The crowd boomed with cheers as the announcer finally spoke up through his microphone, which he was grabbing in his hand. And from the middle of the arena, he welcomed the two fighters. This time, the World Championship was being held in Unova.

"Welcome, Unova, to the first match of the World Tournament!" The announcer said, achieving to make the crowd cheer even more than they'd been doing before. "Ladies and gentlemen, receive the defending champion, Gold, from Johto!"

A young man, of regular height and long hair, entered the arena while waving at the crowd in several directions. The golden color of his eyes matched up perfectly with the yellow tie he wore under his vest, and the white shirt as well as his black trousers resulted in a fancy suit. Once he reached the center of the arena, he bowed at both the referee and the announcer, and went to his assigned place.

"And now, a great trainer from Unova has returned to the World Tournament, give Hilda a round of applause!" The announcer raised his hand and then pointed at the entrance, from where a younger trainer emerged.

The crowd cheered and yelled even harder as the brown-haired trainer started walking towards the arena. Her white cap with pink details, white tank shirt and denim shorts gave her a more sporty look, contrasting with Gold's fancy suit.

Hilda also greeted both the announcer and the referee before going to her assigned place. And once there, she took a poke ball out.

So you've chosen one already... Gold said as he took out one of his own poke balls.

The announcer left the arena to continue commentating a little further from the fight, while the referee went to a side of the arena. And as he gave the signal, the two trainers quickly took their Pokemon out.

As Gold opened his poke ball, he revealed his shuckle, while Hilda had chosen her serperior. The world champion couldn't help but grin as he saw what he thought to be a favorable match-up.

"Shuckle, use stealth rock!" Gold ordered as Nate withdrew his Pokemon.


From his bed, a young boy watched the battle between Gold and Hilda with excitement. He dreamed of being the one challenging the champion of both Kanto and Johto, though he doubted he'd ever reach that level if he were to start a journey.

A chimchar was still sleeping next to him, as it was still early due to the time difference between Unova and Kanto. If they were still in Sinnoh, he wouldn't have to wake up so early, and maybe chimchar would watch the battle with him, like they normally did.

As Hilda's carracosta knocked shuckle out with the second hydro pump, he noticed that she had turned the tables from a bad initial match-up. And there he thought: Why don't I start my journey? I'll tell mom, professor Lyra will give away starter pokemon in two days.

The sun started to raise and Joseph began to plan his journey. What he would wear, the backpack he'd use, he even started to research on several Pokemon on his PC to build a team around chimchar.

And then, Gold's typhlosion was also defeated, leaving the world champion with just three pokemon to face his opponent's six. Joseph was shocked as he checked his TV while still using his PC to investigate. Was Nate really going to win by 6-0? Joseph decided to enter the forums as he hadn't paid much attention to the battle. And it was until he started reading the Gold vs. Nate thread that he realized how big it actually was.

The forums had become a war zone. Hilda fans or just Unova fans in general mocked the Kanto and Johto fans, while the second group defended Gold and even argued that Gold was faking it so she got overconfident and lost in an easier way. If Joseph had to give an opinion though, he thought the thrashing was genuine, but he also thought Gold could still turn the tables and end up winning. However, just after thinking that, his kingdra was also defeated and the match was pretty much done.

Maybe it's finally Silver's time. He turned off the TV and closed the forums. He had some research to do.


"Joseph, time for breakfast, wake up!" A feminine voice called from the first floor.

Chimchar was the first to wake up, waiting for his trainer as he stretched. Joseph took a while, so the pokemon gave him a slap and woke him up. The young boy seemed drowsy, at least until he saw the sunlight, which reminded him that today was the day. He jumped out of the bed, glanced at the chair he used for his desk, and as he saw that his clothes were ready, he ran all the way through the second floor and the stairs to the kitchen.

His mother couldn't avoid but smile at her son's enthusiasm. As she served the food, both her son and chimchar were already sitting down. She then served her own and sat down as well.

"Did you prepare your things yesterday?" She asked calmly.

"Yep."

"That's great." She took a sip from her cup of coffee. "It's good seeing you being so excited about something, it's been a while!"

This time, the boy nodded as he continued to eat his food. He really couldn't wait to arrive at Pewter, and he wanted to be on time so he had to hurry. Chimchar, who was sitting next to Joseph, had already emptied his bowl of food.

"Seeing you like this, I wonder why you didn't want to start your journey last year," she started eating one of her toasts before continuing, "you turned 14 last year so you already had the required age to go on a journey."

"I don't know, I guess I wanted to do something different, but now I'm pretty sure that I want to go on a journey." He gave her mom a smile. "And I guess the idea of choosing from different species of different regions also got me interested."

Both chuckled. "So you will get another one apart from chimchar huh, that's cheating!" She joked. "I'm not denying it's a smart move though."

Joseph took the last spoonful from his cereal and stood up. He quickly ran towards the bathroom to take a shower, forgetting that he had to was his dishes. However, his mother let it go, as she understood that her son was very excited. "When you're ready, come out, I'll be waiting along chimchar!"

