280 CH48 (278), The Surprises Keep Coming

During the last four days of the break, the global atmosphere was charged with excitement. Even among my circle, it was the same. The champion battles and the champions themselves were the main topics of face-to-face talks, calls, or chats.

Rose, Weiss, Jessica, Erza, Misty, Marlene, Wendy, and Akame were raving about Cynthia and Diantha. They all went on about how strong and beautiful they were. Rose, Jessica, Misty, and Wendy were more partial to Diantha because they liked her elegant battle style more.

Weiss, Erza, Marlene, and Akame on the other hand favored Cynthia more because she was more of a strategic battler that did not mind going for a power battle. Still, both Cynthia and Diantha made it to their top as role models for all my girl friends, and I meant friends that are girls when I say that.

Well, I think that was the case for all girls worldwide, so it was no surprise that they joined in as well. Still, Misty did emphasize that Lorelei the Orange Archipelago Champion 21 years ago, so the one before the one that lost against Drake, was still her favorite role model.

Lorelei Kana was an ice-type specialist and ice-elementalist that became the Orange Archipelago Champion at 28 and abdicated after her first term, citing that she wanted to focus more on her training.

So, while only 5 of the 18 current regional champions were females, there were a lot of strong female trainers that could serve as role models for the current generation and all generations to come.

The most popular two were probably Agatha Kikuko and Bertha Kikuno, the most famous female Legendary-Class trainers that were alive. Agatha was a ghost-type specialist that was from the same generation as Professor Oak, and Bertha was a ground-type specialist from that generation as well.

Unlike the girls, the boys had to choose whether to let patriotism sway their choice or not, but in the end, two had to share the spot of the most popular new champion.

The first one was Lance, because of dragons, duh, and the other one was Leon because of his Primal Charizard because that thing looked awesome. Cynthia was a close second place because some of the guys were simps, and well she was just that impressive of a trainer.

Aaron, Ace, Kinji, and I were in camp Lance, while Sakamoto, Kazuma, Takeshi, and Sorrel were in Camp Leon. Yu and Coco were in camp Cynthia, those simps.

I mean Yu was now living in Orre, he could have at least pretended to support Wes instead of declaring Cynthia the best. I had put all the boys and girls in one chat group for each gender two months ago so that all my friends could get friendly with each other.

Naturally, there was also a mixed chat group with everyone in it, but I made the gender-separate chat groups because there was always something that one gender was not willing to share in the presence of the other gender.

They all quickly got friendly with each other, which was not that surprising, since I had already introduced most of them to each other at some point.

I did this group chat thing after I had formally introduced myself to all my acquaintances that met me while I was under an alias. I could now proudly call them friends instead since there was no more secret identity between us.

Anyway, the discussions still keep going even after the third term began. It was the favorite topic at the academy, and even on Palkiday during my visit to the knight academy that was the topic on everyone's lips. Thankfully the hype began to die down at the start of the second week.

Around that time, something just as major as the champion streak, as it was now called, happened in our family. Well, at least it was just as important in our eyes. Scratch that, it was more important than that.

On Palkiday at roughly 4 p.m Skye/Pidgeot broke through to the (low) dark gold stage, which was major news for two reasons. One, Skye became a dark gold-stage Pokemon, and two, she was dad's third Pokemon to reach the dark gold stage.

That meant that dad now officially fulfilled the Pokemon requirement to become an ACE-Class trainer. Dad told me that he had already fulfilled all other conditions for his advancement, so he could now apply for his promotion, which he promptly did on Dialday.

He left the home with me at 8 a.m and headed to the main alliance office in Rota while I headed to the academy. When I came back from the academy at 1 p.m he was already at home and told me that he was now officially an ACE-Class trainer.

We obviously had to celebrate such a grand occasion, so mom and dad invited all their friends to a grill party on Kyoday to celebrate dad's advancement. They naturally invited the Fields, which meant Rose would be here as well, but they surprisingly invited the Schnees and Golds as well.

I had not thought/known that the friendship between our parents had reached the stage where they were actual friends instead of acquaintances. Still, it was a welcome surprise, and I was happy that I would get to see Weiss and Ace as well.

The party was a smashing success, everyone had fun, they all congratulated dad, and he was all smiles the whole day. I got to see my friends and they congratulated me as well after they did so to my dad.

I jokingly said to Rose that my dad had caught up with hers before I turned to Weiss as well as Ace and joked that their parents were the new targets.

I was only half joking because I was hoping that dad would someday reach that point as well. I mean Weiss's dad, Jacques, was a Tier 4 Ice-Elementalist and Elite-Class ice-type specialist, after all, so he was a good target.

Ace's father, Roger, was even more impressive since he was a Champion-Class trainer. They all laughed at that and joked that they would have to encourage their parents to keep advancing to not make it too easy for my dad.

Anyway, the party ended on a high note, and it seemed dad's Pokemon wanted the week to end on a high note as well, since his Magnezone, Cell, advanced to the (high) gold stage on Grouday during their light training session shortly after lunch.

Just when I was wondering when some great news from our side was going to pop up, Mothra/Butterfree's Endurance increased to D on Mewday, which meant that only a single one of her parameters had to rise by a single value, regardless of which one, for her to reach the (high) gold stage.

It had taken about fourteen months for this to happen, but her being at the gold stage was not the only reason for this. She had spent some of her time focusing on her minions, and some focusing on her moves.

