C057 - Pete's pokemon progress (un)precedentedly

AN: I've updates the map in the second aux chapter with names I've given to certain places like Spice Island and stuff. Mostly so I don't forget myself. Excuse my terrible handwriting~

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Another week later, Professor Elm and Vivian said their goodbyes and used the professor's Xatu to teleport back home with their son. Valentino was still happily running through Ilex Forest and recording all the different groups, herds, and tribes that have formed now that the chokehold of the Ariados tribe was over.

In this week, Professor Elm witnessed the hatching of Pete's third Miltank firsthand as he was going over research data in Pete's study at the time. Everyone else was currently out, only the older Miltank was present and working in the kitchen.

Pete later learned that this new Miltank was indeed the daughter of the older Miltank, so he was quite happy that his faithful helper in the kitchen got to witness her daughter's hatching.

A few more pokemon evolved this week, likely spurned on by the fact that Trapinch, a rather late hatchling, had evolved before many other pokemon did. Nobody except for Vibrava herself and Golurk knew that Trapinch was expending her ground type energy fully every single day by 'playing around on the beach'. After all, a normal Trapinch would dig one hole to trap pokemon inside, stay there for a week atleast and not dig several holes every single day.

Trapinch was also aided by the bond between her and Pete. He did write the pokemon bond feedback loop into existence that would help a pokemon get stronger by being bonded to a trainer with high typing affinity and Pete's ground affinity was his second strongest affinity just after psychic for which he had found more ways to train.

First to evolve this week were his two grass pokemon and Jasmine's Turtwig. All three evolved roughly at the same time after sleeping on top of a Leaf Stone for a few days and became Servine in case of Snivy and Grotle in case of Turtwig. Both evolutions were still mono grass type pokemon.

Later that same day, Pete's Blitzle followed and evolved into Zebstrika. Ponyta was desperately trying to catch up, but so far, he hasn't evolved. Pete kind of got the feeling that his mother would like for him to stay a Ponyta for a little while longer, so he hadn't offered the same treatment as he did for his grass pokemon by giving him one of his three Fire Stones.

Well, two Fire Stones because he complied with Growlithe's wish to become stronger the next day and gave it one of his stones to help it evolve into Arcanine. He honestly feared it was a bit premature, but he didn't technically even know how old Growlithe was, only that she was the smallest among the other dead siblings when he found her with Nidorino at the forest of Violet City.

Pete didn't have fire affinity to check and compare her growth and strength either, so he had tasked Growlithe with finally comprehending Dragon Claw from the TM he had taught her, and at least one different typing move from the other pokemon. She chose to learn the electric move Wild Charge from Zebstrika and finished learning both moves by the end of the same day Pete gave her the condition.

It was a bit of a surprise that she learned the move Dragon Claw, though it really shouldn't have been since he had tweaked the rules of move pools of this world with his novel.

In Pete's mind, Growlithe and Arcanine only learned Outrage and possibly Dragon Breath or Dragon Rage in the games. But since Growlithe did have claws, it made sense that she could learn the move once familiar with the typing energy.

When she did evolve, she immediately surprised Pete with her newfound speed. Her normal move Tackle had surely evolved into Extreme Speed at this point. There was no way that move was a regular Tackle anymore.

In case she wanted to stay idle now that she got her wish, Pete tricked her with weekly goals she had to complete so that she could follow the adventure group into Ilex Forest.

First, he wanted her to master a new typing energy every week by learning a new one or atleast developing a new move for a known typing energy when she had all the typings down that he knew she could learn.

She started with dark type energy through the Hone Claw TM and would get to poison type energy next week with Nidoking and Snivy. No, not Snivy. It was Servine now.

She already knew the dark type move Bite, Pete knew that, but he wouldn't want to spoil her great mood she had after evolving. So he let her enjoy the week and learn a single move with Hone Claw. She was likely going to learn more moves than that anyway. Adding to that, she had just learned electric type energy on the same day, so he let it slide.

The last evolution in Pete's team came as a surprise to most of them, even Professor Elm. He was, after all, one of his last hatched pokemon, and his species wasn't known to evolve particularly fast without an evolution stone.

