Between battling novice trainers, standing around in wait for the new ones to arrive, and the ever growing frustration of the poor Caterpie, the day frankly felt like an eternity. Still, her overseer giving her a pair of 1000 yen banknotes made this time worth it.
Maybe.
Okay, definitely not. This job was maybe enough for a teenage trainer who was down on their luck and needed some cash to buy a few potions. Even if they were given free rein of a Pokemon Centre's healing services, this would've scratched the bottom of the barrel, but given how they were practically forced to use Revival Herbs? Even for that trainer down on their luck, it was a terrible tradeoff.
Not that she had much of a choice. The five potions she brought to this world were not good at treating fainted Pokemon, and they were left for emergencies.
Though before she could call it a day, set up a tent, make a dinner for everyone, and go to sleep, she went back to the city, for some much needed shopping.
First, she bought more berries for the Absol - a few of differently flavoured cheaper ones, just enough to last for a few days without spoiling. Since those berries doubled as the Dark Type's only source of water, they were the priority. And since she made sure to pick a few different flavours, she could learn which the stolen Pokemon preferred.
She also bought some tasty baked snacks for the poor Caterpie, who could probably taste the Revival Herb in his soul at this point. Making him actually like her was already a pipe dream, but at least these could make his life a bit more tolerable. That would've been good enough for her.
Also, of course she bought some pokepuffs for Owari. The little guy loved those pastries, and while she tried to bake something close back at home, he could only eat the real deal in this world.
Finally, she bought a new bag of Pokemon food pellets, and a few packs of cheapest instant noodles she could find for herself. Yeah, that was not ideal, but she needed to save some money for one last stop before she went back to the route.
With just 400 yen left in her pocket, she entered an Internet cafe.
Some of these shops worked 24/7 around here, and offered access to a passable computer, and more importantly to the Internet at prices that were both affordable and exorbitant at the same time. 200 yen for half an hour of access might not had sounded that much on paper, but not only did it add up pretty quickly - it was also kinda 1/10th of what she earned in a day. She paid for a hour.
After seeing her 'ID' and receiving the cash, a sleepy, wide guy at the reception desk gave her an access card, and a rundown of how to unlock a PC with it. After that, she just found a spot, and logged in.
It was time to search for some essential info.
Of course, looking up the places Dark Type mentioned was out of question. If at least one of those locations was a government facility, that would've been a REALLY bad trace to leave behind.
She could look up some answers though.
And the answers were not good.
Back when she was traveling Alola and Kanto, the Pokemon League was mainly doing one thing - organising tournaments, in this world's equivalent to professional sports events, including bringing those events to new regions. Well, that, and solving every case of an evil organisation using the power of a unique Pokémon to stir up trouble. Solving the latter thing was usually done either by Champions, or high-ranking trainers - or, in other words, distinct members of the League. And as long as these Champions were willing to play ball with everyone else, things went smoothly enough, even as the League was slowly amassing political power beyond its initial scope.
Additionally, even back in the day, all these Champions, their Elite Fours, and every other high-ranking members of the League were making big money through sponsorships, bounties on the criminals they stopped, and the like. Big enough money to not only jumpstart their kids' careers as elite trainers, letting them break into high ranks much easier, but also to invest, consolidating those funds even further.
All of THAT info could be easily found on the Internet, because of course these new age nobles wanted legitimacy to their heritage.
And when combined with looking into such things as job offerings, prices for food, rent and keeping a Pokemon at home, and then at the price of becoming a professional trainer, this painted a rather grim picture.
With the combination of the League becoming more and more politically influential through literally keeping the world safe from every and any madman who looked at a Legendary funny, and its members becoming increasingly more generationally wealthy, naturally came people who viewed themselves as an elite by birthright, both greedy enough to bank in on the League's political capital to encroach on actual political institutions, and classist enough not to want any occasional poor person lucky enough to make it big getting their share of the pie.
