{ === + === }

And just like that, six months have passed.

I ended up getting some seasonal trainer positions. Teams that are looking for more firepower hire seasonals to help round out their teams a little.

As a one off-C3-Trainer, I'm good enough to be given priority during interviews, but not so much that I'm worth getting scouted over interviewing.

Either way, I ended up helping two teams with their runs.

The first was the New Lumiose Grand, a C2 team that needed help preparing their teams for their upcoming circuits due to a sudden lack of manpower.

I was therefore an in-house opposing trainer (O-T). Some of their lower-ranked but long-term trainers' contracts came to term and they were not interested in renewing, so, yeah. Unfortunate.

I was given general plans as to what each gym did, and my job was to execute those plans so their Challenge Trainers would go into their fights with more than just simulator experience. They had a nice stable with a lot of typings, if not necessarily a lot of variation.

I also got to improvise a little if I felt that it was reasonable and helpful–not that improvisation is bad, it's that I lack the context as to how their target gym would react, and therefore how I would do it might not be how they do it. Expectation versus reflex, so says team managers, anyway.

It was fun, taught me a lot. I got to work with variety that definitely would not be possible normally. Azumarills were by far my favorite for being easy to work with, adaptable, and good natured. Even the ones that expressed a lot of Huge Power and broke things on the regular by running into them.

Azumarills aren't generally utilized for their Huge Power. I got the chance to work with one closely and gave it the Belly Drum, Aqua Ring, Aqua Jet, and Play Rough moveset. It's a little hard to get off the ground since Azumarills aren't great on land, but getting around with Aqua Jet helped the agility issue a bit. He was good enough to become a regular fixture on the team, which is nice.

I think I stepped on toes with that move, though, so that's not as nice. In any case, there was a lot of prep work so I never got to go and see how they did.

Their final tally of all the Circuits during that period was generally positive. Above expectations on a few, so that's nice.

…

The second was Team Origami (Sub-League). Pretty much the same deal: they wanted more trainers to help prep their subteams for their respective Circuits.

Like the first team, they also had a vast and varied stable due to connections, contracts, and their general wealth. Unlike the first team, their issue with manpower was due to having a healthier recruitment last quarter than expected and an unwillingness to give up on their new unpolished gems, so to speak.

This time, I alternated between team building and being O-T. Similar kind of work–put together a team, lineup, training schedule, be the bad guy, so on, so forth. Main difference as an O-T was that I could be as creative as I wanted.

Mild tangent: most C1+ Teams have this kind of reputation, where they're very good to their people. I don't know how true that is, but given what I experienced here I'd be inclined to believe it. It's easier to be more free when the bottom line is further away, I suppose.

Either way, my special vision made my teambuilding and recommendations relevant, effective, and required almost no post-build adjustments, so it's probably no surprise in hindsight that I got picked as a pit crew and sub trainer for one of their C3 Circuit challenges. As Pit Crew, my job was to make sure everybody was in top condition between matches and cater to unique tastes if any popped up. As a Sub Trainer, my job was to, y'know, sub in for a trainer if something were to make them unable to compete.

Man it would've been nice to have that in the LoG. It would've been nice to have a lot of things in the LoG. Ultimately, did not need to sub for anybody.

As a sub, I got assigned to one of their C3 Circuits. It was seven gyms, and they badged all seven. If it was one person who swept a C3 circuit that would've made headlines and then some, but sadly, it was 'only' a collective team performance.

Or, as some news outlet put it, the performance was par for a Sub-League Team. I've been invited to return next season, too, so that's nice.

For now, I just want some vacation time.

To the Beach!

…

Shalour beaches are amazing. I keep mapping Kalos to France and it keeps throwing me that Shalour has amazing beach-weather all year round. Then again, I've never been to France so for all I know the channel in December is also amazing beach-weather.

Point being, the sun is strong and Patty has Petilil-specific sunglasses and she is the cutest thing on earth.

And also Rule-of-Anime is in full effect and cute swimsuits are everywhere and I'm somewhat overwhelmed. First place definitely goes to what I'm pretty sure is an Idol group riding a Melotic doing some kind of concert.

Anyways, the beach is fun. Especially since the beach I'm at right now is also very close to Port Shalour.

