Ash slowly stirred, turning over in bed with a groan, thinking he might get a few more minutes of sleep before getting up before something wet streaked up his face. Opening his eyes, Ash shrieked to see bulging eyes inches away from his own.

"Blargh!" Haunter shouted at Ash before the ghost giggled and ducked under the bed.

Sighing, Ash turned over to see Pikachu was on red alert from this unexpected wake-up call, and gently stroked his starter's back as the mouse began to calm down. Looking at the other pokemon in his bed, Ash laughed to see that Rowlet had not moved an inch, and was still snoring away. Poking Rowlet with one finger, Ash chuckled at Rowlet simpling rolling over onto his side and not otherwise reacting.

"Well Pikachu, I do need to talk to Rowlet, but why don't we go and eat breakfast and let him sleep a little more first."

Heading downstairs, Ash noticed that his mom must have already left for her shift at her cafe, as the only other being in the house was Mr. Mime, who was happily doing the dishes.

"Good morning Mr. Mime," Ash called, with Pikachu giving his cry of greeting. The house pokemon turned and gave the two a wave before returning to the dishes. Turning to Pikachu, Ash scratched the back of his head.

"Well buddy, I think we're on our own for breakfast today. Think I can cook without burning anything?" Pikachu thought for a moment before shaking his head at Ash, who sweatdropped. "Hey! I'm not that bad anymore, I've picked some stuff up from Brock and the others over the years! It's not my fault that I always end up traveling with people who are better cooks than me. Just for that, you don't get any ketchup this morning."

Pikachu seemed annoyed by this, but more than anything was sure that Ash wouldn't be able to cook. The mouse was proven wrong though, as Ash was able to whip up some pancakes in a little more than ten minutes.

"Hm," Ash muttered, biting into his pancakes. "Not bad. Not as good as mom's, or Brock's for that matter, but perfectly fine. Take that Pikachu!" The electric-type simply glared at Ash as he ate his pokemon food without ketchup and mumbled something that Ash was pretty sure meant revenge later.

Ash and Pikachu finished their breakfast and Ash went to wash his dishes but was stopped by Mr. Mime, who waved a finger at the two before he took their dishes and began washing them and the bowls that Ash used for mixing his pancakes.

"Thanks, Mr. Mime!" Ash called as he walked upstairs. "I'm just going to change and grab Rowlet and Haunter then we'll be out of your way."

Changing quickly, Ash sighed to see that Rowlet was still slumbering on Ash's bed, apparently not having moved since the trainer poked him. Picking up the owl, Ash turned to walk out the door, though not before calling for Haunter to come with them. Ash shivered as he felt Haunter enter his shadow, and even though he was slowly getting used to it, ghost-types in his shadow still felt a little odd.

Beginning his walk to Professor Oak's laboratory, Ash gently shook Rowlet, as he still wanted to talk to his pokemon before they started training that day. Rowlet slowly awoke from sleep, cooing slightly at Ash once he saw that his trainer was holding him.

"Hey Rowlet, I have a question for you. Do you want to evolve? It's okay if you don't, Bulbasaur doesn't want to evolve and he's still really strong. I just know you really like your everstone but you haven't really expressed an opinion on evolution."

The grass-type turned his neck to look at his trainer before hooting softly, sounding unsure.

"Is it just that you don't want to give up your everstone?"

At this Rowlet hooted with much more firepower, bobbing his head up and down with surety.

"Bud, you do know we can find another stone that you like? I know float stones are shaped pretty similarly to everstones if we can't just find a normal stone for you. And even if you don't want to evolve we can get you started on learning seed bomb without the everstone, it'll probably do more damage that way."

Rowlet cooed at this, a little confused but nodding all the same. Ash stroked his pokemon's head and continued his walk up to Oak's, shaking his head at his pokemon's confusion. The owlet was still fairly young and didn't have as much of a drive for battle as some of his pokemon, but Ash was still determined to help him improve.


After shooing Rowlet and Haunter to the pastures to begin training for the day, Ash and Pikachu entered through the front doors of Professor Oak's lab to see the professor already up and bending over a machine, adjusting something with a screwdriver.

"Ah, Ash! Perfect timing," the professor announced, reaching over to one of his many desks and picking up three pokeballs. Rather than being standard pokeballs, Ash could see that there was a quick ball, a great ball, and an ultra ball. Ash was surprised by the quick ball in particular, as the prices for pokeballs only increased the more they were specialized, and the quick ball was very specialized. Before the trainer could continue his inspection, however, Professor Oak had put two of them down and had handed the ultra ball over to Ash.

