Chapter 38

"Hey." Chris called Daniel as he spotted him in the eating area of the pokemon center.

Daniel sat at the table Chris was at. Surprisingly enough, Chris wasn't alone.

Sitting across the table he found a familiar face- Dyson Esmond.

Chris was in Celadon since the start of his journey. He recently managed too defeat Erika and get his third badge. Instead of moving to another city for his next gym badge, he stayed here as he found an enticing mission.

Missions posted on the league website were great sources for money or certain resources trainers might seek. They were available to all trainers that were at least beginner rank. They ranged from regular chores to difficult life threatening missions.

Dyson had started his journey in vermilion city to have a rematch against Surge to get his third badge. He then headed to Celadon and defeated Erika to get his fourth badge. When Chris found that Dyson was in Celadon, he called him over.

Since he had arrived, Chris sent him the mission details.

Mission type: Specific capture, open

Location: The Great Linkins forest

Requirments: None

Details: The person that issued the mission was present in the Great Linkins forest during the recent fire along with his daughter. Although they managed to escape, some of the persons belongings had to be left behind and were destroyed. The objects destroyed included the daughter's favorite pokedoll that was presumably burned to ashes. However there have been sightings of a banette that is suspected to be the former pokedoll belonging to the daughter. Capture banette and return it.

Target details:

Pokemon- Banette (Ghost type)

[Image attached]

Rank- Pseudo-elemental (confirmed)

Discovered information- Its mastered energy is ghost and integrated move seems to be hex. Prefers usage of moves: shadow sneak, shadow ball and will-o-wisp.

Details- The pokemon appears in the Great Linkins forest only during nighttime. Rank has been confirmed via energy readings. The pokemon does not engage in battles unless trapped and will always try to escape first. Extremely stealthy.

Rewards- 50,000 PKD

An open mission meant that it did not need to be accepted. Anyone could attempt it. This came with certain risks of conflict with others. What attracted Chris's attention was probably the reward. Daniel had received 10k PKD from his parents which he thought could last for a year as long as he did not splurge. Cheap food and stay were available at every pokemon center.

Specific capture was self explanatory. They had to capture a very specific pokemon.

As for the banette being a pseudo-elemental pokemon? This wasn't an official battle. They could send their pokemon to gang up on it.

The high reward showed how much the person wanted the pokemon for his daughter. They were quite lucky to find a mission like this. After all the reward was enticing enough for some intermediate ranked trainers.

"Some people have already attempted to capture the banette. Apparently, its quite slippery." Chris explained.

In order to achieve complete mastery (100%) over a certain type, a pokemon needed to learn how to integrate its own energy into a move. Achieving this would make a pokemon breakthrough to the pseudo-elemental rank.

Such pokemon were a cut above advance ranked pokemon. But against a small army of rookie and advance ranked pokemon? Pokemon had limited energy and thus had a limited number of moves.

Since the banette was a non-hostile pokemon, attempting a capture did not seem like a tall order. At most, they would fail and return empty handed.

The three discussed their lineups with each other.

Chris- Wartortle (advance), Butterfree (advance), Pikachu (advance), Onix (rookie), Bellsprout (rookie)

Dyson- Ivysaur (advance), Gyarados (rookie), Growlithe (rookie), Scyther (rookie), Tauros (rookie)

According to Dyson, gyarados and growlithe had hit a bottleneck and were not advance ranked yet. Chris's butterfree had managed to break the bottleneck by itself and had become an advance ranked pokemon. As for wartortle, pikachu and ivysaur, they skipped this bottleneck by evolving, much like dartrix did.

This reminded Daniel that pawmi should be ready to evolve and proceed to the advance rank anytime soon.