So, the best part about the Pokemon world is the existence of creatures that can fly without worrying about aerodynamics. The existence of such creatures also makes it viable to study and reproduce the effects at scale.

Point is, we have skyships. Like, borderline Spaceship skyships, not age-of-sail-but-blimps.

For example, right now, one large-ish skyship is coming to port. It's a cruise liner, going on descent with the intent of entering the water before it docks. The rear section of the hull is opening to reveal a reinforced glass…dome? Inverted dome? When the ship enters the water, the people standing in that part of the ship get an exhilarating view of water flooding around them, followed by an extended show of the underwater life of Pokemon near the port.

Shalour has the biggest Port in Kalos that services both standard ships and skyships, and is the only mixed port that can handle cruise liners and above.

Actually, on the topic of spaceships, I think Mossdeep in Hoenn have successfully transitioned to, and are in the process of, constructing a mass driver to send stuff into orbit. If the rumors are to be believed, the primary reason for allowing Alola into the IPL is to secure a site that would be good for building an oceanic mass driver.

But the arguments for that are flimsy, so, eh.

…I really don't have anything worth doing on vacation, huh?

I'm bored.

Those seasonal positions paid really well, so I can afford to laze around some more, but I want something fun to do.

…Let's look around a bit, then.

…

[One Week Passes]

…

Eh…nothing major is going on. There's an IPL grade match coming up in like two weeks so that's sucked up all the air in the room, so to speak.

Goes without saying, but despite each IPL grade match being *just* a part of the Kalos IPL circuit, each match gets the coverage equivalent of a major tournament finals. Not quite the Olympics, but pretty close.

Mm…

…I mean, I still have nothing to do employment wise, so let's just find a place to volunteer for a while until something else lines up.

…

[Two Weeks Pass]

…

A local daycare needed some hands taking care of a new batch of eggs.

The eggs were a mix, probably spillovers from other breeders that overestimated their demand for the cycle. There's a penalty levied by the IPL for doing stuff like this and their eggs get taken away and distributed to reasonable accommodations at cost to the breeder.

Anyways, the hatchlings I had to watch over were a Wooper, a Poliwag, a floating jellyfish, and a Goomy.

The Jellyfish evolves into a Jellicent but the name escapes me at the moment. The Goomy is…basically an animated ball that's like a slime with a cute face. It evolves into Sliggoo, a large…snail? Snail-like slimy creature, which then evolves into Goodra, a bipedal goopy dragon.

Which is a bit of a problem, because Goodra is Kalos's pseudo-legendary and is quite powerful. It's a pseudo-legendary that, until it hatched, was not marked by the IPL for being what it was.

This is noteworthy because, again, the more powerful the Pokemon, the more the IPL tracks them to make sure they can respond in the event something untoward happens. An untracked baby Goodra means that one of the breeders that was fined was either directly or indirectly responsible for trafficking.

I guess the point is that it took the better part of six hours to find out who they were and the situation escalated from there. The Goomy's background was investigated and, well, I can see that it has incredible amounts of Deep Wild Affinity, for the lack of a better term.

Given that fact, it is therefore very surprising that the Goomy is so…sociable. Pokemon born in the Deep Wild, Winner Take All kind of world tend to keep that philosophy even as an egg, so…

Either way, the area where the Goomy came from was located after a minor search, and it was returned to the local Goodra along with a short explanation.

And then the Goodras gave it back. Apparently that particular egg was legitimate. I'm not privy to the details, but at the very least the fact that the Goodras are not taking it back meant that the initial transaction was legitimate.

So, long story short, at the end of the two weeks, the Goomy has attached to me and is now considered to be my Pokemon by the IPL. Patty is not exactly happy because this Goomy expresses Sap Sipper and Hydration very heavily, so it really really likes her. Not high on the Goopy department, though, so that's nice.

And I'm now on several watchlists. Ranger Officer Kent is attached to my case and I have his number if things go wrong quickly. His Kirlia is also assigned as a more urgent point of contact and translator. This arrangement will last for at least a year, depending on circumstances, and IPL will cover all Goomy-related expenses for the next five years, as testified by Kent's Kirlia.

Either way, this particular Goomy is fond of Maple Syrup and running tap water. I had to go out and purchase a Dive Ball specifically for him. Dive balls are constructed to be very good at retaining and creating a water-like environment via built-in Water Stone fragments.