"Let's start with this one, as the pokemon inside could be the most troublesome of the bunch. She hails from Paldea and her species is called Tinkatuff. Her records do show that she was newly caught, likely for this very trade. Go ahead and release her now."

Ash looked at the ultra ball and took a deep breath, before lightly tossing the ball toward the ground. What emerged from the ball was a short pink pokemon holding a messily-made metal hammer that looked to be a bit taller than the pokemon itself. The pokemon blinked in surprise and looked around the lab before spotting Ash and charging toward him with a battle cry, holding her hammer aloft. She quickly swung her hammer into the trainer's leg, causing him to wince and grab at the leg.

Before the pokemon could close in and smack Ash with her hammer again, however, Pikachu had lept from his trainer's shoulder and thrown out a thunderbolt, zapping the tinkatuff and leaving her on the ground twitching slightly. The electric-type then leapt back to Ash's shoulder and looked quite smug.

"Thanks, Pikachu," Ash said, still rubbing his leg as he crouched by the twitching tinkatuff. "I don't like seeing my pokemon, even new members of my team, get hurt, but you have to see that this wasn't a good introduction for you."

The pokemon groaned and rolled over, sitting up and laying her hammer over her lap as she looked at Ash. She glared at him for a second before turning her gaze to Pikachu, and suddenly Ash could almost see sparks flying as she looked up at him. For his part, Pikachu looked at the fairy-type for a moment before turning his nose up in what Ash knew to be feigned disdain. Tinkatuff didn't know this disdain to be faked though, and Ash saw her clench her free fist in determination.

"Do you want to be strong then? It will take a long time before you can get to Pikachu's level but I think you can do it."

Ash's new pokemon nodded with great fervor and looked to her new trainer. "Great! Well, I'm going to scan you with my pokedex and then in a little while you'll get to show off your moves so I can see who you should train with. At this Ash pulled out his pokedex and scanned his new pokemon.

Tinkatuff, the Hammer Pokemon. This pokemon is a fairy and steel-type. These pokemon make their homes in scrap metal, where they gather it to create their hammers.

Ash nodded and put his pokedex away. "So you made your hammer yourself?" At Tinkatuff's nod, he smiled. "Great! Well in the future you'll have to let me know if you need different kinds of metal for your hammer, since we don't have any just lying around here for you to use."

Professor Oak, who had been studying Tinkatuff from afar, looked up at this. "Ah, I would love to be able to study how different kinds of metals affect the conductivity of the hammer. Tinkatuff are said to have a partial metal skeleton like lucario, but I imagine that if their hammers were made out of something other than steel, perhaps copper, then they would be able to largely ignore the effects of electricity like a ground-type pokemon. You see," At this the professor pulled up an image on his pokedex. "Tinkaton, the evolved form of tinkatuff, tend to carry hammers much larger than themselves, and perhaps when your tinkatuff evolves she will permit me to buy some different kinds of metals for her to make a hammer with to test this theory."

Ash looked a touch lost when the professor began to ramble on about his theory for a pokemon that as far as Ash knew of, he had never interacted with before today. Kneeling down to Tinkatuff, he whispered, "I don't always know what Professor Oak is saying but if I followed, then this could help you avoid some shocks from electric-types like Pikachu. Do you want to get strong and evolve so we can help the professor test his theory?"

Tinkatuff let out a cheer and raised her hammer high before slamming it into the floor. Ash winced at this, but the only damage it seemed to do was create a tiny scuff. Professor Oak saw this and laughed at Ash's face.

"You would think that I didn't expect pokemon to be causing damage all the time judging by your face. Now if you would kindly return Tinkatuff so we can introduce the other two pokemon?"

Ash nodded to Professor Oak and returned his new pokemon, clipping the ball to his belt as the professor handed him the quick ball this time.

"Now, you should recognize this pokemon, but he does hail from Paldea as well, and there is a surprise about him that I've been waiting to tell you. He was another recent catch."

Ash nodded confusedly at this comment but threw the quick ball out, catching it as it bounced back to him after releasing the pokemon in white light on the ground. What emerged was a spotted yellow and black pokemon standing on four legs with pink spines running up his back. He also had a black tail that had eyes and a mouth. Ash blinked in surprise, he did recognize this pokemon, he was a girafarig.

