Chapter 566: Player and Referee

"That last gamble paid off for the gambler."

Baimu savored the simulation he had just completed.

Compared to the "coincidence" of advancing from the top sixteen to the top eight, his real stroke of luck should have started from when the gambler entrusted the Withered Leaf Gym Leader.

In the gambler's era, could the Gym Leader also be counted among trustworthy people?

He had no way of knowing.

Presumably the gambler likewise could not be certain that the Withered Leaf Gym Leader would be willing to risk offending Team Rocket in order to offer aid to him and his grandson.

But faced with a behemoth like Team Rocket, the gambler had no choice but to trust the only party willing to extend a helping hand.

Fortunately, that party not only succeeded in rescuing his grandson, but also found them a way out for the future.

Unova was a distant land where Team Rocket could not reach.

The second gamble.

Was the gambler staking his own life, intending to perish together with the Team Rocket member who had truly destroyed his family and life, and who shamelessly came to exploit him.

This gamble he also won.

Poliwrath evolved into Politoed, broke open the shell of the car sinking into the sea, and rescued the unconscious gambler.

A sufficiently happy ending.

"Too bad the rewards given aren't all that great."

Baimu looked at the four selectable rewards and fell into hesitation.

The level reward was a must-take; among the remaining three, Earth Power was decent, but no Pokémon in his team could learn it, so it would likely get stuck like Spider Web — still unused to this day.

But the Pokémon lead…

He glanced at the several Pokémon leads piling up in the simulator, and silently chose Earth Power.

Earth Power might still find a day to be used; he wouldn't have to pass it down as a family heirloom to relatives and friends in the future, whereas the Pokémon lead, if he fixed his team members, would become a complete ornament.

However, for now he had no intention of fixing his team members.

There were simply too many interesting Pokémon in the world; it was truly hard to part with any.

As for the talent…

【Hot-Blooded Youth】 wasn't a rare ordinary talent like 【Psychic】 or 【Villain】; drawing it ten times out of four or five simulations was a complete waste.

After deciding on the talent.

Baimu left his room and found the shiny Milestone sitting prettily alone by the pool in the Gym's ecological garden, gazing up at the bright moon and singing out in a melodic cry.

Its golden scales reflected a faint light, and its pale-blue hair-like fins drifted like long hair.

In a daze.

The wondrous image of a bewitching sea siren gazing at the moon and singing aloud surfaced in his mind, but the many Water-type Pokémon crowded in the corner quickly brought him back to his senses.

The shiny Milestone's appearance was highly praised in the Gym; who knew how many Pokémon it had enchanted.

At this moment they too were watching from afar with adoring expressions.

"Milestone!"

He beckoned.

"Mii~lo~"

Milestone's song cut off abruptly; after a delighted sideways glance to confirm, it twisted its slender, sleek water-snake body and swam over.

Since this one was primarily a Water-type Pokémon, Baimu generally arranged for it to stay in the Gym's ecological garden at night; the humid environment helped maintain the moisture-oil balance on its body surface, which was good for its health.

Worried it would be lonely, he had also chased Aggron over, but right now…

"Where's Aggron?"

Baimu swept his gaze over the surroundings, puzzled at not seeing the big monster.

"Mii~lo~~"

Milestone first nuzzled his cheek, then pointed its tail toward a certain spot in the distant thicket.

He looked over and could faintly see Aggron apparently communicating with some Pokémon; he thought he'd go over and check in a bit.

"Come on, Enlightenment!"

Baimu reached out and pressed Milestone's brow, giving the level reward he had just obtained to this one.

Excellent guidance helped rapidly raise a Pokémon's strength.

After a month of special training, he finally understood why Ash always liked to play this routine; aside from anything else, the energy level really did rise fast!

Previously at Verdanturf Town the shiny Milestone's level was still at the bottom, but now it had already surpassed the Galarian Corsola, and the two levels just now pushed it past Porygon2, reaching an astonishing level sixty-six!

Of that, only four levels involved the level reward.

In other words, it had raised more than ten levels through its own strength in less than two months.

It had even surpassed the Hydreigon that the simulator had labeled 【Excellent】.

One had to know that back then, in order to make Haxorus evolve quickly, the level rewards invested could be called ungrudging — to the point of stuffing them in whenever available.

The simulation results back then were also excellent, unlike now where for two consecutive months the bottom guarantee was the top eight.

"Mii~lo~"

The shiny Milestone carefully felt the new power welling up within its body; its beautiful eyes suddenly tightened, and it raised its head in a long cry.

"Woo—!"

In an instant.

The air grew more humid, a nameless wind slowly picked up, and the moonlight was shrouded by dark clouds.

Baimu raised his head. "This is…"

Pitter-patter—

Fine rain soaked his face.

【Rain Dance】?

