Chapter 316: Bite the One You Love

Route 110.

In the games, a winding elevated cycling path was set up here, letting players bypass the grass and head straight for New Zi Jin City.

The anime has one too, only it's merged with the highway and doesn't exist as an elevated structure.

After all, the anime's region is far vaster than the games'.

All Baimu strolled through the lush green forest with his Doduo, whose two heads were curious about everything.

"Heiyu?"

"That's a weed."

"Heiyu~"

"That's a dandelion—hahaha, spit it out, you've got fluff all over your mouth."

"Heiyu!"

"That's a poisonous Toed—don't eat it!"

*Smack! *

A light slap landed on the misbehaving head on the left, making the head on the right—currently spitting out fluff—shrink back too.

All Baimu grabbed the Doduo's leftmost and rightmost cheeks, stretched them as wide as they'd go, and said seriously: "Remember, anything this colorful—red cap, white stem—you absolutely must not bite!"

"Heiyu!" "Heiyu!"

The Doduo nodded seriously.

Once its trainer had walked on ahead, it carefully studied this bad thing called the poisonous Toed.

So you're the one who got me hit?

The Doduo angrily whipped its tail at it, smashing the colorful Toed to pieces in one strike.

Bad Toed!

"Heiyu~" "Heiyu~"

Reassured, it chased after its good All Baimu.

Another stretch of questions and answers along the way.

Before long, they passed a small stream along the route.

The Doduo, suddenly possessed by a husky spirit, couldn't walk straight anymore—its four eyes lit up at the sight of the clear stream.

"That's a stream. Want to go down for a swim? Want to swim?" All Baimu grabbed the Doduo's two heads and scrubbed them vigorously, making it yelp and stick out its tongue and teeth to lick and gnaw at him.

"Heiyu~" "Heiyu~"

Compared to the bustling city, the wilds clearly made the Doduo far more at ease—as if its suppressed nature had been released—running east and west, charging back and forth.

And because it had two heads, its ability to observe things had increased by one measure, though it occasionally couldn't judge the distance between its two heads well, leading to the occasional accidental bump into each other.

All Baimu's assessment of this was: just get used to it and it'll be fine.

So far it hadn't shown any sign of the two heads having separate consciousnesses—it just looked like its brain had been split into a left half and a right half, each given to one head.

But then again, saying it's low intelligence…

This guy's single-headed form was never exactly bright outside of battle.

They arrived at the stream.

All Baimu was just thinking to test the depth before taking the Doduo in for a swim, when the corner of his eye suddenly caught a wild Fisherman wearing a conspicuous orange vest, sitting on a folding stool.

Their gazes met, and a wordless understanding was reached.

"Let's battle!"

"Sure—will it affect your fishing after this?"

"Just move spots! Come see my big baby!"

The Fisherman couldn't wait and tossed a Poké Ball onto the riverbank.

*Pop! *

A flash of light.

A giant red Crawdaunt topped with a huge five-pointed star, half a person's height tall, appeared on the field.

*Clack-clack~*

Its fearsome pincers snapped shut quickly, producing a crisp metallic ring.

"Heiyu!"

The Doduo's attention swiftly shifted from the stream to the Crawdaunt, but it didn't launch an attack—instead one head turned to look at All Baimu. "Heiyu?"

"…Those aren't heads, they're pincers. The head is under the yellow five-pointed star!"

All Baimu explained the Crawdaunt's anatomy to it.

There was no helping it—one of the defining traits of arthropod Pokémon was having lots of claws, to the point that the Doduo mistook its pincers for heads and the two short little claws under its belly for feet.

The Fisherman didn't quite understand what they were doing, but in a wild battle releasing a Pokémon counted as the match starting, so he immediately shouted: "Charge in! Dragon Dance!"

"Xiza!"

The Crawdaunt's two legs pumped rapidly, its giant pincers spun like a top, and azure light flowed over its body.

Goodness!

A Crawdaunt that knows Dragon Dance!

All Baimu was quite surprised, thinking it was only fitting for a Fisherman's pick. "Dragon Pulse!"

"Heiyu!" "Heiyu!"

The Doduo's two heads drew in a deep breath at the same time—azure flames flowed from one mouth, crimson flames from the other—and blasted forward fiercely!

*Rooooar—! *

The dazzling light wave took the shape of a fearsome dragon before it, emitting a thunderous roar as it ground against the air!

The Angler was genuinely startled by that burst of dragon energy, shouting: "Get out of the way!"

"Hizaa!"

The Clawever Lobster sensed something was off too, leaping sharply up from the ground and barely grazing past it.

Boom!

The dragon-shaped energy ultimately landed in the deep part of the stream beside the Angler, and as the energy surged, it blasted water droplets high into the sky, which drifted down in a shower.

Under the sunlight, a rainbow flashed and vanished.

The Angler turned his gaze back from behind in shock, silently swallowing his saliva, and looking at the Doubled-Dragon not far away letting out a piercing roar, he said somewhat in disbelief: "Such tremendous power!"

The Clawever Lobster landed, likewise awed by the move's power, and for the moment was also a little reluctant to approach.

"That's called Parental Bond—two heads are stronger than one."

All Baimu replied with a smile.

"Huh? Parental Bond?" A trace of blankness flashed across the Angler's face.

Little did he know that someone was just talking nonsense—no matter how many heads a Pokémon has, as long as the total amount of elemental energy it can mobilize hasn't changed, the actual power remains the same.

What the 【Parental Bond】 Ability brings is simply that the elemental energy it can mobilize is more than before.

"Grudge!"

All Baimu swiftly gave the order, completely ignoring that the Angler was still in a daze.

"Hee-oor!"

The Doubled-Dragon let out an extremely ferocious roar at the Clawever Lobster, and a terrifying ghostly face rose up behind it—the latter, already intimidated by its move's power, was struck on the spot!

"Now! Dragon Dive!"

"Ah! Use Crabhammer!"

The rapid-fire commands All Baimu issued finally brought the Angler back to his senses; the unfortunate part was that the Doubled-Dragon had already launched its attack a step ahead.

"Hee-oor!" "Hee-oor!"

Ferocious killing intent formed an almost tangible pressure as the Doubled-Dragon charged forward!

The Dark-type Clawever Lobster was actually scared off once again, and only when the opponent's body had already been covered in Dragon-type energy, transforming into a ferocious two-headed evil dragon, did it raise its crab pincers high, coating them in a layer of pale blue water film, and smash them down viciously.

The roaring, energy-wreathed two-headed evil dragon and the Clawever Lobster's massive claws collided with a thunderous crash!

Dong!

A tremendous roar rang out as blue flash and thick smoke exploded simultaneously!

The Angler nervously clenched his fists, then watched as the Clawever Lobster was sent flying on the spot by the powerful shockwave, breaking through the smoke before crashing to the ground, revealing a pair of spiral eyes.

The Doubled-Dragon, meanwhile, flapped its small wings to disperse the smoke, revealing a spirited appearance.

First battle after evolution—

Victory!

"Hee-oor!" "Hee-oor!"

The Doubled-Dragon excitedly turned around and lunged at All Baimu.

"Very good, very good."

The latter rubbed its two big heads, recalling the Dragon Dive from those two heads just now, and couldn't help slightly raising an eyebrow.