Ignoring Professor Oak for a moment, Ash approached the pokemon warily, all too aware of what had just occurred with Tinkatuff. Holding out a hand to Girafarig, Ash watched as the pokemon sniffed his hand impassively. After a moment the pokemon gazed up at Ash with disinterest clear in his eyes. Internally, Ash sighed, figuring that this may be another hard sell.

"Hi there," Ash started, backing off slightly to give the pokemon some space. "I'm your new trainer, my name is Ash and this is Pikachu. I hope we can be friends!" This statement didn't seem to garner much appreciation from the pokemon, who looked around the lab briefly before snorting and scraping one of his hooves on the ground. Professor Oak piped up before Ash could attempt another tactic to woo his new pokemon.

"Ash, the surprise about this pokemon that I wanted to tell you about is that there have been recent studies and observations in Paldea that Girafarig here may be able to evolve. There have been sightings of a pokemon that looks remarkably similar to girafarig seen with herds of them in remote areas of the region, though scientists aren't sure what triggers the evolution yet. The leading theory is that it is possibly triggered by a new move. But that's all I have to go on for the moment."

While Ash was interested in this new information, Girafarig was the one who was most excited, stamping his foot and nodding along to the professor's explanation.

"You've seen this evolution then Girafarig?" Ash asked his new pokemon. When he nodded at response to the trainer's question, Ash smiled; fantastic, he'd found an inroad. "Then why don't we work on learning new moves together and maybe between that and some serious training you'll be able to evolve!"

The giraffe gave a low cry at this and nodded as Ash pulled out his pokedex to scan him.

Girafarig, the Long Neck pokemon. This pokemon is normal and psychic-type. The tail on its back contains a small brain that emits powerful psychic energy and watches over this pokemon's back 24 hours a day.

Ash nodded at this entry, as he had encountered girafarig before, even if he hadn't trained one.

"I'm going to return you for a little while so I can meet my last new team member, but I'll let you out soon so we can see what moves you have and see how strong you are, okay?" The long neck pokemon nodded at this before approaching Ash and tapping his pokemon to recall himself. Ash blinked, he guessed that his new pokemon was already familiar with how the technology worked.

Clipping the ball to his belt, Ash reached out to take the great ball from Professor Oak's hand.

"This pokemon hails from Galar," the professor said. "And I am confident that you have not encountered her species before. She is the one pokemon who had a trainer before, for about 4 months if the records are correct. The only note I have for why he was trading her was supposedly for unsuitability with his team, but I do have a theory that I'll share with you after you introduce yourself."

Nodding, Ash tossed the great ball in front of him. This time what came out of the ball was an orange, mostly spherical pokemon with four legs. She had green bumps running over her head and back, culminating in a mostly green trunk that ended in a spade. She also had two square metal tusks beginning to emerge from the sides of her mouth that were only about an inch long but looked out of place on her body.

Noticing that the pokemon was looking around curiously, but without the rage or indifference of the previous two pokemon, Ash slowly kneeled down and reached out his hand to the pokemon. She noticed Ash after a moment and cheerfully walked up to him, ramming her hard head into his hand.

Ash winced internally at this, as he was pretty sure his new pokemon didn't know her strength, but didn't let it show on his face, instead smiling at the small pokemon.

"Hi there, my name is Ash, it's nice to meet you. You're now my pokemon, is that okay?"

The pokemon trumpeted happily after a moment and leaned into Ash's hand. Ash smiled at the friendly pokemon, and took out his pokedex once more, carefully holding it a little ways away from the pokemon. "I'm going to scan you with my pokedex now to find out your name, is that okay?" At the pokemon's happy trumpet, Ash did just that.

Cufant, the Copperderm pokemon. This pokemon is a steel-type. Cufant can lift loads weighing up to five tons. It is very docile and lives in herds.

Professor Oak spoke up at this entry, nodding along as he listened to it. "Firstly, I would suspect that Cufant is close to evolution, as can be seen from the small tusks beginning to emerge from her face and from the bumps on each side of her head. In addition, that pokedex entry leads into my theory on why Cufant didn't mesh well with her previous trainer. Their species live in herds and her previous trainer only had a very small team, even after getting 8 gym badges in Galar. Luckily, she should do much better here with your team."

Looking down at his Cufant, Ash smiled sadly. "So you wanted to be part of a big group huh Cufant? Well lucky for you, I have over 50 different pokemon, not including all of my Tauros. You should get along well with Donphan too, he's friendly and has a trunk kind of like yours!"

Cufant trumpeted happily again at this and began to do a little dance in a circle around her new trainer. Ash laughed at this and stood, motioning for Cufant to follow him.