By that time, every single big corporation in the world was in one way or another tied to these big money clans. The Pokémon Centres. The network for transferring Pokemon over long distances. The medicine and items manufacturers. Even companies not dealing with the League business directly, like food producers, law firms and transportation companies either had their stock majority in League's hands, or were outright bought out by some of their members.
An average salary on the market was 100 000 yen per month. The price of a person living alone was around 70 000 without rent. A single Pokemon that did not need special care or diet, like a Dragon Type needs, was roughly half as much, at 35 000. Renting a single room was in the ballpark of another 70 000 per month. Healthcare for a human, or for less 'difficult' types like Normal and Bug was 40 000 per month. Renting a box in the Pokemon transfer system was 50 000 per Pokemon, transfer subscription was another 50 000, and a single transfer without it was 10 000 yen.
The math did not work at all, unless you saw the solution offered - almost every company had its own corporate housing that the workers stayed in 'for free'. Many companies offered healthcare plans for as long as you worked for them. Some companies had 'Pokemon daycares', where people could leave their Pokemon, and have said Pokemon properly fed and cared for. None offered anything that could help a beginner trainer though.
In other words? These companies locked their workers in place, with a very distinct threat of losing their livelihoods and their Pokemon in case said workers got fired. A person working for such a company could never save enough money to buy their own house, and saving cash to even attempt to challenge the Circuit required jumping through extra hoops, like that guy, Hiro did. And even once he managed to collect enough money to give his daughter a shot at this, she would've probably had to specialise on one or two types just due to the cost of Pokemon healthcare, giving her more wealthy opponents a distinct advantage.
The League made damn sure that nobody too poor ever had a chance at the Championship.
HOW did they achieve all of this?
Same as with their rise to power - gradually. For example, there was a time when one of the countless evil organisations started a de facto civil war on the islands, wrecking havoc in practically every city. During that time, Pokemon Centres implemented a relatively small, 100 yen fee for every healing to help with the war effort, and then with the restoration. With years, the martial law faded away, but the fee not only stayed, it even began to steadily increase into frankly unmanageable territories. Then, the League came up with a 'solution' to this issue, that being Pokemon healthcare plans that allowed you to heal your Pokemon for as many times per month as needed, for a hefty sum of course. And naturally, these healthcare plans were also slowly increasing in price, up until the point where most people could not even afford one.
Same thing, just to a lesser extent, happened to the other aspects of the economy, with one notable exception.
People working for some high-profile companies with close connections to the League were still doing just fine. Pokemon Centre personnel, Pokeball manufacturers, breeders, and similar workers enjoyed five to ten times the salary of an average worker. And finding the reason for that was as simple as checking into the recent GyaraDocks disaster, and reactions to it on social media.
People working at GyaraDocks lived in what would've been reasonable houses back in Kanto and Alola - their salaries meant they could afford a nice house, a few Pokemon, and maybe even have their kids challenge Pokemon Gyms. Which, apparently, made them 'those damn rich people', and the disaster being them 'getting what they deserve', if those comments were anything to go by.
The League basically granted a small number of people a decent living, making said people feel indebted to their 'benefactor', while making the rest hate these lucky few, instead of the League itself.
Ding.
The hour was up.
With a sigh, she left the internet cafe, still thinking about her findings.
Was the world heading in this direction last time she visited? Or was this part of that fifth axis shift that also affected the geography? From what she remembered, back in the day, the League higher-ups almost all were good people - save for few bad apples like Giovanni. The world going to shit could've been attributed to bad people coming to power in League from within, of course, but...
Hm…
The Championship did not reward the most virtuous person. Only the most capable. A trainer who was an absolute monster, but managed to turn their team into a terrifying battle machine could still win against a Champion who firmly believed in the magic of friendship.
Which meant, even if the system didn't go to shit courtesy of nepo babies, it still ran on borrowed time until someone like Giovani or Lysandre came to power, huh?..
Hm…
Possibly.
By the time she finished mulling this new info over, she already reached the railway station, and sat in the train heading to the route she was working on.
She was going to need an actual vacation after this 'vacation', huh.