Can defend effectively against Stage 2 Pokemon at most.'

I was really surprised at my find.

'What's this first the Invisible Scope and now a Warding Talisman, did I land in an exorcism/ghost movie, or what? Still, these are quite useful, so I am definitely going to get them.'

After taking the Warding Talisman as well, I went to my parents and told them that I had found two things that I wanted. I saw that they had chosen nothing so we only had to pay for my items. The total cost was 75 Poke, but the real worth was probably in the tens of thousands range, so I believe I had made a small profit. After we left the store, my parents asked me why I chose those things. I had seen that they were confused about my choices, but they had waited until we had left the store to ask their question. I was happy with their behavior and told them the truth, kinda. I said that I sensed that these items were special and thus decided to buy them. They were satisfied with my answer and told me they would later try to find out the items use for me. We walked around the city for another hour before going to the "Golden Duck" for dinner. I have to admit their roasted Psyduck tasted remarkable. After dinner, we returned home and watched a movie. Once the movie was over, my mother brought over a small cake with 4 candles on it. My parents told me to blow out the candles and I did. They told me I would get another bigger cake on Kyoday, which was great. One could never have enough cake after all.

After I had eaten my slice of cake my mother brought over 4 wrapped gifts. I could guess from their shape what they were and my guess was confirmed after unwrapping them. All I can say is that the gifts were awesome and really expensive. My parents had splurged for my gifts and they said that I would get more gifts on Kyoday. Just wow.

The first gift was a Silph Co. Bag, Rookie Edition. This was the bag all trainers bought at the start of their journey before they switched to a higher edition later on. It had become somewhat of an unspoken tradition to use it for at least a year before one changed the bag and even those that could directly afford the higher edition started with the Rookie Edition. I gave them a hard and long hug and thanked them from the bottom of my heart for their gift. The other three gifts were 3 complete trainer outfits perfect for outdoor activities. Each set consists of a pair of shoes, a pair of socks, 1 pair of briefs, 1 pair of pants, 1 T-Shirt, 1 jacket, 1 pair of fingerless gloves, and one cap/hat. The first set emulated the bug catcher outfit a bit. The color scheme was mostly green and yellow, the T-Shirt shirt had a Butterfree picture on it. Thankfully the pants were normal and not short pants. The second set had a black and red color scheme going and the third set was blue and gray. I once more hugged my parents and thanked them for the gifts as well as the awesome day. I directly put my new outfits inside my Silph Co. Bag and went to my room after bidding my parents good night. After I deposited my new bag on my table I went to bed to sleep.

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