She started washing the dishes while the little monkey went out to play in the garden.


A couple of hours after he got ready, he joined his mom and chimchar in the front garden, then leaving for Ecruteak's train station.

Once they arrived, her mom hugged both of them, and kissed her son on the cheek. She waved them off as the pair left her side to enter the bus, as it was about to set off. A lot of people were there as well, so she easily lost track of her son. She was happy for him, but couldn't deny that she was worried nonetheless.

Once in the entrance of the train, a man asked him to take his pokemon back into the poke-ball. Joseph had never used the train until that day, so he didn't know that pokemon couldn't go outside their poke-balls. He took out the poke-ball and then pressed its button, releasing a blue light that absorbed the little monkey. The man with the black uniform thanked him and let him go to find a seat.

As he walked through the vestibule of the train, he struggled to find an empty space. However, by the end of it, he finally found an empty compartment, where he ended up sitting. Once in, he placed his backpack on his lap.

He also found two other boys, from around his age, sitting in the compartment he had chosen. One was sitting next to the seat he chose, while the other one was sitting in front of them, with the seat next to him empty and looking outside the window. The one next to him was around his same height, though his hair was curly and short; and his red hoodie contrasted with Joseph's own green one. The other boy wore a gray jacket with red details, which seemed to be some sort of an 'S'. He didn't show any interest in any of them, which made the situation slightly uncomfortable.

"You're going to Goldenrod as well?" The boy of the curly, short hair asked, turning to look at Joseph.

"Yep. I'm guessing you're going there to pick a starter as well."

"Mhm," his eyes snapped open before he continued saying anything else, "oh, and my name is Trent, nice to meet you."

"Mine is Joseph, nice to meet you as well!" He said as both of them shook hands. "And by the way, where are you from? From Ecruteak as well?"

"Hm, not really, I'm from Lavender Town, bu-"

"From Lavender Town?!" Joseph was confused as to why someone would travel from so far away.

"Yeah..." Trent cringed at how he was interrupted, but kept himself calm and went on. "It's not too shocking you know? Johto and Kanto are connected, way more than before, and anyways my grandpa and I travel to Ecruteak since he had a house there."

"Makes sense I guess." He shrugged it off and jumped into another topic.


The train went on to Goldenrod City, the biggest one in the Johto region, where Joseph could see an absurd amount of people at the time of the arrival. He knew that Goldenrod was quite populated, but the amount of people going from one train to another and walking all throughout the station shocked him. The tall buildings and skyscrapers also surprised the boy from Ecruteak, since the tallest building he'd seen was the Bell Tower, but even such a big and majestic building wasn't as tall. It made sense on his mind, in the end normally the most populated cities were the most developed and technological ones, but it wasn't what he was used to. He was used to the quiet environment of Ecruteak, living along pokemon and vegetation, with more traditional and smaller buildings.

From the window, the young trainers had observed the buildings getting closer until they were already in the station. The first one to leave was the silent boy, who was getting ready since he saw the Radio Tower from the distance. And behind him, the other two trainers left.

Trent checked his watch and noticed that it was almost time for Lyra to deliver the starters for the new trainers. It only took him to show his watch to Joseph for both to start running together.

They managed to run through the crowd and find a map on the station, so they could locate the Pokemon Center. It took them around fifteen minutes to get there, so they were late, but at least they weren't too late, being lucky enough to find Lyra still in front of the Pokemon Center.

"I wonder where the train got delayed." Trent said as the two ran through the streets of the big city, even increasing the pace as the assistant professor got ready to leave.

As they continued running, they spotted a girl running from the opposite side of the street towards the Center. Joseph found the appearance of the girl familiar, but couldn't really tell as she was still far from them.

However, as unexpected as it was, neither them or the girl got to Lyra first, but another boy that crossed the street running. Unfortunately, he crashed with the young professor, whose hat fell down to the floor as well as herself. And while he tried to get up, he slipped with Lyra's lab coat, so he fell once again, although this time he fell on her, leaving the two in an uncomfortable position.

At this point, the three other trainers had stopped. Joseph and Trent couldn't do much but cringe at the situation. And while couldn't really tell, Joseph would bet a thousand poke-dollars that the girl was also cringing.

The boy finally managed to properly stand up, first helping the young professor to so herself and then fixing his blonde, flowing hair and his blue scarf. And as Lyra was able to grab the briefcase in which she stored the poke-balls, the other three trainers were already next to her.

"Oh, more trainers." She said once she noticed their presence. "Did you come with the train? I heard it was delayed."

Trent and Joseph nodded, while the girl shook her head.

"But I came from Pallet Town, so it took a while to arrive here." She took off her green scarf at that moment, as she was sweating because of running to get there.

"Yeah that's far away..." Lyra moved her gaze up to look at the group of trainers. "Oh, Green, is that you?"

Green? So she's that girl from Pallet that was training with Red... Joseph thought as her name finally rang a bell on his mind.

"Yes, I wondered if you still remembered me." The girl answered as she untied her ponytail for the professor to recognize her better. "It's been a while after all."