CH133 (747), How Unfortunate

I asked Sceptile for permission to properly observe her for a few moments, and once she gave the okay I circled her a few times while prodding her occasionally. While I did that, I naturally checked her status sheet to confirm if my assumption was right, and the status sheet ended up verifying that Sceptile did indeed have yellow potential which usually sets a Pokemon's limit or rather their conventional stage ceiling to (low) gold. The fact that Sceptile managed to literally break her limits not just once to advance to the (mid) gold stage, which was the limit for those with deep yellow potential, but twice by reaching the (high) gold stage, was a testament to the effort she put into her training and the hardships she suffered to reach this point.

It also explained why she had come across a roadblock like this since she was literally defying the natural limits set for her by life through the power of YOUTH, sorry, I meant through sheer determination and extremely tough training. The fact that she had defied those limits twice was unbelievable, but it was a fact that each time the difficulty of overcoming her limits like this rose multiple times. The chances of her doing so for a third time; To break through to a new major stage at that was, I did not want to say infinitesimally small, but it was probably something along those lines.

Heck, usually, if I saw a Pokemon struggling due to the limit of its potential, I would say that raising its potential by a minor grade would probably be enough to make things easier even if it did not take care of the problem, but in this case "simply" attaining deep yellow potential might not be enough. Breaking conventions twice did not come without its consequences, which included over-drafting the body, so while having her potential raised would probably ease the difficulty a bit, that would not be all that helpful in reality. Sceptile needed to have her potential raised to light green at the very least to push the natural limit to the (low) dark gold stage to allow her overdrafted body to break through naturally without having to strain it beyond its limits any further.

What the status sheet did not mention, but my aura senses told me was that Sceptile's body was crying out in pain. I was pretty sure she had shortened her lifespan a bit through her training, though the loss was insignificant compared to the gain that came with the advanced stage/level. However, if she somehow ended up succeeding in breaking through to dark gold after continuing to relentlessly train and overdraft her body, the loss of lifespan could potentially outweigh the gain that came with sublimating her life level by reaching a higher stage. Still, I kept that to myself since I thankfully had a rather easy fix for not only Sceptile's over-drafted body, at least the direst part of it but also her potential problem.

Hence, I told Sceptile that I had a way to help her, but for me to do that, would require her to join me. A smile full of hope and happiness blossomed on Sceptile's face when I told her that I could help her, but she was slightly bewildered when she heard that I wanted her to join me. She mentioned the very talented Treecko trio that had joined me and asked why I would be interested in her when I had a trio that was destined to surpass in the not-too-far-off future, which was a bit valid, though I had a simple logic behind my request.

I did not even bother to mention Utopia, but simply said that only her joining us would justify an investment in her, as for what she would do afterward; That was rather simple, someone who had trained as much as she had would be an incredible teacher for the little Treecko that I had gotten from her tribe. I could feel that she felt a bit flattered and happy at my take on her, and my answer seemed to satisfy her curiosity. Sceptile agreed to my condition without any further hesitation, though the previous bit was more confusion than hesitation.

Anyway, since she agreed to join us, I brought out another ForestBall and pasted a Sceptile head sticker on the ball before I tapped her with it. She got drawn into the ForestBall and the process successfully concluded within nearly the same moment due to zero resistance on Sceptile's part. Everyone eyed the ball in my hands, and I placed it inside Utopia before asking into the open if we should just Teleport back to Brightwick City since I was already pretty satisfied with the haul from this trip. The others pretty much said yes, but before I could tell Tatsumaki to move us out of here, we all heard a few "{Stop, don't leave yet please}" shouts.

We all turned to look in the direction of the shouts and saw a quartet of Grovyle coming out behind some tree not that far away from us. Honestly, it seemed that I had gained quite a few stalkers during my short visit to the Sceptile/Treecko tribe. We all watched as the quartet began to approach us slightly hesitantly, and even though I had a slight inkling as to why they had followed us in the first place after the encounter with Sceptile, I still patiently waited for them to come over and speak up before saying anything, so we all just silently stared at the approaching Grovyle, which seemed to increase their nervousness for some unfathomable reason.

Once they made it in front of us, they stared into each other's eyes for a few moments before one of them spoke up and pretty much explained that their progress speed was much slower than that of their peers and that they would like to know if I had something that would be able to speed up their progress speed. Seeing me/us showing no indication of speaking, the Grovyle hurriedly added that they would be willing to let me capture them as I did with the Sceptile just a few moments ago. I could feel that the last bit was more of an impromptu thing on the speaker's part, but none of them spoke up against it, showing that they were willing if that was what it took to get my help.