Furthermore, Mothra had not been targeting a specific parameter during her training but opted to train them all, which might seem counterintuitive since it increased the time it took her to reach the (high) gold stage, but we had more than enough time to afford it.

It was something she wanted to do, and I agreed because it ultimately was not a loss of time since she would have had to spend the time to train the other parameters either way. Besides, I was pretty sure that her Strength was going to follow suit pretty soon, so Mothra reaching the (high) gold stage during my third term was a foregone conclusion.

I was pretty happy with this, and that I won 17 out of 22 spars against Erza and her fellow novice knights on Palkiday only improved my mood even further.

The days until Giratiday were pretty calm, but that day ended up being an uncommon one. It showed that I was a pretty good coach if I had to at so myself. Under my great tutelage, Sorrel's Lopunny broke through to the silver stage, which served to lit a fire under Marlene who wanted her Stoutland to be the next one to reach the silver stage.

If they kept up the good work, I believed that they could become strong enough to make it to the continental competition by the end of our third year. That would be good enough for them to earn enough points to visit either the Riolu or the Togepi habitat.

Two days before the start of the second month of my third term, or the 32nd month of 2180, good old Stan/Gyarados decided to give me a reason to end the month on a high note. His Agility reached SS, which meant that only his Endurance and Energy Capacity were left until he completed his second round of limit breaking.

Like always Stan's fellow Sinister Six members were nipping at his heels, or rather tail. His improvement was followed by a wave of parameter increases from them as well, and by the end of the second week, all five Gyarados had raised their second parameter to SS.

It seemed like fortune did not like me one-upping dad since Vibra/Rhyperior reached the (high) gold stage on Giratiday of the third week. Well, at least, lady fortune decided to wait for 3 days before she had Vibra trump our progress.

Not that I minded, I was happy that dad's Pokemon were getting stronger. To be honest, I was kinda hoping mom's Pokemon would start advancing soon as well, since it had been some time since I had seen some visible progress, stage-wise, on their front.

I mean, I believed that the stronger my parents were the better since they could not be used against me if they were strong enough to fend for, and take care of, themselves.

Anyway, the third week proved to be a good one, because I got to hear a rather interesting piece of information on the evening news on Dialday. The news was from Sinnoh, and it stated that they had found a swarm of Qwilfish variants and some Overqwil, which were thought to be extinct.

A group of archeologists had been searching the area roughly 500 km from Sunnyshore City after finding mentions of Hisuian settlements in an area that was called the Islepsy Shore in ancient times.

According to the report of the anchor, the archeologists managed to discover a cave that led to an isolated underground lake where they spotted a swarm of Qwilfish and Overqwil.

They thankfully retreated before they were discovered, because alliance personnel that later surveyed the lake confirmed that there were platinum stage Overqwil inside the lake, and old records state that the species were not of the friendly sort.

Apparently, the lake was connected to an underground river that led directly to the sea, which was how the swarm maintained/ensured their food intake.

This was a major find since researchers had thought that the species had become extinct due to the actions of the people of Sinnoh, or rather the whole southern continent, nearly 4000 years ago. The last wild Overqwil and Qwilfish variant had been sighted 3200 years ago after all, so it was reasonable that they were considered extinct.

The reason for the merciless hunt was that the species has been recorded to poison the water sources they lived in, on top of being overly aggressive and savage. The actions by the previous Hisuians were recorded to have been supported by the wild water types that suffered under the Qwilfish and Overqwil.

Communications from the alliance's side with the leading Overqwil confirmed that the leader was the one that actively prevented the spreading of their species since it lived through the hunt and did not want a repeat to happen.

The boss Overqwil did not believe something reckless like taking revenge on everyone since it knew that to be unrealistic, so it acted accordingly. The newscaster reported that the alliance was currently in negotiations with the leading Overqwil regarding their proliferation outside the lake they were found in.

I was really interested in that news, and I thought it was great that new, or rather old species and variants were rediscovered. The fourth week was calmer, Marlene's Stoutland reached the silver stage just like she hoped and she thanked me for my help.

Our group chat got a bit chatty that day because she bragged about her Stoutland's breakthrough in the girl's chatroom, which then involved the mixed chat. In the end, my status as a great coach got solidified among our circle of friends.

On Palkiday something happened inside Utopia that took me by surprise. Drowzee approached me after I entered Utopia to check up on everyone. I naturally checked his status and saw why he came to me.

The guy managed to advance to the (high) bronze stage, and I had told him all about the optimal evolution points, so he told me that he wanted to evolve. I had promised him that I would be willing to support his evolution with supplements as I did for the others, which was why he had approached me.

I passed on the news to everyone else and we all made our way to Drowzee's habitat. They encircled us and I began setting the standard energy/material circle I set up for each evolution. I had already prepared a potion for Drowzee after I had given my promise to support him just in case it would be needed, so I gave him the potion before I joined the others outside the circle.

Drowzee promptly gulped down the potion and initiated his evolution after taking a few calming breaths. The light show began and it took 20ish seconds for the light to die down, after which we approached the newly evolved Hypno to congratulate him.

I did not forget to check his new status and saw that while he still had light green potential, it had increased by 60% thanks to my supplements, so he was not too far off from reaching green potential.

I had told him about the limit breaking and the breakthrough points after he had joined Utopia, so after the hubbub died down for a bit, I asked him when he was planning to break through to the silver stage since he was at the (high) bronze stage.

Hypno informed me that he wanted to try his hand at limit breaking, and I told him he could approach me whenever he wanted to know the state of his parameters before I wished him the best in his endeavor.

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