Chapter 35

When we got back to the Pokemon Centre, the sun was already beginning to dip down below the horizon and the dusk of night would soon be on us. So, it looked like I couldn't set off from Cerulean City immediately. Oh well, as much as I wanted to push ahead further and get my hands on a few certain things, a day here and there wouldn't hold me up much.

Besides, I couldn't exactly put most of my plans into motion until Pidgeotto evolved. Or well, I could, Fearow could likely carry me to where I wanted to go, but it was a lot of places and a lot of distance to cover. So it would be more efficient for me to have Pidgeotto reach Pidgeot first, or catch some other large flying type pokemon, so I could switch between them when one got tired.

When we entered, Hilda went off up to the room she had reserved in the Pokemon Centre to change her clothes, taking my jacket with her. Not that I minded, it looked a hell of a lot better on her than it did me. And that show she gave me was just nice.

I on the other hand, made my way over to the video phones, taking a seat at the one most furthest away from others, and then sat down and dialed in the number for the Viridian City Pokemon Centre.

After a few moments of ringing, the phone was answered and the video screen lit up showing the familiar face of Nurse Joy, but not only that, she was cradling a Charmander to her chest.

Her eyes lit up when she saw me, "Jord!" she said, "Finally, I've been waiting for you to call, there's been a lot going on the past few days about you?"

"What?" I asked in confusion. As far as I'm aware, beyond capturing quite a few pokemon, and getting my second badge, I've not really done much.

"Well first, congratulations on your second badge, I just got the notification for it not long ago," the attractive pink haired woman congratulated me, and I smiled proudly, then she narrowed her eyes, "But, more importantly, where did you catch this Charmander? They're very rare, and there shouldn't be any wild populations anywhere near Cerulean City."

That's my Charmander! I didn't recognise it through the video phone, I really want to transfer him over soon, and I will even if my plan doesn't work out to my expectations, "An asshole called Cross released it because my Beedrill beat Charmander in a battle," I shrugged, "Not to brag, but my pokemon are incredibly strong and Beedrill is fully evolved. The guy was a total moron, releasing a pokemon as amazing as Charmander over one loss. And I may have let my excitement at seeing such an amazing pokemon in front of me and caught Charmander." I wasn't sure of his gender, which and made sure to keep from calling the fire type 'it' as much as I could. It just felt so disrespectful to such a majestic and awe inspiring creature of legendary proportions.

Charmander looked up from Nurse Joy's chest to look me in the eye through the video phone and I put on the most inviting smile I could, "Sorry if I gave you a bit of a shock Charmander, I got a bit ahead of myself," I apologized, "I think Cross is an idiot to have given you up, and if you'll have me as your trainer, I promise I won't make that same mistake." especially since I know with a bit of dedicated training from Ash, it absolutely demolished Cross' Incineroar the second it fully evolved into Charizard.

Charmander keeping looking at me with big green eyes for a few moments, and I won't lie, my heart hammered in my chest and I felt my palms getting sweaty with nervousness at the thought of the fire type turning me down. But I breathed a sigh of relief when Charmander slowly began to smile at me, "Char, Charmander!" Charmander raised one little orange arm up to touch the screen and nodded at me.

"See, I told you Jord would be happy to have you, like I said, he was even happy to get a common little Rattata," Nurse Joy rubbed Charmander's head with a giggle, getting a little mewl of happiness from the little flame tailed lizard pokemon, "Now why don't you run along for a bit and play with the other pokemon while I talk to Jord about some things?"

"Charmander." Charmander nodded, and let Nurse Joy set him or her down, but not before they tossed me a little wave. I happily waved back.

Once Charmander was gone, Nurse Joy sighed and rubbed her forehead, "You've really gone crazy catching pokemon haven't you?" she mused.

"I can't help it, they're all awesome pokemon," I shrugged, and I meant that about every single one. I was even kicking myself for putting that Goldeen back instead of catching it. "But I don't think that's the problem you want to talk about?"

"If only. While you've definitely got even more eyes on your trainer page now because of all your pokemon," she replied, "It does tie into your pokemon though. One of them specifically. That Smeargle you caught."

I raised an eyebrow, "What about him?" I asked. Beyond his stupidly large move pool, that had grown even larger since I caught him from what I could see on the pokedex, he was still just a Smeargle.