Never thought a weather move he'd been self-studying for so long without learning would click the moment his level went up.

Milotic excitedly watched the not-so-large dark clouds overhead, turned its head to nuzzle All Baimu's cheek again, gave a soft cry, and dove into the water to swim about.

The other Pokémon in the pool, feeling the gentle drizzle, all broke into smiles. Aggron, hearing the wind, also came over, and upon spotting its trainer froze in place.

"Gugou?"

"Lagu~"

The Swampert beside it spoke in a low, muffled voice.

All Baimu raised an eyebrow and stepped closer, his tone lifting: "Hey? When did you two start hooking up?"

"Gugou…"

Aggron, which had been slowly approaching, paused mid-step. Standing in place, it wore a remarkably human look of exasperation. Though it didn't understand the meaning of "hooking up," just from the tone it knew it couldn't be anything good.

And in fact—

The friendship between Aggron and Swampert had already shown signs the day the Gym Challenge ended.

Both of their private personalities were the steady, easygoing type. Though they were obsessed with winning and losing in battle, they never held grudges over a loss or grew arrogant over a win.

Heaven knows which side started it first. In any case, these two Pokémon, who frequently ran into each other in the ecology park, gradually grew closer.

Occasionally they'd chat about battle experience.

Today they happened to bump into each other.

All Baimu glanced at Swampert, which gave him a goofy grin, walked over to Aggron, and patted its thick steel arm, complaining:

"I told you to come look after Milotic, and here you are, chatting up other Pokémon, leaving Milotic to sing by herself!"

"Gugou~"

Aggron awkwardly scratched its head and didn't argue—after all, it really was in the wrong.

It's just that although it got along extremely well with Milotic, the two of them basically didn't have much in common to talk about.

Perhaps related to past experiences of being ostracized and forced into solitude, Milotic was actually a closed book—the third school after Luvdisc's "too lazy to socialize" and Dragapult's "afraid to socialize"—the "doesn't like to socialize" school.

Its two most common behaviors were nuzzling people and spacing out.

Which led to, in the first few nights—

Aggron and the shiny Milotic would either gaze up at the bright moon or look down at their reflections in the pool. The former was nearly bored out of its mind, while the latter still looked perfectly happy.

Even more spaced out than Slowpoke!

On par with Slowking!

Aggron once suspected that even if it hadn't come, the shiny Milotic would still be perfectly happy living here in the ecology park, so it experimentally left the shiny Milotic's side for a while.

The result was exactly as it had thought.

The shiny Milotic was happy at its return, but it hadn't seemed particularly lonely when it left either.

Back and forth like this.

Aggron simply started drifting between Swampert and the shiny Milotic—wandering here, wandering there, and when tired, settling down to sleep peacefully alongside the shiny Milotic.

The somewhat dull days finally gained a little seasoning.

"Miro~"

Seeing that the trainer seemed to be scolding Aggron, the shiny Milotic immediately swam over, circled them, and nuzzled each of them with its head, as if trying to break up a fight.

All Baimu pushed away its wet head and said, "Alright, alright, you two just rest and play as you please. Pretend I was never here."

He winked at Aggron.

In reality, with their bond this deep, a misunderstanding was hardly possible.

So he only went to bother the big lug with all sorts of interesting and boring excuses, the way you'd treat your best bros, and occasionally got bothered back.

It was precisely through this mutual teasing, complaining, and dependence that the two of them found their own unique bond and way of getting along.

"Miro?"

The shiny Milotic watched the trainer's retreating back, its eyes slightly bewildered.

Aggron stretched out a claw and patted its head, let out a soft roar, then turned and walked away with Swampert.

"Gugou~"

At this moment—

The two vastly different silhouettes, in the shiny Milotic's eyes, briefly and strangely overlapped.

Gone in an instant, it thought it had seen wrong.

"Miro."

The shiny Milotic shook its head and went back to the pool to sing.

The trainer said it sang better than Blissey, so maybe it could provide accompaniment for Mawile at a big celebration.

——

Over the next two weeks.

Perhaps because the League Conference date was drawing near, the number of trainers coming to challenge the Sootopolis Gym increased.

All Baimu was fretting over how to speed up the simulator's cooldown, and also needed plenty of opponents to improve his real-combat response ability.

So he asked the old butler to accept challenges from nearly twenty trainers willing to battle him, this temporary Gym Leader, at a rate of two per day.

Because of Mi Ke Li's former Champion status, the trainers who dared to challenge the Sootopolis Gym were generally of a high level.

Some of them couldn't accept the Gym Leader being swapped out and chose to leave; others didn't care; still others were curious what qualified All Baimu to take over Mi Ke Li's position as Gym Leader.

All these trainers using different Pokémon, even from different regions, gave the latter a strange sense of déjà vu, as if he were taking part in the Conference early.