I agreed to their request and confirmed that I could help them if they were willing to join me. Taking a look at their potential revealed that they had either yellow or deep yellow potential like Sceptile, but unlike her, their potential only slowed them down and did not block their road ahead since they were only at the (low)/(mid) silver stage right now. Nonetheless, that was fine since I was honestly adding them to raise the number of Treecko line members; With half of them being female, which was rather lucky in itself, I could slowly start a colony inside Utopia.

With us having reached an agreement, I brought out 4 more ForestBalls and pasted 4 Grovyle Head stickers on them before balling the Grovyle. Once the capture was complete, I moved their balls inside Utopia as well; All 5 balls, Sceptile's ball included, landed beside my Earth Clone, who had already finished showing the 3 Treecko their new home, and was introducing them to the others. The appearance of 5 balls did naturally not go unnoticed, and everyone was curiously watching the balls, waiting for an explanation. I chose to just release Sceptile and the Grovyle instead, and everyone, especially the Treecko trio, was surprised by their appearance.

I ignored their shock and focused on the ongoing optimization log instead, and to my surprise, Sceptile actually ended up getting lucky during the process. She actually ended up unlocking a talent, and I was rather curious to see what it was, though I had to wait for the process to finish first. I heard Sceptile actually release a groan of relief when the optimization ended, which naturally took longer for her than it did for the Grovyle and required a surprising amount of energy. Still, even though I was quite curious, I still briefly told everyone that the 5 were new additions that had joined Utopia in exchange for resource support. In Sceptile's case, I added that she would teach the Treecko trio and the Grovyle if they wanted; However, unlike the quartet, the trio did not have a choice in the matter.

Anyway, after that short explanation, I first checked the Grovyle and saw that as the report had shown, only their potential had increased. One of the males now sported green potential, while the rest had light green potential, which was pretty decent, and would suffice to start the "ordinary base" for the future colony. Once I was done checking their potential and had shared the news with them, I turned to the main prize. I saw Sceptile checking herself in wonder. It seemed that she could feel a difference, and I, as in my earth clone, went up to her. I pat her on her back and congratulated her on her new improved self before finally checking her status sheet.

Due to my curiosity, my eyes/mind directly skipped to the talent section, and I had to say that the talent sounded just as impressive as it was long. Sceptile had unlocked a talent called Body Forged Through Blood, and considering her past it made a startling amount of sense how fitting the talent sounded. I naturally read through the talent description, and I felt a pang of regret once I was done. Not because the talent was bad or anything since the talent was in fact pretty impressive, but because I felt regretful that Sceptile's potential and current level meant that she would never become part of the main team.

With her new talent, my resource support, Utopia's energy-rich environment, and the premise that she focused on limit breaking from now on, there was a good chance that Sceptile could at some point reach some very high heights, but doing so was going to take a long long time, at least compared to my actual team. So, while she could become very strong someday in the future, and her talent ensured that I was willing to invest in her to ensure that she could do so, Sceptile would be unable to keep up with my team which made it impossible for her to join even the reserve team.

Still, Body Forged Through Blood was a rather incredible talent and I believed that it would have been a perfect talent for Tyson/Machamp or anyone else really since gaining a 25% boost to all of one's physical parameters was very impressive. While the boost did not manage to equal the one granted by the royal/ancient gene because the two energy values were unaffected by it, it still surpassed the 15% boost provided by the Shiny gene by a single percent. With this, Sceptile's RV/BS became 615, pushing it into the apex category. *sigh* It was really unfortunate that her potential was dragging her down.

Speaking of which, I took a look at her new potential and saw that it had thankfully been raised to light green. The fact that her percentage was at 38% right now meant that her potential used to be yellow (78%). This took care of the wall that stopped her so far, and I was pretty sure that the unlocking of Body Forged Through Blood had taken care of any negative consequences her previous over-drafting had caused, which I was assuming was why Utopia used so much more energy during the process than usual.

Speaking about the wall being gone, I would have to speak with Sceptile about delaying the breakthrough she had been looking forward to in favor of undergoing the limit-breaking training. I was semi-confident that she would agree, and for the sake of her incredible new talent I was definitely hoping that she would do so, but if she insisted on going through with the breakthrough as soon as possible I would not stop her. Either way, I shared the good news with Sceptile, and the others who heard it were very impressed by her talent as well.

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