1. Country boy
The sun was shining brightly up in the sky bearing its gifts of light and warmth to the land below. Down on the land below were open paddocks where mooing could be heard, near the paddocks on the north side was a large barn with a couple of houses not far, with one of them being off to the northwest side and a bit further away behind the barn almost, while also a bit larger than the others. On the east side of the larger house and north of the smaller houses, were quite a few trees with various strange fruit growing from them. West of the farm looked like the beginning of some woods that quickly got a lot thicker, while the north had some woods that led to the foot of a mountain range. To the south and east were some more woods, with a well-maintained road going through them. Although not as thick as the woods to the west they were relatively thick the further you got from the road.
This looked like your typical dairy farm at a glance. Between the paddocks and the large house, on the west side of the barn was a small hill with a large tree on top. When standing on this hill, due to the rest of the farm being mostly flat land, you could see the entire farm with relative ease from the top. With the tree standing on top as a perfect source of shade, with a nice fresh breeze rustling through the leaves. No doubt this would be the best place on the farm to relax and watch the day drift away, maybe even have the occasional picnic. Unfortunately for the farmhands, they haven't been able to enjoy this spot much the last couple of years.
Sitting under the tree at this moment is the reason for this. A young boy sat there on the soft grass with his back against the trunk of the tree. This young boy sat there looking rather lazy as he did, he was a bit tan from being in the sun often, he was rather fit looking as well, presumably from running around and causing mischief as young boys do. He had light short brown hair and looked rather cute. He seemed about five years old and you could tell he would be handsome when older but not outrageously so.
If there was a feature that stood out it would be his eyes. They were an inky dark black and seemed to contain the very stars themselves or a bottomless abyss. The longer you looked into them the harder you would find it to look away, almost like they were drawing in you're very soul. Currently, he was looking out at the farm, or more specifically the creatures making all the mooing noises in the paddocks. Present in his eyes was a mix of excitement, anticipation, anxiety and an almost unnoticeable sliver of fear.
Looking out on the fields at the creatures it was quite plain they were not you're standard dairy cow. They were rather round and all pink with black around their neck and heads but pink faces, small white horns on their head and white bellies and four large udders sticking out, their tail was white as well as being a bit thick with a black ball at the end. They had four black hooves but the ones not eating were actually walking around on their back two legs! That's right they were the Pokémon Miltank.
The young boy sitting under the tree is not originally from this world. He comes from Earth and after a somewhat harrowing experience in a place he has come to call the Origin Plane (OP), got to choose to reincarnate here in the world of Pokémon, and he's been here for 5 years and 2 months now. Although he could choose which world to reincarnate in, he couldn't choose where he would be reincarnated in that world.
Assuming he would end up in pallet town and didn't think much more about it, so he was a bit surprised when he realized where he was. It made sense when he thought about it though, he couldn't just be made to hover above pallet town like a ghost waiting for a baby to be born, could he. What if he turned into a Gastly doing that. Although he was a bit surprised to not start in a city at all, never mind a starter town from any of the games. All said and done though he's happy with the situation he is in here.
On earth he was an only child and grew up in a big city, closest he got to the country was holidaying in a fancy cabin for a week. Here, growing up on the farm is vastly different, and so far, he is enjoying it. Especially with Pokémon being the farm animals. He also has siblings, two twin sisters who are 5 years older than him. Although they tease him now and then, most of the time they treat him like their little treasure and spoil him as much as they can. His mother here is also very loving and gentle while his father is a bit stricter, he's also a loving father. His parents here are the owners of the Moomoo milk farm off route 39 in Johto, so while not rich their far from poor.
As he sits there mulling all these things over these things, his eyes never stop wandering over the Miltank and the few Tauros, out on the edge of the field making sure everything is safe. As he does, sometimes his eyes seem to sparkle from their depths just a little more than normal from time to time. From the boy's point of view it's not just the Pokémon that he can see, he seems to be trying to see something else from deep inside them. As he concentrates on each Pokémon one at a time, shades of colour slowly begin to emerge.
In this world of Pokémon, things are a bit different to how things are in the games. Not all Pokémon in this world can be slowly trained up to level (lv) 100, in fact, majority cap at lv30. Here Pokémon have certain grades of talent graded by colour, which is further divided into 3 shades light, normal and dark.
The only colour grades he's discovered so far are, in order grey, bronze and silver. The shade of a colour makes no difference to the level cap, so a light grey Pokémon and a dark grey Pokémon will both peak at the same level. What the depth of shade makes a difference for is how fast it levels up, how well it can train its stats and how quickly it learns new moves.
Yep, Pokémon here aren't necessarily as limited by their level and species as in the game, although the majority like to keep to the Pokémon's strengths as it will always be faster in what its strong at than what its weak in. for example a Machamp has good physical attack but not so good physical or special defence. If you were to train Machamp's physical attack it would naturally rise very quickly within reason of his level. If you take that same Machamp and train one of his defensive stats, while it would rise it would not rise as fast as his Physical attack.
Most of the time trainers don't bother to train a stat a Pokémon isn't strong in because it's just not worth the effort for the little return. However, if you have a high talent Pokémon, then that's a different story. A light bronze talent Pokémon will train the same stat almost twice as fast as a dark grey Pokémon, making the effort worth it to at least try and cover their weaknesses without losing any of their strengths.
As the talent gets higher so do the differences in learning curves. That goes for moves as well. A brand-new move that you're Pokémon has just learnt is not all of the sudden going to be mastered. More often than not their clumsy and take a lot of practice to use. Most of the time needing to be stationary while trying, making you a bit of a target. It's worse for moves learnt through a TM or anything else besides by level up. Moves learnt through level up are like gaining the theory of how to do it while also having advice and demonstrations for it in your head. Other ways are like just getting the theory. For all these reasons plus the higher-level cap, having a higher talent Pokémon can make a trainer leagues above the competition. Unfortunately, there are no true trainers at this farm even though there are lots of Pokémon. The only potential grades and their level caps that he knows are,
Light Grey-Grey-Dark Grey, cap of lv30
Light Bronze-Bronze-Dark Bronze, cap of lv50
Light Silver-Silver-Dark Silver, cap of lv70
As he looks out on the fields all he can see from all the Pokémon is different shades of grey. As a part of the gift he got from his time in the OP, what normally can only be done at a Pokémon centre or a research lab for a fee, he can see with his naked eye. He can see the talents of all the Pokémon if he concentrates.
As he goes over all the info he's found out so far and tries to think of how he could get his hands on a high talent Pokémon, he hears the voice of his mother call out to him "Roby, time for breakfast". Robert quickly snaps out of his thoughts at the prospect of his mother's delicious food, he gets up and starts jogging down the hill.