I'm really worried about how much this guy will grow up, but it shouldn't be that bad.

…I'm starting to have a lot of maple syrup bottles though. Probably should do something about that.

Anyways.

Goomy's stats are incredible and his growth potential is incredible. I don't know what he is in the context of other Deep Wild Pokemon. He's barred from Circuits because, again, Deep Wild, but if he's up for it he can be a helper Pokemon for Teams once he's a year old.

The IPL has lower age limitations for Pokemon who want to do anything beyond just taking orders, largely because, while Pokemon come out of the egg with the ability to defend themselves and full logical reasoning (species-dependent) they lack the experience to be effective.

If the IPL finds out that Pokemon within a Team are performing tasks they're not allowed to regardless of how much the Pokemon themselves wanted to help out, then the Team runs a risk of losing their license. Loss of license is something that sticks with the individual person, so having, say, caused a dissolution of a C3 Team would be a pretty big deal.

…

So what do I do with this guy?

I'm gonna call him Tappy. 'cuz he likes tapping his little…well, they're not feet, but…

Similar to Patty, he doesn't really 'eat'. He just uncorks the bottle and lets it sit in his entire being until the contents are gone. Which is wild, because he has no issues drinking from the faucet normally.

Well, normally is him opening his mouth waaay open like a bowl and asking Patty to turn on the faucet, but eh.

The faucet turns on and off via button push, mind. Patty has developed a habit of standing on the button a little too long in an attempt to be mean to Tappy. Tappy runs Hydration so he genuinely thinks she's being nice to him. Patty is also hoarding her stock of hard candy from him, despite him not being at all interested. It seems that Goomy in general dislikes eating non-liquid foods.

Also he will need something that is more balanced nutritionally or else this will end poorly. Maybe I should learn from the internet and blend a sandwich. A sandwich that has been aged for many days.

…In all seriousness I probably should see if he's willing to eat some solid foods. Goomy-specific food is pricey, which will be a problem after this year is up. Per the IPL recommendations I am to avoid meat just in case, especially ones that are Pokemon-adjacent.

For context and example: farmed salmon that swim along with, say, Magikarps, are Pokemon-adjacent. Wild salmon that swim in the same water with Magikarps are not. I'm not sure how it's different. My vision can see an affinity difference in the end result but that's as far as I'm getting.

Farmed Magikarps are not food. Most fish farms double as ranches for fish-type Pokemon. It's always fun when a Magikarp somehow evolves, though.

…

I guess the next event is just to watch the IPL stream?

…

[Three days later]

…

IPL Stream, Kalos Server, Mirror 33. I think these are all just concurrent streams instead of mirrors, but eh.

The qualifiers have been done and over with, so this is…Wulfric's Gym.

Gym type: Ice. Grade: IPL.

So, IPL Grade matches are something else. You know how, in the games, you have to go through some kind of challenge per gym before you can get to the leader at the end?

Put that in real time and space and that's an IPL challenge in a nutshell.

The field today is a massive 1km by 2km rectangle, with a foot-deep of snow, frosted pine trees, massive rocks, and visibility dramatically lowered by both occlusion and snow blindness.

So, the format is as thus:

The Challenger has thirty minutes to get to the gym leader and an extra ten minutes to win, either by full team knockout or on score (have more survivors than the leader). They start on one end of the gym floor and must make their way across in that time limit.

The gym's trainers are also on hand to be obstacles themselves, with the amount of trainers being two + the challenger's badge count this Circuit. In other words, a challenger who's on their seventh badge would be up against nine trainers apart from the gym leader. There is no enforced one-on-one, so the trainer can and will be swarmed by the gym trainers if they take too long in combat.

The challenger is allowed to use all the Pokemon in their team at any time, up to six, and a bag of goodies. Too many things in bag equals too much weight, so plan accordingly, and all that.

All trainers are also given a dual-layer shield that is keyed to the amount of Pokemon they have that are still in the fight. If their full team goes down, the first layer shield breaks. If the second layer shield takes significant damage (50%), it's game over. The first layer will regenerate up to some value, dependent on how many on the team are active. The second layer will not.

The first layer's status, incidentally, is only visible to the gym. The Challenging trainer must keep track of their team state at all times. On the flip side, if a Gym Trainer's first shield breaks, they're out for the rest of the challenge.

