Despite Pierre's proclamation to himself that he would become an adventurer on the first day of the new millennium, it took him several days to reach the nearest city that had an adventurer's outpost for him to register at. It would have taken even longer, had he not come across a wagon being pulled by an old Zebstrika, who didn't mind him hitching a ride in exchange for some conversation.
Pierre knew Kyber City was more technologically advanced than his village. Although each city, town, and village throughout the lands managed themselves autonomously, leading to wildly different environments and lifestyles, in the Psychic Domain, towns like Pierre's home, which barely even had electricity, were rare. Yet even knowing this, Pierre was still completely overwhelmed by just how different the place was.
The roads were paved in black, and dominated by roaring cars, a type of machine Pierre had only ever seen once or twice. The buildings stretched up towards the sky, taller than anything he'd ever known. The sidewalks were bustling with pedestrians on their way from point A to point B, chatting with each other or staring down at phone screens to pass time in between.
Pierre wandered aimlessly for a while, peering into shop windows at the fancy hats or jackets, or gazing up at the bird pokemon mingling on the telephone wires and wondering which of them were humans and which were true pokemon.
But even though his curiosity and wonder were screaming at him to investigate everything, his excitement pushed him to tap on the shoulder of a man waiting at a bus stop and ask, "Do you know where the adventurer's guild is?"
The man looked at him, clearly put off by the intrusion. From the antler-shaped earrings he wore, it was obvious he was a Stantler. The rest of his outfit didn't seem very Stantler-esque, which meant he likely didn't shift forms very often. It was always easier to shift if your human form already looked like your pokemon one. "I don't know," he said. "I can look it up for you." He took out his phone and opened the map function. Pierre watched the little device in awe. After a moment, the Stantler said, "You're gonna wanna take the bus three stops over, then go north down that road and you'll see it on the right."
"What if I miss it?"
The man smirked. "You won't."
Pierre followed the Stantler's directions and found the adventurer's guild outpost. The man had been right; the building was impossible to miss. It stood tall on the street corner, a large mural of a sunset (or perhaps sunrise) painted across one wall, and the ocean painted over the other. There was an assortment of flags lining the roof, one for each of the 18 monarchs. No, that wasn't true. One flagpole, the one for the Poison monarch, remained bare.
Pierre's heart twinged slightly as he saw it, a strange flurry of mixed emotions flaring up in his chest. The former Poison King had nearly killed all of the other monarchs, thirty years ago. It was a war that took place long before Pierre was born, but that didn't mean he didn't hear about it growing up. As a Poison-type himself, Pierre was supposed to be loyal to his king, but no Poison-type would express pride in the former King's actions. Not publicly, anyway. To Pierre, the Poison King was a source of endless history lectures and cautionary tales. A lesson in hubris and greed. A warning against villainy. He'd grown sick of it. He didn't need unending recountings of the Poison King's conquest to teach him how to be a good person. That should just come naturally.
Pulling his eyes away, Pierre clenched his fists and entered the building.
Inside, the outpost was just as full of activity as the street. A large bulletin board nearly filled one wall in the lobby, cluttered with papers describing various quests. Pokemon came and went, perusing the board, taking down flyers or putting one up. Other Pokemon sat around various tables, discussing plans and strategy for their next mission. Some presumed-adventurers were arguing with a person dressed in baggy pinkish-red pants (whom Pierre supposed was likely a Medicham) about the payout for their last mission.
"There were ten of them! That's clearly a rank 3 mission, not rank 2!" The leader of the small group, a Litleo judging from his red mohawk and brown outfit, pressed.
"Look, unless you have some kind of proof that you truly did take on ten bandits, I can't help you," the Medicham said exasperatedly.
"Can I help you?" Pierre was startled from his staring to see the woman at the front desk looking at him. She had black hair and yellow circles on her cheeks. Emolga, Pierre thought.
"Um, yes, I'd like to register as an adventurer!" he responded.
With a friendly smile and a nod, the Emolga pulled out a large binder from under the desk and dropped it heavily in front of her. "Will you be registering as a solo adventurer or a party?"
"Uh… What's the difference?" Pierre asked.
"Well, solo adventurers are just that– a single pokemon that goes on missions by themself and takes the entire reward for themself. Since it's more dangerous, you would get more money from the reward payouts than you would if you had to split the prize with a party, and there are some missions available only to solo adventurers. The drawback is you can't officially work with anyone else. If you want to split the reward with another adventurer, you'll have to form a party."
"Party, then," Pierre decided. "It's no fun adventuring all on your own."
"Okay, and who are you forming your party with?" Emolga asked.
"Can I just form it by myself and find allies later?"