"C'mon Cufant, we'll start the move testing with you since you're already out. Cufant trotted after Ash, waving to Professor Oak with her trunk who waved back at her amusedly.

After finding a nice boulder to use as a test subject for Cufant's moves, Ash ordered his pokemon to start using each of her moves, noting them down in his pokedex as she used them.

At first, Cufant didn't move, but her body quickly flashed silver, giving her a polished coating that Ash assumed was from iron defense. When Ash called for the next move Cufant's foot glowed white and she slammed it into the ground, leaving a small divot in the ground. Before Ash could order another move her body glowed white and she threw herself into the rock, causing small cracks to form.

To Ash, those moves looked to be stomp and body slam, two normal-type moves that could deal some serious damage if used properly, though stomp would be hard to hit since she was still pretty short. Ash called for another move and stumbled slightly as the ground shook around him, though the move was once more centered on the boulder. That move didn't seem powerful enough to be an earthquake, so Ash would guess that it was a bulldoze attack.

Once more Ash called out to Cufant, and the pokemon gave a cry before charging at the boulder, head gleaming silver, shattering it into pieces with an iron head. Ash nodded at that since all of the moves so far were quite well-polished.

"Do you have any more moves to show me Cufant?" Ash questioned the pachyderm. When she shook her head Ash smiled. "That's alright, we'll just have to learn some more soon. Those moves all look well-practiced to me, and that'll give you a good start to learn some new moves. I think we'll have you train with Donphan and his group for now, if you want to follow me."

Once Ash saw Cufant was following him, he walked through the pastures, waving to his pokemon as he passed. Luckily Ash was able to track down Donphan's group quickly and flagged down Torterra to ask him where the other ground-type was. Donphan must have heard this, as he sped out from behind Torterra and wrapped Ash's hand in his trunk.

Cufant must have been beyond excited to meet Donphan, as she charged out from behind Ash and trumpeted to Donphan. When the ground-type heard this his ears perked up and he turned to the new pokemon and responded in kind, excitedly rolling around in a ball for a moment before being snatched up by Cufant, who lifted him well above her head. Donphan, rather than looking panicked at this, simply looked overjoyed, and cried out something to Cufant, who tossed him up further in the air, where he spun for a moment before landing still in movement.

Ash chuckled at this, seeing that he wouldn't have much of a problem getting Cufant enmeshed with the rest of his pokemon like he might with the others.

"Alright Cufant, I need to go talk to the other new pokemon I received today, will you be okay here with Donphan until I can set you up with a training schedule?" Ash received a happy cry back from his pokemon, the two pachyderms already doing some sort of complicated trunk handshake.

Laughing, Ash waved for Heracross to join him as he passed the pokemon on his way back to a more isolated area. Heracross jogged to catch up with Ash before letting out a loud chitter.

"Hey bud, it's good to see you. How's training been going?"

Heracross let out a soft cry as he concentrated for a moment before light blue swords slowly manifested around him, the points of each of the swords tilting inwards until they rested above his head. The move took a few seconds to form but after it dissipated Heracross looked more powerful than ever. Right after this Heracross' right arm glowed black and he swung it lightly, leaving a sizzling sound in its wake.

"Looks great! Throat chop must be almost ready and swords dance is coming along, it just needs a bit more time to be battle-ready. Now, I'm going to have you participate in a mock battle with my new girafarig so we can suss out how strong he is, is that alright?"

Heracross nodded and looked excited at the notion, making Ash smile at his bug-type. Noticing that they were far enough away from any other training pokemon, Ash grabbed the quick ball off of his belt and released Girafarig. The pokemon appeared without a cry, simply looking around in interest.

"Girafarig, Heracross is here to help me test out your moves in a mock battle before I find a training group for you. The goal here is to use all of your moves so I can get a good idea of how strong you are and what we need to work on. Does that sound alright?"
The long neck pokemon nodded to Ash and looked at Heracross, planting his feet in a battle-ready stance. Ash quickly jogged out of the way of the two pokemon, before raising his hand.

"Begin!"

Girafarig immediately fired off swirling psychic energy that Heracross was able to sidestep. The bug-type retaliated by quickly shooting a pin missile into the flank of Girafarig, who grimaced in pain but stood firm. The psychic-type then focused for a moment, psychic energy suddenly gathering around Heracross' head, which caused the bug to flinch.

Taking advantage of this momentary flinch, Girafarig charged in at Heracross, ghostly energy gathering on his horns. Heracross was not moved by this, however, and simply planted his feet and got under Girafarig, bodily lifting the pokemon into the air. Girafarig panicked for a moment before slamming one of his hooves into Heracross' horn, causing the bug-type to wince and toss Girafarig away.

