Chapter 3: The Army of Ash
Nemona was excited, that wasn't really much of a surprise for the Academy and its inhabitants, but this morning was unique for she was in a REALLY eager mood. Nemona often gets in over her head in certain situations, such as when she challenges a trainer that is trying to heal their Pokémon, or when she interrupts a date for a battle. She is well meaning of course, she has her standards, but still, it doesn't stop her from when she should restrain herself.
"Nemona will you stop bouncing around?" Arven grumbled with irritation clearly in his voice. "Are you kidding?! We get to see ALL of Ash's Pokémon! I want to battle all of them!" But before she could get any ideas, Liko cut in "Maybe you should ask permission, Ash may still be tired from getting all of his Pokémon back" This deflated Nemona, but she relented.
The group was heading towards Ash's dorm room, amongst them was Amethio of all people, which was odd since he preferred to keep to himself, but they didn't really pay it that much attention. "I'm rather curious as to what the variety, and magnitude of his older Pokémon" Amethio said to himself "I heard that he won both the Manalo AND the Wyndon Conferences" Roy said while reading a magazine on those subjects. "I also heard he was the first trainer to defeat the Kanto Battle Frontier" Dot said, watching a video on her Rotom Phone that shows Ash and his Pikachu battling Brandon's Regice.
"Maybe he can shed some more light on his career once we get to it" Penny said before knocking on the door, only there was no response "Is he still sleeping?" Liko wondered before trying the doorknob and found that it was unlocked. She opened the door, only to find that Ash and Pikachu weren't inside.
"Where is he?" Nemona practically whined, before Amethio found a note on a table that read 'Meet me south of the town" I suppose he got up before any of us" Amethio theorized before the rest of the group dashed out to find his friend, making Amethio sweat drop.
Everyone soon arrived to the southern outskirts of Mesagoza to see Ash surrounded by a figurative army of Pokemon, they still couldn't believe that there were so many Pokemon that Ash had, and they were eager to get a closer look, however.
"Krooko!"
A sunglass wearing Krookodile stood in their way, holding his arms out as if denying them access.
"Wait, Krookodile!"
Ash ran over to them to stop any possible disaster.
"It's ok, they're friends of mine"
Krookodile took a second look at the group and nodded, before walking off and leaning down against a tree.
"Sorry about that guys, Krookodile tends to get a bit…. aggressive" Ash muttered while rubbing the back of his head, before heading back to his Pokémon to feed then, and golly what a large amount of Pokémon he has. Many of them were swimming and playing in the river, others were perched on tress, and others still were loafing around.
"Wow…. look at them all…." Dot uttered, as everyone watched in awe at the sheer number of Pokémon in one area, even Amethio had a look of awe on his face. "How did he get so many of them?" Roy wondered aloud "And how does he manage all of them?" Liko asked herself.
Over at the river, they saw small blue turtle with a red shell, a bigger rougher looking snapping turtle with a large underbite, a small blue alligator, two red crustaceans clashing with their claws, an armless blue toad that was also splashing around, and even a Lapras. Many of them were particularly surprised at the Lapras, given how rare they were.
They saw a Snorlax doing what it naturally does: sleeping, a green reptilian creature with a twig in his mouth, a bipedal frog that has its tongue wrapped around a scarf meditating, a large gray and white bear creature that seemed to be wearing a bandana that was also meditating, and even a Charizard. However, there was something odd about this Charizard, it seems to be resonating power from its very being, making the group very wary about upsetting it.
Up in the air was an osprey-like bird with a yellow and red crest, a gray and white hawk with a red tipped crest, a large bat-like wyvern, and a small green owlet. Within the trees were a lime green insectoid creature that was currently talking to Lokix, while a large green gorilla was happily pounding on its wooden drums, with an orange tortoise humming along to the beat.