"Unfortunately, I can't register you as a party unless you have at least two members," Emolga said sympathetically. "You'll have to find one other person to register with."
"Oh…" Pierre said, disheartened.
He stood awkwardly for a moment, wondering where he was going to find another party member to team up with, when a voice behind him said irritably, "Are you done?"
Pierre turned to see a boy about his age, although quite a bit shorter. He had brown hair with yellow on top, and a brown hooded capelet with the same yellow borders. Pierre struggled to place his species. "Oh, sorry," he said, stepping aside to let the boy pass.
The boy stood in front of the front desk and said, "I want to register as a solo adventurer."
"Alright," the Emolga said cheerily, glad not to have to put the binder away just yet. "What is your name and species?"
"Rudy, Deerling," the boy answered.
"And you said you'll be solo, right?"
"Hey," Pierre interrupted excitedly. "Or you could join my party!"
The boy, Rudy, looked at him with narrowed eyes. "No thanks."
"Come on, adventuring together will be a lot more fun! Plus, we'll both get stronger together, and you'll be able to evolve faster!"
With a frown, Rudy turned on him. "I don't need you telling me when to evolve, alright? I'll evolve when I want to evolve."
Pierre blinked at him. "So you're a Deerling still on purpose?"
That seemed to make Rudy even angrier. "You don't think I'm strong enough as a Deerling or something? Cuz I can show you just how mistaken you are about that."
Now, other adventurers were beginning to take interest. Emolga said, "Boys, if you want to spar, you're going to have to do it on the training floor."
"Training floor?" Pierre echoed excitedly.
"Normally it's only for adventurers, but in this instance, I can make an exception, since you're both about to register anyway," she said. "Do you want to see it?"
"Yeah!"
The three of them took the elevator up to the roof, which acted as the training floor. Several other adventurers followed them up, wanting to watch the two fight.
"My name's Pierre, by the way," Pierre said to Rudy as they stood in the elevator. "I'm a Toxicroak. Although you could probably tell that from my outfit." He gestured down at himself. Pierre was wearing a blue leotard under white shorts, with black straps over his shoulders and along his hips, hooking between his legs. A red blade was strapped to each hand, and his shoes had curved red barbs on the heels.
Receiving no response for his introduction, Pierre continued, "I'm from down south. This is my first time seeing so much technology. I've never been in an elevator before."
"I don't care," said Rudy.
Once they reached the training floor, the two of them each stood on opposite sides of the large square painted onto the roof.
"First to be knocked out of the square loses," Emolga said. She counted the two of them off, then declared, "Begin!"
Pierre shifted to his Toxicroak form and jumped forward. He expected Rudy to follow suit, and so he jabbed a Sucker Punch at him, but surprisingly Rudy lurched sideways as his form shifted. As Rudy moved, a strange afterimage began to follow him. Agility, Pierre realized. Smart. He tried again, this time throwing out a Poison Jab, but once again Rudy slid past his barbed fist, using Agility again.
"Think you're just about fast enough now?" Pierre asked.
Rather than respond, Rudy opened his mouth and spat a barrage of Bullet Seeds. Pierre managed to dodge most of them, with three barely nicking him and one biting into his thigh. He winced at the sting of it.
"You'll regret that," Pierre said through gritted teeth. Although the pain itself wasn't that pressing, he felt it power him up as he unleashed a slash with the power of his Revenge.
Even with his increased speed, Rudy shouldn't have been able to dodge it, and yet… Pierre felt his barb slash through an afterimage. Rudy had used Agility again in order to dodge even quicker. Pierre grinned. This guy was interesting.
"Are you just going to dodge all–" Pierre was cut off just as he had begun to turn around. He felt the Deerling ram his head directly into his abdomen with a surprising amount of force for his small stature. The impact pushed the air from Pierre's lungs and sent him sprawling across the concrete. Cheers rose up from their small audience.
Winded, Pierre pulled himself up and looked back at Rudy. The Deerling was shaking his head, clearly not unscathed from his Double-Edge. Pierre prepared to lunge forward with another Poison Jab, but before he could even move, Rudy was on him again, driving his skull into the Toxicroak's gut. Pierre was knocked back again, and this time, he sat up coughing and saw he had landed just beyond the arena boundaries.
"Winner!" Emolga announced. "Rudy Deerling!"
Pierre sat dazed on the floor as Rudy stood triumphantly, back in his human form, in the center of the square. He stared down at Pierre humorlessly, but from the fire in his eyes, Pierre could tell their competition wasn't over.
"You're way faster than I expected you to be," Pierre said as he heaved himself to his feet, shifting as he did so that the floor below him seemed to rush away from his feet. "Next time, I'll be more ready for it!"