So how many Badges had he personally handed out?

One.

The Trainer given to him was—

"Double Return!"

A pink-haired, brown-skinned, androgynous-looking youth waved his hand and shouted. A surge of brownish-red energy exploded violently between the colliding giant Steelix and Smeargle!

Boom!

A muffled, thunderous crash.

Smeargle flew backward like an arrow loosed from its string, scraping past the youth's side and slamming into the wall at the edge of the arena.

"Whimper!"

It let out a pained whine.

Steelix likewise lost its balance and tumbled from midair into the clear pool. Terrifying columns of water shot skyward with a heavy crash, then came raining down like a torrential downpour.

In no time at all.

The scattered dust and smoke were washed clean away.

Two-thirds of Steelix's body could be seen exposed above the water's surface, its pitch-black eyes showing no pupils—only a pair of spirals.

It had plainly lost its ability to battle under the effect of Double Return.

On the other side.

The pink-haired youth tirelessly called out to Smeargle, whose gaze was unfocused and whose expression was one of struggle.

"Hold on a little longer! Smeargle! Victory is clearly within reach!"

"Awoo…"

Smeargle swayed left and right, trying to stand, but couldn't even hold onto its tail—the brush—any longer. In the end, its legs gave out and it pitched forward.

The old butler raised the flags in both hands at just the right moment.

"Both Smeargle and Steelix have lost the ability to battle. The Challenger has zero Pokémon remaining; the Gym Leader has one Pokémon remaining. The Gym side wins!"

"…Sigh."

Mi Ke Li let out a sigh, a pair of peach-blossom eyes filled with helplessness as he looked at the recalled Steelix. "You worked hard, Smeargle."

A young voice came from afar.

"An outstanding decision! I never expected Smeargle to pull off Double Return under those circumstances, and even hold its ground against Steelix's Heavy Slam at the most critical moment. Impressive, truly impressive!"

All Baimu applauded Mi Ke Li and his Pokémon.

To be honest.

He never expected to see a Sun and Moon—that is, a character from the Alola region—here in Hoenn.

The other party was named Mi Ke Li. In the games, he was a Trial Captain of the Island Challenge in the Alola region; in the anime, he was a senior student who had gone abroad to study in the Kalos region.

How could this person have come to the Hoenn region to challenge a Gym?

And from the looks of it, he even seemed to be planning to enter the Ever Grande Conference, which left All Baimu genuinely baffled—shouldn't he be entering the Manalo Conference instead?

He had probably already entered it long ago.

That said, Mi Ke Li's overall strength was formidable.

Even without employing the two systems of Mega Evolution and Z-Moves, relying solely on the coordination of his three Pokémon, he had taken down the Corsola that, due to the wrong target for 【Absorb】, was unable to recover sufficient stamina.

This guy was the first Trainer All Baimu had faced in all his battles so far who fought as a coordinated team.

Rather than, like other Trainers, showing no cooperation whatsoever between Pokémon—appearing to be a team on the surface but actually fighting solo.

His Smeargle was also very strong, knowing all sorts of bizarre and unusual moves.

It fully proved that, without being limited in the number of moves, Smeargle's strength could be improved geometrically.

Even its offensive capability, limited by its base stats, had been very considerably compensated for by the anime's background factor of acquired hard work.

It was hard to imagine such a person losing so easily to the villain Guzma at the Manalo Conference, the inaugural League tournament of the Alola region…

"Your team's level is very high. I'll look forward to meeting you again."

All Baimu said loudly.

"Thank you for the praise! I'll come back to challenge again!"

Mi Ke Li bowed to him very politely, his tone exceptionally firm.

The Gym Leader's remaining Pokémon was only one, and it wasn't even in perfect condition. If it weren't for the overwhelming power of the giant Steelix's Heavy Slam, Smeargle would have had a perfectly viable chance of winning.

He was truly unwilling to accept it.

The Sootopolis Gym—he would definitely overcome its challenge!

Mi Ke Li secretly clenched his fist.

All Baimu, hearing this on the opposite side, shook his head and said:

"No need! Your performance is worthy of this Sootopolis Badge!"

"Huh?"

"Master Mi Ke Li told me before he left that the win or loss of a Gym battle is not the decisive factor in determining whether a person is worthy of a Badge. Your strength is beyond doubt."

All Baimu casually spun a tall tale.

Before Mi Ke Li left, he had indeed asked how to gauge the strength of the Sootopolis Badge, and the former's answer had been—"Just give it as you see fit."

What do you mean, "give it as you see fit"!

That's far too frivolous!

But considering that he, a Conference participant, had been able to become a temporary Gym Leader—堪称 the referee and the contestant were both his top-tier flashy maneuvers—it didn't amount to much anymore.