625 CH6 (620), One Contest Begins While Another Ends

I spent the time until 2:30 p.m. when my first match was scheduled fishing. Well, I was mostly relaxing during the periods when no Pokemon was biting while keeping an eye on the big screen to watch any battles that caught my eye, but the relaxing part was a matter of course while one was fishing. Anyway, because the (high) silver stage was the limit set by the organizers, I made sure to watch all battles involving any silver-stage Pokemon since any of them could end up facing us.

A few interesting trainers/Pokemon had already made an appearance such as a (high) silver-stage Electabuzz, an honest-to-Mew Lucario, and Snorlax. Still, more interesting than that was my lucky catch half an hour ago. I actually managed to pull a Skrelp on deck, which attracted quite a bit of attention. Not only because it could evolve to a dragon without any aid unlike its fellow seahorse Pokemon, but also because Skrelp were quite rare, especially in these waters.

Hence, it did not take long for Skrelp to draw a crowd, and some people directly threw out an offer to buy the little lady, but I declined their offers after checking her status sheet and seeing her deep yellow potential. Once she entered Utopia she would have either light green or green potential, and I believed that she would make a good friend to the male Horsea I had captured yesterday. They were both seahorse Pokemon that evolved into dragon types eventually after all.

I had to admit that I was curious if one of their descendants would eventually end up becoming a Dragon/Poison-type Kingdra if the two species interbred often enough. I'd need a few more Skrelp and Horsea for that to keep a somewhat diverse gene pool, but I did not mind since I did not mind having more future dragons inside Utopia. They were dragons after all.

As for the diverse gene pool, while Utopia's optimization process ensured that most, if not all negative consequences of interfamilial breeding were dealt with, I preferred expanding the gene pool either way since it helped not waste part of the optimization process to take care of defects/flaws that could have been simply avoided.

Nevertheless, I balled Skrelp before everyone's eyes and put the ball away to show that I had no plans to sell her before recasting my line and settling back into my chair. While waiting for another Pokemon to take the bait, I released Skrelp inside Utopia and let her undergo the Utopia treatment before settling her beside Horsea. She turned out a bit lucky with her potential rising to green, which was more than good enough for my plans.

Anyway, I rose from my chair once there were only 10 minutes left until my first battle. I had to reel in my rod since I was not allowed to leave it out while I was away. Doing that and moving to the battlefield only took 5 minutes, leaving me just as much time until the start of my battle. 2 minutes before 2:30 p.m. I was asked to head to my designated side of the field by a staff member who approached me, and I saw my opponent, an older-looking gentleman, doing the same.

"Are both contestants ready?" The referee asked which got him a nod from the two of us. "In that case, release your Pokemon at my mark," he proclaimed. I had long decided which one of my 6 registered Pokemon I was going to use first.

"3, 2, 1," as soon as the countdown ended, we released our Pokemon. "Go Growlie," my opponent said while a Growlithe appeared on his side, barking energetically. I had a call-out line as well, but mine had an instruction in it. "Dazzle these sleepyheads, Jean," I said while releasing Jean/Espeon, who appeared elegantly on my side.

The energy that Growlithe was releasing was of the (low) silver stage, but the undulations felt a bit "weak", which made me suspect that it had broken through not long ago. That put it at a disadvantage against Jean, who released a cute Yawn as soon as she showed up, making the opposing Growlithe drowsy, creating a stark contrast to its energetic start.

I really like that starting line of mine since it was actually a multifaceted instruction. The execution depended on my inflection while issuing the order. If I emphasized the sleepyhead, Jean used Yawn as soon as she appeared. If I emphasized Dazzle she used Hyper Voice, which thanks to her ability became a psychic move. Some would say Dazzling Gleam would fit better for such an order, but Jean did not know that one yet.

"Growlithe don't fall asleep my boy," my foe was urging. "Quick, use Wild Charge," he ordered and his Growlithe began to rush towards Jean all sparkly. Meanwhile, Jean had directly moved on to using Calm Mind after her Yawn, and she calmly finished her move, ignoring the sparking Growlithe rushing at her.

"Protect," I ordered three seconds before Growlithe could crash into her, and a shimmering pink energy barrier appeared around her moments before Growlie could hit her. Instead, it crashed into the pink barrier, getting doubly hurt due to the crash and recoil.

"Growlie!!" my foe shouted in distress, which I ignored. "HP," I promptly issued a follow-up order instead, which had Jean take a step forward and aim her mouth at the Growlithe on the floor before releasing a psychic-type Hyper Voice.

"Growlie quick use Roar," the old man ordered, probably hoping to counter with his own sound move, but Growlithe's Roar got drowned out by Hyper Voice, and swiftly turned into a whimper after Growlith got hit by HP.

"Quick Attack," I had her capitalize on Growlithe's pain. My opponent tried to give an order of his own, but Jean slammed into Growlithe before he could say more than his Pokemon's name, sending it flying across the deck.

