Viridian Forest

With a yawn accompanying my steps I walked out of the huge Pokémon Centre in Viridian City, fully equipped to tackle the long walk through the near Viridian Forest.

Before I would be heading there though I needed to buy myself something I hoped to be able to afford with my current limited budget. A rod.

I wanted and needed a water Pokémon on my team and getting myself a rod would be a good step towards doing that.

Thus, I walked into the direction the nurse Joy had pointed me and soon after came upon a massive market for trainers and the equipment they desired and needed.

The Pokémon Centre had already tipped me off before but it was now real clear to me that the dimensions of the buildings were a lot bigger in reality than they were in the games.

Quite obvious if you think about it, but I strongly doubt anybody ever had to think about the true dimensions of Pokémarts for real.

Walking into the tall, blue and white coloured building, I soon found myself in a large hall filled with all kinds of equipment, while the cashier was located just besides the entrance, so you had to literally walk past them to get out again.

With a sweeping glance I checked all the direction signs, ranging from tents to Pokéballs, until I found one that said equipment for water Pokémon.

Having found a hint for the right direction I quickly made my way through the tall shelves, until I reached an area that was filled with gear for everything that had even remotely to do with water Pokémon or water at all.

Not long afterwards I stood before a shelf holding different fishing rods, confusing me for a second, until I found a sign next to the shelf explaining which rod was good for which sort of Pokémon.

Apparently, while it was theoretically possible to catch any water Pokémon with all rods, most Pokémon lived in different depths and preferred different baits, which also correlated to the strength of the different rods.

The sturdier the rod, the more weight the bait could be, which then lead to bigger and more often than not stronger Pokémon ending up on the hook.

Although, trainers were given advice to start with thinner rods, as some Pokémon could be rather temperamental and occasionally lash out rather violently. A receipt for disaster obviously when the trainer and his Pokémon were ill equipped to handle such a strong opponent. Logical, really.

Then again, I had no intention to start with a strong Pokémon. After all, I considered the road to be part of the goal when talking about being a trainer, hence preferring to bring up a Pokémon from scratch, forming and moulding it to my fighting style, instead of just relying on a Pokémon that was already set in its ways to begin with.

However, the prices on those rods were rather steep, so I thought about it for a second and then decided to wait a little longer before buying one for myself.

Rather I got myself a small knife for utility, a Firestarter and a sleeping bag, which cost me a steep 450 Pokédollar. Which pretty much left me penniless.

Thus, I knew I would need to battle some trainers soon, but as I was heading into the wilderness between the cities right now, money was not that important anyway, which left me more time to train up my Ghastly so that I could make sure I would not be penniless for much longer.

After leaving the Pokémart I swiftly walked into the direction of the forest and soon left the outskirts of the busy Viridian City and its towering buildings behind.

/////

"A Mareep? But… how? This is Kanto! Why the hell is there a Mareep here?" I asked myself in confusion, only to be surprised when the Mareep I had only seconds ago thought to be alone be joined the rest of its herd, bringing their numbers to a juicy nine.

I scratched my head in wonder, after which I continued on my way towards the Viridian Forest, all the while musing about that weird occurrence.

Before I could think further on the matter however, I was interrupted by another surprise that I didn't think possible until only seconds ago. Three Poochyena stuck their noses out of a nearby field of high grass, probably after hearing my steps on the dry dirt road, immediately darting away after checking for a second whether I posed a threat to them or not.

Mulling over the weird things happening around me for a minute a thought occurred to me that just wouldn't let me leave alone, even though I considered said thought to be absurd for a second. But was it maybe still possible?

"I remember that both of the species were native to this route only in Pokémon radical red, amongst a few others. Could it be possible that the Pokémon in this world are exactly the same location-wise as in that particular game? I need to check on this further. If so then many of my problems of team building just became a worry of the past." I spoke while my heart began to thump joyfully in my chest.

Thus, I looked for a nearby tree behind which I crouched down to check if my theory was correct. And so I waited. And waited. And waited some more.

Until, to my immense joy, another Pokémon appeared, namely a Skwovet. The squirrel Pokémon, originally native to the Galar region if I remember correctly, quickly checked for its surroundings before running down one tree and up another before disappearing from my sight once again.

And even though I knew that my observations were for the moment no real confirmation for my theory, they most certainly were a step into that particular direction.

And I hoped I was right. Because if I was I would not have to travel to a different region only to hunt down one Pokémon I really wanted on my team. But instead I could find it here, in Kanto. Namely the Safari Zone. Meltan.

Although I knew that not even the internet of this world had any information about that Pokémon, besides the fact that it was exceedingly rare, if my theory proved correct than I would sooner rather than later be the proud trainer of a Pokémon belonging to that mysterious species.

Right then and there I decided to keep an open mind and observe as much of my surroundings as possible, so I would hopefully find myself proven correct in my theoretical assumption on this world's inhabitants. And if I was truly right, what did that mean for the other regions, let alone the trainers of this one? Would I meet gym leaders with teams and strategies like those from those hardcore Pokémon games? Or would I meet those from the vanilla games and the TV series? Questions over questions with no answer in sight. But I was sure I would find out soon enough.

And with thus I finished my ruminations and stepped foot into the thick canopy of the mysterious Viridian Forest.