There's also a hidden layer. If that layer is damaged in any way the trainer is immediately teleported out.

Gym Trainers will avoid purposefully attacking the Challenger unless the following happens: 1) the challenger can't field enough units, usually at a rate of 3 to 1. 2) The Challenger is obviously avoiding engagement despite coming under attack. 3) The Challenger making obvious attacks onto a Gym Trainer directly. It has to be 'obvious' because most Dark types enjoy sneak attacks, so the rule being just *any* attack is unfair to them. Regardless, anybody attacking a Trainer directly should expect to get jumped on instantly, so it's not something you'd do unless you're willing to heavily follow through.

Each gym trainer has four Pokemon, and the leader has six, so the challenger will always be outnumbered.

As a final layer of difficulty, for people with more than four badges, the area is placed under a magic room effect, courtesy of a few Psychic Pokemon, that wraps the map along the relevant edges, so it's not possible to 'hug the wall' and advance that way. Normally there's actually a fence.

…

All that said, each challenger therefore gets a full hour block to do their thing, and there are three concurrent fields running, with three leaders. The true Gym Leader is only on field for one of the three fields. The other fields are therefore easier, but not by much.

…

In any case, first up…fire boy! His roster: Typhlosion, Typhlosion, Talonflame, Rapidash, Emolga, Musharna. His name is on a banner but I'm not interested.

Dude is older than me (he's 36), kickass beard, well-groomed in general, wearing what is probably a custom-designed leather overcoat and a belt configuration with oversized grips near his head for fliers to latch onto. His bag is a bandolier on his waist, so probably built to be bigger on the inside like most high-end bags nowadays. He's decorated with the insignia of the Team he represents, and three patches of the team's top financial backers.

He looks like he's from a different game.

Anyways, team-wise…

The Typhlosions seem to be his Anchors. From what I can see of past IPL challenger rosters, a pair of the same Pokemon is overwhelmingly favored in terms of teamwork in situations like these. They're human-sized, bipedal…uh, mongoose? I think they have a very mongoose-like body but with a mane of flames. Mono-Fire typing.

Talonflame is a large, agile bird of prey, massive wingspan, red and white body, Galeforce Brave Bird forever. Dual type Fire Flying.

Rapidash is Ponyta evolved. Horse and flames. I wonder which one he's going to pick as his primary mode of transportation? Mono-Fire.

Emolga is a small flying squirrel. Electric Flying dual typing. I assume this is his coverage in case the Ice gym is also running Water types.

Musharna is mono psychic, a…I dunno, floating kidney-looking dream pig. I think that's meant to be his means of coordination in his team.

The Challenger takes his spot within the ring, when the round starts, he will be teleported into the field somewhere within the starting zone, on the left side of the field. The target is somewhere on the right side.

Good luck to him, I suppose.

…

[Challenge Start]

…

Challenger is dropped close to the left edge, middle field, rough start. He brings out Rapidash, Musharna, and Talonflame. He mounts Rapidash, sets Musharna on his shoulder, and rides into the snow. Talonflame takes to the sky.

As Talonflame rises above the trees, streaks of ice shards fly up from the field. Talonflame, who seems to have expected as much, inverts and dives hard. It takes negligible damage.

There's increased psychic activity from Musharna, which points to something being done behind the scenes. Challenger and Rapidash plow through the snow. I think he's trying to avoid contact.

Again, there's a lot of occlusion in the rocks and trees, so it feels much bigger on the inside.

Challenger and Rapidash run headfirst into an Abomasnow. The moving…I don't even know what to call it. It's like a big buff angry person who's been out in the snow too long. With a large coat. Or something. Snowman plus Pine Tree. The Abomasnow wallops the Rapidash with an arm, appearing out of the snow without warning. Observer reports the move as Wood Hammer.

It then slams its massive arm onto the ground for Earthquake. Rapidash leaps into the air despite reeling from the earlier hit. Talonflame catches Challenger via his harness and gives Rapidash the extra second or so of airtime needed to escape most of the Earthquake's effects.

The Earthquake subsides, and Talonflame releases its trainer. It tries to go in with a Flare Blitz against the Abomasnow. As it wraps itself in flames, beams of ice and jets of water shoot out from the snow. I just noticed that it is now snowing. Weather shifting moves like Hail takes a moment to come into effect.