"Growlie, can you stand my boy," the old man asked worriedly while his Pokemon tried to get back on its feet. "Grow, lithe," it shouted determined, but it was wobbling pretty badly. It honestly looked ready to fall over and I considered whether I should give Jean another attack order or not, though that quickly became irrelevant.

"Growlie!!!" the man cried out as his Growlithe collapsed, interrupting my musing. Jean skipped up to me as the referee declared Jean/me the victor, and I knelt down to hug her before praising her for her good performance. Honestly, the battle went easier than I thought it would, but that was to be expected considering where we were.

Anyway, I recalled Jean and thanked the old gentleman for the battle before returning to my fishing spot. The whole thing from my leaving to my return took less than 15 minutes, so I still had 75 minutes until the end of the fishing competition. Hence, I placed the bait onto the hook and cast the line before taking a look at the scoreboard to see if anyone had trumped my Magikarp while I was gone, which did not happen. Magikarp was still in first place with a close to 50-point difference compared to the second-place holder.

Happy with that, I settled on my "camping" chair and proceeded to wait for a Pokemon to bite the bait while keeping an eye on the screen showing the battle happening right now. It was likely going to take another 3 to 4 hours until my second battle, so I had nothing better to do anyway. At least the fishing competition would be settled by then, and I would be able to freely check out the Anorith fossil I was going to win.

That said, the 75 minutes passed by and I managed to reel in 6 more Pokemon during this time. None of them were all that impressive, but I did end up catching 3 of them since they had decent potential, at least they did after the optimization. It did add a bit of variety to the water species, though I'd probably need a lot more Pokemon for a visible impact. Still, for now, a yellow Goldeen, a deep yellow Carvanha, as well as a light green Tentacool ended up joining Utopia.

More important than that was the fact that no one managed to catch anything with a better score than Magikarp's 200 points even when the end of the competition was declared over the speakers, securing me first place. The closest that anyone came was a Frillish that someone somehow managed to reel in 15 minutes ago, and even then it only managed to secure second place with 168 points. As for my other captures, they got pushed out of the Top 10, so no other prizes for me aside from the most important one.

Anyway, the organizers had set up a stage and the top 10 contestants got called up for the award ceremony. Places 4-10 collectively received their prizes, which was a set of coupons that gave them 40% off if they purchased a rod in some fishing store, along with a 10 kg bait package they could exchange for free from the same store.

Following that came the prizes for the Top 3, and the other two prizes were not bad either. Third place received a dozen LureBalls, while the second place received a dozen LureBalls and a Water Stone. Then it was finally my turn, and I was quite giddy when they handed me the Anorith Fossil. Since it was a complete fossil, the stone block they handed me was not small. It was pretty much a small "boulder" with a height and length of 1.2 meters as well as a width of 0.8 meters.

Naturally, something like that was child's play for me, but there were quite a few shocked exclamations when I simply lifted the small boulder from the trolley, though I ignored them in favor of checking out my prize. Honestly, I was only half listening to what the emcee was saying since I was reading through the description of the fossil.

'Name: Intact Anorith Fossil

Type: Rock

Class: B

Description: A rare complete fossil of an Anorith. This particular piece is the result of a sudden underwater volcano eruption. The suddenness of the eruption along with the swiftly cooling lava is the reason for the completeness of the fossil along with its great condition. It contains preserved traces of Anorith DNA.'

I was certainly happy that this fossil belonged to the group of fossils I theorized stood a chance of being "revived"/resuscitated by Utopia. This was an extremely lucky development, and I honestly could not wait to place the fossil inside Utopia to see if it would work or not. Still, I could not help but wonder what the class/classification in the status sheet meant for fossils.

Was it related to the condition of the fossil or the Pokemon before it became a fossil? It was also possible that it was related to either the strength of the Pokemon before its fossilization or its potential. Maybe even both, or a combination of all points. Either way, I suspected that it would affect the potential of any Pokemon that got revived from a fossil, though I would need more than a single successful resurrection to confirm that theory.

I was also curious whether Utopia would be able to replicate the fossil. Since it was already at the B-Class there was no chance to further improve it, though I was also quite interested in knowing if that was possible with fossils of a lower class/quality. I could not help but wonder if a Pokemon restored from such a fossil would still have its potential raised by Utopia's optimization or not since it would practically mean that the Pokemon would have undergone two rounds of upgrades if that was the case. One as a fossil and one as a Pokemon.

Honestly, the subject was interesting enough that I considered working on the fossil restoration technology I knew I had inside my head since it would allow me to work with most of the available fossils instead of banking on a slight margin of them. Not to mention that I still did not know for sure if Utopia was capable of resurrecting even those. That would only be ascertained once I placed the Anorith fossil inside Utopia.

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