As Girafarig landed and immediately charged back into battle, glowing back with energy, Heracross raised a fist up and slammed it into the other pokemon, knocking him prone. Ash decided he had seen enough and called an end to the battle.

"Stop! Good job you two, but I don't think we need to see a knock-out right now. Girafarig, did you have any other moves left?" At the pokemon's nod, Ash turned to Heracross. "Mind being the test dummy for a couple of extra moves? Use endure just to be safe."

Heracross nodded at his trainer, so Ash waved a go-ahead for Girafarig, who immediately turned around and kicked out at Heracross with both hooves. This seemed to do little but cause Heracross to slide back a couple of feet, arms crossed in front of him. Girafarig then glowed lightly white and rammed into Heracross once more, before spinning around in the same motion and hitting the other pokemon with his tail.

After these two moves Girafarig backed off, panting slightly from the exertion.

"Alright, good job Girafarig. I want to say that you used psybeam, confusion, stomp, astonish, assurance, double kick, and double hit, am I correct? They all looked well done, although you could use some more ranged moves."

Girafarig whinnied at this but nodded his head in agreement at his new trainer's words.

"Good, well for now I think I'll have you train with the same group that Cufant is training with, and I'll show you the way myself so I can grab Melmetal on the way back. Heracross, can you send Noctowl our way? I've been meaning to move her over a group anyway and I think she might get along well with Girafarig."

With a nod to his new teammate, Heracross chittered to his trainer and trotted off in the direction where Ash thought he had seen Noctowl last. Ash walked Girafarig to Incineroar and waved at the pokemon, who was currently engaged in a spar with Glalie.

"You'll be training with this group for now, why don't you stick with Incineroar and when she gets here, Noctowl."

As Ash finished his sentence he felt his shoulder grow heavy as Noctowl landed on it and hooted at him, bobbing her head when he lightly patted her. "Great, there you are Noctowl. Do you mind taking Girafarig here under your wing and working on some psychic moves with her? And Girafarig, lets focus on strengthening your confusion for now to turn it into a psychic attack soon. I'll do some research on different moves your species can learn later and then we can work on those to work towards evolution for you. Maybe it has something to do with using moves with your tail?"

As Noctowl flew off his shoulder and landed on Girafarig's back, Ash saw Melmetal in the distance and figured that he'd be perfect for the next session, so called him over. Melmetal charged toward Ash with thundering steps, stopping just short of their trainer and gathering him in a massive hug.

Ash grunted as he was swept into a bone-crushing hug and felt his breath leave him. He frantically patted Melmetal on the back for a moment before the pokemon realized something was wrong and released their trainer.

"Hey buddy," Ash said, gasping slightly. "It's good to see you too. How's training been going? Getting used to the new body yet?"

Melmetal flexed in response to this question but promptly stumbled over a rock. The massive pokemon somehow looked sheepish at this, even without a face to show their expression.

Ash laughed, commenting, "That's okay bud, I'm sure you'll get there. It's a big adjustment to go from barely having arms to having huge arms and legs, not even talking about the size difference between your unevolved form and now. Now," Ash continued, "Are you willing to help me out with something? I need to test the power of a new teammate and I figured you'd be perfect to do it with. We'll do a little mock battle."

Melmetal flexed again at this and rotated their arms, managing to not trip on anything this time. Ash noticed that they were far enough away from everyone else to not disrupt their training, and plucked his ultra ball off of his belt, releasing Tinkatuff in one smooth motion.

With a cry, the pink pokemon emerged from the ball clutching her hammer, which Melmetal's eye suddenly locked onto. As the steel-type took a step forward, eye still locked hungrily onto the hammer, Ash sighed and stepped between the two pokemon.

"Melmetal, remember that not every piece of metal is food. More importantly, that hammer is important to Tinkatuff, just like your nut was when it could still detach from you. Remember when you lost it? I'm sure it'd feel similar to her if you ate her hammer."

Tinkatuff seemed to realize what was going on at this, and looked at Melmetal alarmed, seemingly never having run into another pokemon that was interested in her hammer like this. Suddenly protective of her possession, she poorly hid her hammer behind her back and then stood behind Ash for extra protection.

Ash smiled slightly at this but made no move to touch Tinkatuff just yet, as he figured that she would simply hit him for such an action. Melmetal ducked their head in shame at Ash's words, groaning out something that Ash was pretty sure was an apology. Tinkatuff slowly stepped out from behind Ash but made no move to remove her hammer from behind her back just yet.