"Well, for one, I've had to keep him in his pokeball, Smeargle picks fights constantly and has even tried to attack me a few times, it's very violent." Nurse Joy told me.

"It did go for me the second I saw it," I recalled, the little prick, he's just lucky Poliwrath took him out or I woulda beat his ass myself, "I was just passing through an alley after getting my first badge and found him tagging a wall."

"So that's where you found it," Nurse Joy hummed before shaking her head, "Tell me Jord, what do you know about how TM's are made?"

"Through some kind of machine that takes the information straight from a pokemon right, making them lose the ability to use that move?" I answered. I'd been quite interested that first night browsing the internet back at the Viridian City Pokemon Centre and found out they were a thing. I don't know why it takes the information and ability straight from the pokemon though and why not like, copy it. I couldn't find any information on that.

I only had two TM's personally right now. I got a TM Case from Brock when I won my first badge. And it didn't really look like a a case, it was more like an adapter with a small screen and pad of buttons on it. To use it, all I would have to do is connect the pokeball to the adapter and select the tm I wanted from the screen with the buttons. I had the TM's for Rock Throw and now Aqua Ring from my two gym battle wins.

"More or less, because of that, Smeargle are a type of pokemon worth quite a lot of money and have become quite rare these days," she nodded, "Because the league has access to your trainer page, associates got the information as well, and I was contacted by a higher up from Silph Co who runs the TM Department with an offer for you, to buy Smeargle from you."

Okay, that sounded sketchy as hell. That was like the definition of big brother having an eye on you. That meant, whatever pokemon I caught, the league had the ability to see it and everything it could do. I suppose it does make sense though, pokemon are super powered magical monsters when you get down to it really, so it would be common sense to have a way to monitor people who had pokemon.

I put it out of mind for the moment since there was nothing I could do about it regardless right now, "What kind of offer?" I asked in interest.

"Well, originally they offered five hundred thousand pokedollars and ten TM's of your choice," Nurse Joy replied, "But when they found out just how violent Smeargle is, they cut the offer down to three hundred thousand and five TM's of your choice."

My eyes went wide and shock filled me, "I'm sorry..what?" I asked stupidly, "Three hundred thousand?" I asked for confirmation.

"That's right, and five TM's of your choice." she confirmed.

"So if I said Hyper Beam?" I asked.

"Then you'd get one for Hyper Beam." she nodded, confirming for me again.

Well. Honestly, as amazing as it would be to have a Kakashi-lite with a Smeargle, that was some amazing money. For winning my second gym badge just there, I earned fifteen thousand, six hundred pokedollars, bringing me up to just under twenty thousand. I would be multiplying my funds by over fifteen times.

My bank account in this world, had an interest rate of 1.4% per month. I'd made sure to look over it thoroughly when I first got here when trying to puzzle out how the fuck I even had one already set up. At those rates, with three hundred thousand in the bank alone, I'd be getting twelve thousand pokedollars extra a month.

If I stick to my original plan of living on my earned money through gym battles and such, I'll have a decently large fixed income building up over time, which will steadily raise higher bit by bit each month.

Screw Smeargle, money all the way! I know where to find some wild ones anyway, "Then I think I'll sell it," I decided, "Will you be able to handle it for me?"

"That should be simple enough, I already know your bank account, and I'll just need the user code for your TM Case to get the TM's sent to you," Nurse Joy smiled at me, before frowning a moment later, "Are you sure about this though? Smeargle is your pokemon after all."

I almost hesitated at that. Because...wow, that still felt amazing to hear. That is my pokemon. But, he's a violent little shit, and I don't really have the desire to try and get him to come around when I've got such an amazing offer on board.

"If this guy wants Smeargle for making TM's, he probably has other Smeargle and has a good idea on how to handle then," I decided on replying with, "I have no idea what to do with him right now, so he'll probably be better off with this guy."

"That is true," the pink haired woman hummed, "Well, that's really the only problem besides the fact that eyes on your trainer page have ballooned in the last few hours since you got your second gym badge. Two in two weeks of just starting your journey is really impressive, it looks to everyone that you'll be going places Jord."

"So I've been told," I snorted, "Still, now that I've got two badges, I'm wondering if there's something you can do for me."

"Oh, what's that?" Nurse Joy raised a fine pink eyebrow in interest.

"Can you increase my carry limit?" I asked