Among the pastures were more of the smaller and faster Pokémon, a hawk-like Pokémon with the physique of a wrestler, an orange wolf with rough stones jutting out of its fur, and a curled up grey pachyderm were having a sort of race, clearly in the lead while a curled up red centipede, Gliscor, and some of the Tauros were keeping pace.
And there were STILL more of them.
As they let out their Pokémon to interact with Ash's large family, they see the trainer in question hauling bags of Pokémon food for everyone to eat, as they didn't have breakfast yet. He then poured the bags into bowls before wiping the sweat from his brow.
As they helped Ash, their Pokémon proceeded to mangle with Ash's family.
Pokespeech On
"So let me get this right, not only did you withstand that attack, but you also turned it into amor?!" Roy's Wattrel questioned incredulously. "That's right kid" Swellow replied with a puffed up chest "Pfft, I don't believe it, there's no way you could withstand a super effective attack like that" Nemona's Dartrix dismissed with a wave of his wing. "You better believe it pretty bird" Staraptor snarked "When you're on Ash's team, practically anything is possible, and that's only scratching the surface" Dartrix merely scoffed before turning away, clearly being a strict realist. Sprigatito meanwhile was conversing with Bulbasaur, clearly enjoying the wise Grass starter's musings "Wow, that was amazing!" Sprigatito marveled with sparkling eyes. "When you get to be in many battles, you tend to face many amazing things kid" Bulbasaur said plainly, knowing that the young kitten would be easily impressed. "Mr. Bulbasaur" Liko's Wooper ran over "Do you know about any other Wooper like me out there?" "Indeed, but you'd be surprised by how different they are from you."
Quaxly was talking with the other water starters, getting a laugh out of Oshawott's narcissistic tendencies and his resulting pratfalls. Arven's Nacli and Smoliv were conversing with Boldore and Bayleef respectively, eager to talk with Pokemon of their respective types.
Pokespeech Off
Back with Ash, we had finally finished filling the bowls for his Pokemon "BREAKFAST IS READY!" He hollered, as the subsequent rumbling of a hungry swarm came as they got ready to eat.
"So, Ash" Amethio started "Which Pokemon would you say is the strongest?" Ash paused for a moment before answering "Personally, I don't think I could answer that, all of them are strong of course, but some have those specific traits that make them particularly powerful" He then turned towards a regal looking dire wolf of cyan coloration with metallic wings, a crowned head, and a sword tucked away on her body.
As they were conversing however, Zirc and Onia of the Explorers appeared, and launched a net at Koraidon, but before it could trap the injured reptile, Pikachu leapt into action and sliced the net with Iron Tail.
"Blast that rodent!" Zirc groaned as he sent out Rhydon, not giving any of them time to prepare "Hand over Koraidon boy, or else things will be painful" Onia demanded with a smug smirk, only for Ash to replay with a similar smirk "Don't you see that you have the odds stacked against you?" The duo gave confused squawks before a legion of angry and displeased Pokemon surround them. Zirc and Onia were utterly stumped, where did all of these Pokemon even come from?
"Bah, now matter, Golduck, attack!" Onia commanded, foolish move. Before Golduck could unleash a Zen Headbutt, Ash's Pokemon launched many attacks at both it and Rhydon, which completely overwhelmed them and their trainers and sent them flying Team Rocket Style.
Ash's friends were utterly stunned at how easily he stomped the annoyances thinking 'why didn't we do that to begin with?' before shaking out of their stupor and turning to Ash. "So, um…. Ash… how many regions did you go to?" Asked Dot, to which Ash paused before replying with "Well I've been to Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, Sinnoh, Unova, Kalos, Alola, and Galar, I've also been to the Orange Islands and the Decalore Islands" Pretty much everyone was utterly stumped at how seasoned Ash was, but it did explain how he amassed many Pokemon.
"I guess that explains how you caught so many Tauros" Penny marveled, only for Ash to sheepishly rub the back of his head and reply with "Actually, that was a bit of a mistake, I was trying to catch some Pokémon at the Safari Zone, but they kept getting in the way"
Everyone fell down anime style by how ludicrous that sounded, for they clearly didn't the true extent of the walking talking chaos magnet.