"Alright you two, we're gonna have a spar now. Tinkatuff, that means that the two of you aren't trying to knock each other out, but rather that you're just practicing your moves. This doesn't mean that you should back off if you have the advantage, but if anyone, which includes the both of you and me, calls for a stop then you stop."

"Tinkatuff, your goal for this spar is to use all of your moves. I want to see what they look like when using them in an actual battle, even if they don't do much damage to Melmetal. Melmetal, I want you to try playing keep-away from Tinkatuff. I know that will be hard for you, but do your best, okay?"
As both pokemon nodded to their trainer and focused on each other, Ash backed away, still backing up as he shouted for them to start.

Tinkatuff jumped right into action, her hammer glowing nearly black as she jumped up and swung it at Melmetal with no shortage of force. To their credit, Melmetal did try to move out of the way, arms rotating as they took massive steps away from the fairy and steel-type, but didn't get very far, and their body rippled as they were hit by the hammer. Even as Tinkatuff landed and cheered her attack for a moment, she looked up to see that no real damage had been done to Melmetal, whose liquid metal body just moved back into place.

This seemed to tick Tinkatuff off, and the smaller pokemon screamed before launching herself at Melmetal, glowing white. The rage must have thrown off her aim, however, as with a rotation of their arms, Melmetal was able to move out of the way this time. As she seemed to be about to use this move again, Ash called out.

"Remember Tinkatuff, different moves every time!"

The fairy-type scoffed at this, but obeyed her new trainer, dropping the slam attack and instead extending short glowing claws on her offhand, swiping at Melmetal. This move did connect, and slashed a divot through Melmetal's body, though the metal that splashed onto the ground quickly moved back toward Melmetal, and reformed in a matter of seconds. Before Melmetal could move away, however, Tinkatuff had jumped onto their shoulder and smiled sweetly, giving them an aggressive kiss on their head hexagonal nut, which seemed to suck the energy out of them for a moment before they recovered and threw her off with one rotation of their arms.

Landing on her feet with a cry, Tinkatuff stepped forward once more, before she seemingly realized something and stepped back. With an annoyed look on her face, she took a deep breath and blew out pink wind that Melmetal mostly stepped out of the way of, with the remainder barely even seeming to faze them.

Now looking almost disgusted, Tinkatuff screwed up her cheeks and blew out a series of hearts that hit Melmetal right in his eye, causing him to start looking around in confusion and swinging wildly.

"Enough!" Ash called, stepping between the pair. "Melmetal, I think it's best if you sit down for a moment." With a groan the steel-type did just that, shaking the ground as they plopped down on the ground.

Turning to Tinkatuff, Ash smiled. "You did well Tinkatuff. It's pretty hard to hurt Melmetal with physical moves and I won't lie to you and say you did much of that but you got on your way there with some of them. I saw you use brutal swing, slam, draining kiss, metal claw, fairy wind, and sweet kiss. Were there any other moves that you know?" At her shake of the head, Ash continued. "Great, that's a good move pool to start, but I did notice that you don't seem to like using moves from a distance. We can stick with close-up moves for now, but you'll have to work on learning ranged moves eventually, okay?"

At her grimace, Ash sighed and decided to throw her a bone. "How about this; we get you started by channeling the steel-type energy you use in metal claw into your hammer, and then you can hit even more things with it, okay?" This got a cheer out of his new pokemon, and she jumped up in the air, waving her hammer around.

Turning to Melmetal, who seemed to have shaken off the confusion and was standing up, Ash smiled at the huge pokemon. "You did well too Melmetal, don't worry about not being able to dodge some of those hits, just keep working on your movement and the attacks that you're learning, okay? I'm gonna send Tinkatuff back with you, work with her on steel-type energy, and on hitting things hard okay? I'm sure you two will get along great."

Tinkatuff warily looked up at the other pokemon at this but nodded and followed Melmetal after giving a wave to Ash. For his part, Ash turned toward Oak's laboratory after whistling for Pikachu, who had been keeping Ash in his sight all day. He did still have to talk to the professor about something today.


Hey y'all, here's another chapter for you. Updates may slow down slightly, as I just started a second job and it may take me some time to get into the groove of working two jobs. In addition, I also started another long-form story! It's called The Ocean Master and you can find the first chapter on my profile. It's a little different to this story but I suggest that you check it out if you're interested in water-types! Let me know what you thought about this chapter!