Anyways, a mix of…Glalie and…Spheal's first evolution. Glalie is a ball of ice with a scary face and horns, and Spheal's first evo is a walrus. They're shielded by the rapidly intensifying blizzard and are acting as turrets. Talonflame can't approach like this and cancels its Flare Blitz, taking some token damage from the heat and intercepting fire.

Challenger now sends out his two Typhlosions. They shoot out of their balls and their manes of flame erupt at full blast. Both Typhlosions use Fire Blast and each take half of a circle, clearing the blizzard and really, seriously ruining Abomasnow's day. The clear shot at the target allows the Emolga–when did he get out?-to dash in and…Nuzzle, against the Spheals-evolutions.

I guess that makes sense. Nuzzle is low power, low dedication, and really suits a small flying annoyance. It flits among its targets, grazing them with its cheek, and only takes one flipper to the face for its troubles.

The Spheal-first-evolutions are all paralyzed by the…I guess Emolga's not *that* much smaller than the walruses, huh? Anyways, they're all paralyzed and the Glalies have retreated slightly to keep within the shadows of the encroaching hail, so the Typhlosions rush in to mop up the Sealeos with prejudice.

I don't know why I kept calling them Spheal evos when the names are written right there on Observer. Sealeos.

Anyways, despite the type disadvantage, these Typhlosions have Thunderpunch, apparently, and deck the Sealeos to kingdom come, before retreating from the Glalie Ice Beams. Fire is strong against Ice, but chip damage is forever.

Still, Challenger has now been found, and icicles are now being tossed in like artillery from beyond visual range. The Sealeo trainers did not replace their frontliners and instead opted for those backliners, huh? Those Bergmites are working really hard.

A Bergmite evolves into an Avalugg, and is basically a cute little ice turtle. They're launching their entire ice shells towards Challenger's location and there's twenty of them.

Challenger, meanwhile, is riding low with the Typhlosions flanking. He can't withdraw them because there's still Ice Beams coming in at odd angles. Musharna seems to be linked with the Typhlosions, since its energy is dropping in exchange for the two guards parrying or deflecting the incoming hits.

Buuut he still has no idea where the Leader is. He's riding towards the general direction of the artillery fire, but the Leader is not in that direction. He's faster than the Glalies though, who hover. If they go up too high, like one of them did just now, then it gets instantly murked by Talonflame's Flare Blitz. Talonflame then gets skewered by like five different Ice Beams and is…conditionally ok.

Musharna is Recovering and Pain Splitting with Talonflame to help keep it in the fight. The post-battle care will probably be intense, but for now it's going strong.

Pain Split with an opponent will only ever cap at 50/50, because the target will only ever accept fairness, but Pain Split with an ally doesn't have that disadvantage. Musharna is barely keeping up with the aggregate damage, though.

An Avalugg pops out from the snowbanks. The Typhlosions react fast enough to nail it with Fire Blasts, but Avalugg endures the brunt of the damage and lands its Earthquake. The Typhlosions, recovering their posture from fire blast, hunker down and soak the damage, shielding Rapidash from some of the incoming. We're at that point where a single Earthquake can't knock anybody out, but that's still a really bad hit.

Notably, Rapidash is on its last legs. Challenger feeds it some Sitrus Berries as the Typhlosions jump on and beat up the Avalugg in a rather unsportsman-like kind of way.

They then see the trainer responsible for sending out Avalugg, and jump him and the…what, Glalie, Sneasel, Seel? The Gym Trainer sends out three Pokemon quickly but the Typhlosions just roll right over them. His shield is popped real quick and both he and his team get Teleported out.

Ten minutes have passed. Challenger Team's total HP pool is down to about a third.

Challenger rides hard, takes a Bergmite icicle to the head, and reaches a section of the woods that's especially dense. He dives right in, finds a good place with plenty of cover, and then hunkers down. The hit looks like it dazed him plenty, so he also needs a breather. As they rest, Emolga climbs a tree to keep watch.

After they've gotten enough rest, Talonflame explodes through the treetop with a psy-link to Musharna while Challenger slinks away all quiet-like.