Espeon evolved weeks before Pete thought it was going to happen. Usually, a 'high friendship' or as Pete would rather put it, a feeling of social belonging in a group, no matter how big or small, and a profound sense of self-worth was needed for Eevee to evolve into Espeon, Umbreon or Sylveon depending on the circumstances.

Now, since Eevee was trained almost relentlessly by Duosion and Farigiraf in psychic moves, Pete would add accelerated evolution speed by being familiar with the respective typing energy to his long term project called 'Eeveelution Research Paper'.

It was so long term, Pete even hoped that by the time he was old, he would have found eeveelutions that weren't in the games. Like flying, poison, or ground. Possibly even dragon, but he was not going to hold his breath for that particular evolution.

The evolution happened when Eevee, right after breakfast during daytime, finally used a move it couldn't in the games, Confusion. That might have helped the pokemon break through, but in his hopefully long life, Pete could find many other aspects that would aid in or decide an Eevee's evolution.

At this point in time, Pete and Valentino's trip to Hoenn was only a few days away, and he was watching his pokemon spar together with Jasmine's. During this week, he had told her about his TM with the reusable TM-CD function, which resulted in most of her pokemon seeing big progress on their move pools.

"You know, girlfriend or not, I'm a bit miffed you'd rather have me house-sit than come along for your vacation to Hoenn," Jasmine said in a quiet voice with a cute pout.

A full week of teasing by Vivian and Sophie had done wonders to cure her shyness and resulted in Jasmine talking much more openly around Pete. Maybe that was Vivian's plan all along.

The professor's wife certainly looked and behaved like it was her masterplan all along as she hugged him goodbye and whispered 'you're welcome' in his ear on the day of their departure.

"Well, the hotspring's almost done, and your mom and your sister are about to get here with her newborn. Isn't this sort of a vacation for you, too?"

"Hmph, I'll still need to tend to all your plants," Jasmine retorted with a pout.

"Oh woe is you! You have to pick berries so your pokemon can eat them for free! Such hardship, ah it breaks my heart," Pete comically quipped back by pressing the back of his hand against his forehead in a dramatic fashion.

"Hey, I want to be an elite trainer, not a farmgirl," Jasmine countered as she lightly shoved Pete with rosy cheeks.

"I mean, you could just do what I do and combine it all with training exercises disguised as fun little games. Like sniping a ripe berry from the tree with a well placed Rock Throw. Holding back and controlling the output of energy is good training, too, you know. Two weeks of that could massively help you with your ground and rock affinity," Pete argued with a warm smile.

Of course, Pete wasn't the only person in the world with an affinity. These past few days, since they became boyfriend and girlfriend, Pete explained all he knew about affinities and bonds.

Though she thought these were just urban myths like most people that weren't in the know, she did learn she had the rock and ground affinity through Pete's encouragement to try out. It likely came from her bond to Steelix, who used to be an Onix.

Not wanting to keep that from her sister, we learned that Sophie actually already bonded to her two first ever pokemon and gained a water affinity.

Even Corsola would eventually benefit from that, though Sophie was adamant she would not become a water pokemon trainer or gym leader like her sister was aiming to be.

"Haaa, can you keep a lookout for suitable pokemon then? Baltoy and Drilbur are very high on my list," Jasmine eventually relented.

"What happened to the Mudkip and Swinup line?"

"Ugh, not everyone wants to train a hundred pokemon, Pete. I still need to care for all of them and properly train them," Jasmine argued as she punched his shoulder.

Pete was really carefree about adding tens of pokemon to his farm. There was, after all, a reason most people would never start training more than six pokemon.

"Alright, okay. Steelix, Gliscor, Donphan, once Phanpy evolves, Rhydon/Rhyperior, and eventually Camerupt and Torterra will be an amazing lineup for an aspiring ground type gym leader. Claydol and Excadrill will be amazing additions, too. Claydol for coverage and Excadrill would be a ridiculous doubles partner for Steelix with Sand Rush and Sand Force abilities having such a crazy synergy with Sandstorm. And who knows, maybe your mom is crazy enough to buy you a Gible after all," Pete agreed with a laugh.

The twin's mom would arrive later that day with Lily, Jasmine's eldest sister, and her first grandkid. Pete had no idea that his joke would turn out to be the truth.