Amethio in particular pondered to himself, thinking how could such a seasoned and experienced trainer that was on the level of champions also have such a goofy and laughable attitude. As Ash's Pokémon went back to breakfast, they decided to let their own Pokémon get some breakfast themselves, as they hadn't eaten yet.
After the group left, Ash looked back to his Pokémon and sighed before he forgot something.
"OH CRAP, I FORGOT TO CONTACT PROFESSOR OAK!" Ash shouted as rapidly pulled out his Rotom Phone and began to hastily tap the Professor's phone number in.
Scene Cut
In the Hall of Origins, Arceus carried the ivory flute from before and handed it to Latias. "Take this prized instrument to Paldea, the Chosen One awaits his next gift" Arceus ordered, to which Latias replied with "Yes father" Before flying through a portal and into the Pokémon world. Arceus then turned to Dialga "Have you made the preparations for Ash's future allies?" "Yes father" Dialga replied with a bow "We have made preparations in Dragonite Island, Vermilion City, Motostoke, Galar's Route 6, Treasure Island, and Winding Woods" "Excellent" Replied Arceus "The Chosen One will need all the allies he can get for the coming storm."
Scene Cut
After contacting Professor Oak, Sabrina, Anthony, Ranger Mason, Keanan, and Professor Kukui to make sure the Pokémon left with them were OK, Ash slumped down behind a tree and sighed. It was 8:23 in the Morning and already he was exhausted, though on the bright side, he was happy to see his old Pokémon all gathered, he even got to reunite with his released Pokémon, with Butterfree regaling tales about his life with his mate, whom was currently looking after their Caterpies, Pidgeot getting acquainted with her fellow birds, Primeape getting into a macho contest with Hawlucha and Scraggy, Haunter was pulling pranks on some of his less tolerant Pokémon, which often earned him a chasing around, which he simply avoided by vanishing, Lapras was merely laying in the river as the smaller water types played around her, Squirtle was talking about how many fires he put out with his team while flashing his sunglasses, Larvitar meanwhile was talking a big game about how strong he was, but he was doing it in front of Urshifu, whom was unimpressed, Greninja was having a spar with some of what were considered 'aces' amongst Ash's Pokémon like Sceptile and Infernape, and Goodra was giving rides to the smaller Pokémon himself.
It suddenly dawned on Ash that he didn't scan his older Pokémon to see what moves they might have, so he did just that. Ash saw that Pidgeot had upgraded her Gust attack into Hurricane, and learned moves like Twister, Feather Dance, and Agility. Butterfree had learned Psybeam, Silver Wind, and Air Slash. Haunter had learned Night Shade, Shadow Ball, Psychic, and Ice Punch, Primeape had learned Brick Break, Ice Punch, Fire Punch, Thunder Punch, Cross Chop, and even Stomping Tantrum. Lapras meanwhile had picked up Ice Shard, Confuse Ray, Life Dew, and even upgraded Water Gun into Hydro Pump, clearly showing how much she grew. Larvitar didn't learn any moves yet, but he did master the ones he did know. Greninja had upgraded Cut into Night Slash while Goodra had picked up Power Whip, Aqua Tail, and Sludge Bomb. Finally, Naganadel had learned Flamethrower, Air Cutter, and Sludge Wave.
All of these moves has given Ash a few ideas on how he could integrate move training into his regimen.
End of Chapter
Ash now has his army with him, and that should repel any possible poachers or the like. Now, for the review responses.
UltimateCCC: This fanfic won't have any romance in it, aside from a few jokes here and there about his connection with his female travel companions, and yeah, he will indeed need a bigger camp
Guest: I won't be pairing Ash with Liko, romance is not what I'm going for
Guest: No, Ash won't catch the Swords of Justice, but I will have a work around for that
Pokémon Fan: That will indeed be fun, just wait until they see their true power