Now, the rules of engagement are as thus: If the Challenger is present in any format, the Gym Leader can no longer move from their position. The Challenger's Pokemon are allowed to engage independent of the trainer, but all nearby gym trainers are allowed to intervene and support if that happens. The Gym Leader is allowed to use as many Pokemon as the Challenger has on the field, and the Leader knows at all times how many Pokemon the Challenger has active, though not their position or state.

Talonflame sees the Leader in a relatively clear opening, relays to Challenger, who mounts and beelines towards his objective. The Leader is 'merely' one of the Gyms' top elites. Talonflame has to engage to keep the Leader pinned per the rules, so it shadows the Leader from up high, evading streaks of Ice Beam and other ice-based anti-aircraft fire. Once Challenger gives the order, Taloneflames dives with Acrobatics onto the Leader's Abomasnow, darting through the lines of tracers like an absolute badass.

And then it runs headfirst into Powder Snow and takes a bad hit from the Leader Avalugg's Rock Slide. Talonflame recovers and sacks a Flare Blitz to take itself back to altitude and away from the shots, but loses the Leader's position due to the glaring snow. Observer is now showing Sunny Day instead of Hail. When?

Either way, Challenger is now close enough that he could make the last ditch dash towards the Leader without losing too much position. He takes some juice pouches and touches them to his team's Pokeball buttons. The pouches go in for the contained Pokemon to drink as they go.

…

Challenger is close, but not close enough to be considered engaged with the Leader. Talonflame regained focus but can't approach due to a lack of health. Both sides are being walled off by withering amounts of ice and rocks. Still, Challenger is low on time and the other Gym Trainers are closing in with their more threatening Pokemon, so it's make or break.

He thinks on it for a second and gets his Rapidash to just beeline towards the Leader while clearing its own path with Flamethrower. Steal is zero, speed is not max, this is as good as it's going to get.

He charges right towards the Trainer with Rapidash getting heals from Musharna the entire way, and makes contact with both Pokemon being absolutely drained.

The Leader has Avalugg, Glalie, Froslass, and…Lapras but legs. Tappy's blocking that part of the screen and I can't see the name.

Aurorus. Rock-Ice four legged dinosaur. Fabulous shimmering neon fin-like thing on their head and extending down their neck.

Also, this means Challenger has, uh…what's its face. Emolga. He has Emolga hiding somewhere.

Ten minutes gets added to the clock as Foot-Lapras and Glalie unleash Hyper Beams towards Challenger. Rapidash Bounces up high and Challenger recalls Musharna. Talonflame grabs his harness and he recalls Rapidash as well. Talonflame eats an errant Rock Slide and is out.

It's not a big fall, and the snow helps a lot. Challenger brings out his two Typhlosions right before smacking into the snow. They help capture attention as Emolga zips in from God Knows where, Electroballs flying everywhere. It's juiced to the gills with Agility, so the Electroballs are hitting supremely hard.

Electroball done right is one of the most technically challenging moves to use. It's power goes up if the user is faster, so generally people tend to have their Pokemon run at the target for maximum effect, but there's no time to charge up and fire and dodge in that case. Best use is by strafing, but strafing while going at that kind of breakneck speeds and hitting the target is really tough to do.

Kudos to this Emolga, really. It's circling around the field like it's drifting on rails and popping Electroballs on everything it can see. Leg-Lapras is countering the best it can by turning the entire area into a Blizzard. Blizzard is not as strong damage-wise while Sunny Day is up, but the shimmering of ice against the sunlight is dazzling like crazy and some of Emolga's shots start to go wide.

Leader calls out his Beartics to counter the Typhlosions, as both are roughly the same size and can stand on their back legs. As the giant flame lion mongooses face off against giant angry ice bears, one bear gets a lucky slap against Emolga. It's like a bird hitting a window, just a dead drop into the snow.

The Beartics and the Typhlosions are roughly the same size, and they…well, they would square off. Challenger right now is outnumbered two to six, and he's really regretting his decisions. After a knockout on the challenger side, the Leader has one minute to make good of the numerical advantage before being forced to downsize the team to match.

In other words, Leader is not at all interested in letting Challenger breathe.

Within Frosloass's mist and snow, Glalie and Fabulous-Leg-Lapras spray Ice Beams onto Challenger's Typhlosions, who try to counter with Flamethrower. The Beartics move in at speed to disrupt, and the Typhlosions can't shoot and have to dodge. They try to shoot at the Beartics, but the shooters nail them with Ice Beams and scramble their targeting.

Musharna comes out and tries its best with rounds of Psychic, but it can only meaningfully hit one at a time, and can't keep up. It gets caught in the punishing amounts of long-range attacks and goes down. One Typhlosion takes a bad hit in the head and goes down.

When the minute is up, Challenger has Typhlosion and Rapidash both mostly on their last legs. The Leader adjusts and leaves out one Beartic. Of the Leader's team, Froslass has more or less just been frolicking in the snow up to this point, so she's nearly at full power. Compared to everything else that's only at, like, almost full power.

Challenger knows he can't force it at this point and taps out.

…

In context, it makes a lot of sense that IPL-grade fights are like this when, y'know, Victory Road is a thing. Well, more exactly, Victory Road was a thing, and isn't required anymore due to a few deaths when things went awry, but the IPL-grade rules are based on when it was necessary to have people toughen up so they wouldn't die doing it.

It was in Johto, or something? A group of Gravelers got pissed off and Exploded on top of a party.

…

Anyways, Challenger did ok, but did ultimately fail. The field is reset thanks to a team of hardworking Reuniclus, and the next round begins.

Photo of the day is Typhlosion wiping its face in that…I dunno if it's iconic, but that particular 'man faces camera while wiping face' pose that some video game cover art has. Photo taken while it was facing down with a Beartic. Says a lot about the situation at that point when the Pokemon with a solid type advantage was losing.

The battles take a while and the post-battle interviews take longer, so I stop watching and leave it in the background for noise.

…

To summarize, some five days later, about a third of the challengers managed to get the gym badge. This round of IPL challenges was doing really well up until the latter half, so they're down to, like, sixteen people.

Highlights include one dude who showed up with a full team of fliers and got shot down like a World War Two movie. Somebody on the internet already put an old-timey video filter on it. It looks cool.

Speaking of wars, wars are…well, wars between human factions are basically nonexistent. Psychic Pokemon and Teleportation makes declaring and prosecuting wars extremely dangerous for leaders, and in general it's kind of difficult to be the guy sitting in the back giving orders when, y'know, there's an ever-present danger of Exploding Pokemon that just suddenly appear out of nowhere. Or Ghosts. Or Exploding Ghosts.

Wars between Deep Wild Pokemon are pretty common. They last for months and both sides get angry if anybody tries to intervene. Makes for great nature documentaries though and very rarely are there casualties.

…

Tangent again: I bought a battle van. Had to re-get my license…or get my license, depends on if you consider the Earth one valid in this world or not. It's a small van, so it only has some of the amenities.

I say 'van' but it's about the size of a short bus, so it's definitely bigger than a van. Included in the package are a ball repair station, a Center Strip, size three, and a slightly-too-snug bunkbed setup for four people. I stripped that down to two and a half: one bigger bed and one smaller upper bed.

A center strip is the standard equipment at a Pokemon Center. In this case, it fits three balls at a time, and takes about a minute to heal the Pokemon of fatigue and light battle injuries. Good in a pinch, though long term rest afterwards is just as (if not more) important.

The ball repair station repairs balls, and can print components. Ball repair is very important when heading out into the wild, and somewhat less important but still important in urban areas. All Pokeballs are designed such that, even if the ball is completely destroyed so that only dust remains, the entirety of the contents would be ejected well before that. If the thing that could destroy a ball is still nearby when that happens it could get pretty dangerous. This kit is kind of old so it won't service badly damaged current gen balls, but that's ok, because I have no idea how to service current gen balls in the first place.

I mean I can do basic maintenance and all that–it's required for being licensed as a trainer–but if I need something replaced and the ball respecced…a ball's components are divided into the three C's: Common, Critical, and Needed ('Cannot do without'). Knowing how to replace Common components is a license requirement. Assuming enough spares, Common parts can be worked and replaced with field tools. Critical and Needed parts needs a station to replace. Most repair stations (like mine) can only make Common and Critical parts on the spot.

So, yes, take care of your balls, and all that.

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Anyways, I have a sketchy van now, so maybe I should find something to do with said van?

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