10 Training Camp Begins!

"What did you want to talk to me about?" she asked while eating.

"I want to gather experience in battling and was hoping for someone I could fight. You are the only person that came to my mind," said Alan.

"Is it because you noticed how the levels increase with battling?" she asked as if she understood what he meant, and to that, Alan nodded his head.

"Then I would say it is wrong. Your level doesn't increase with normal battling; you need to experience battles that are more than just 'friendly fights.' If it were possible to raise levels with friendly battles, people would just be fighting each other at home and never go out on a journey," she explained and smiled when she saw Alan understood what she was trying to say.

He leaned back on his chair as he thought while placing a hand on his chin, 'true, if it was possible to raise levels with just a friendly battle, everyone could do it. So that means only when a pokemon goes through 'serious' battles would they grow stronger.'

'Then that means if I want Eve to grow stronger, we need to go out in the wild but are we strong enough for it?'

"You know, levels are not the only thing that contributes to power," seeing him deep in thought, Cynthia could understand what he thought as she too went through the same ideas when she found out about this, "your pokemon's level was lower than you opponents yet you defeated him, right?"

"But I was just lucky," said Alan as he shook his head. He believed that luck played some part in his win.

"That is how you think, but in my opinion, it was not luck. Was it luck that you lead Daniel into a rhythm of Tackle and dodge, or was it luck that you calculated the distance of your opponent's moves or was it luck when you used Sand Attack to understand Confusion?" with a sly smile as if she knew everything, she spoke, her words confident.

"You should train your moves; even a low-level pokemon can beat a higher level pokemon if its moves are well trained, and then there is strength and stamina training."

Cynthia spoke her thoughts to Alan; she did not know why but for some reason, she wanted to support Alan and help him if she could.

Then there was also his face, even though Alan himself ignored it, he was a handsome kid with sharp features, and it was tough to miss him when you were this close.

The duo remained silent after and finished their food before Cynthia stood up first, "it's almost time for my and Drake's training; I hope to fight you someday, in a real fight, not a friendly one."

She walked away carrying her dishes with her, and Gibble followed behind but not before eyeing Eve.

Alan could swear he saw sparks fly when they stared at each other.

'What is his potential, though?' curious of Gibble's potential, he silently activated his eyes and immediately turned them off, but his face was shocked by what he had just seen.

'How is this possible?'

It did not make sense to him; he could not have even imagined the potential of the Gibble even in his dreams.

[Tsk, he always tried to pick a fight, maybe I should thrash him someday.]

Eve's voice returned Alan from his daze, but his face was void of any expression, "you want to beat him?"

[Yes.]

"Then we will have to work hard, really, really hard."

[What do you mean.]

Alan did not reply but went back to eating his food, while only one word rang in his mind.

'Violet.'

****************

It had been two days since Alan had arrived in Kanto and had his first battle. Since then, he had made a schedule that he was sticking to.

From strength and stamina training with Eve to practicing moves to increase their mastery had been what he had done.

The result had brought a lot of satisfaction to Alan as now Eve could at least use Protect and Shadow ball. At first, Eve could not even create a shield, and even if she made a shield while using Protect, it was a very weak one, but now she could gather the energy from a shield with some substance, but there were still a lot of improvements to be made.

Same for Shadow Ball, it was a strong Ghost-type move, and it took everything out of her to charge and release it, and even then, the Shadow Ball was small and weak.

Today was the day the training camp started; was it because he was excited about it? Alan today woke up pretty early and was the first to reach the training grounds.

He still did not know what they would do in this one month, but from the words 'training camp', he guessed it was some hardcore training given directly by Prof. Oak or someone strong.

Eve being too lazy to wake up early, decided to stay in her Pokeball, which was now hanging on a necklace around his neck.

It took about an hour before people started coming to the training ground they were supposed to gather at.

Over the last two days, Alan had almost heard of everyone attending the camp, and he had to say they were all big shots in a way or two.

Children of Champions, famous professors, or very influential clans. Only Alan was the odd one out with not so strong background.

He even found out why everyone was looking at him weirdly when he talked to Cynthia.

One of the strongest Aura users seen in the history of Lore, or that is what she will be in future due to her high talents in Aura. The granddaughter of Prof. Caroline, who is a Dragon-type expert and a Champion of her time like Prof. Oak.

Cynthia was like a quiet kid who never spoke to anyone, but then started talking to someone random no one knew about and that 'someone' was Alan.

He also saw two more light Violet pokemons, a Pichu and Squirtle. Their trainers were Ash Ketchum and Gary Oak, sons of Red Ketchum and Blue Oak, the two champions of Kanto and debatably the strongest ones in the current generation.

'Every single one of them is going to be a strong trainer once they grow up; it almost feels unfair to attend this camp.'

As time went by, the training ground was filled with kids, and as it hit 9 am, a loud sound was heard on the horizon. Everyone turned to look at what it was, and there they saw a giant Charizard charging towards them, and before everyone could react, it was already up above them.

What was even more surprising was the person riding on top of it. The Charizard gently landed on the land, and its features became visible to everyone.

'That scar...'

On the face of the Charizard was a scar that ran along with its right eyes, and from the looks of it, it was from a claw attack.

'Just what the hell could injure this beast?' thought Alan as he was impressed by the power the pokemon in front of him was radiating.

The pressure of the pokemon was almost unbearable, and the air felt suffocating. He and everyone present in the campground felt that pressure and suffocation.

"Alright, stop scaring them and go back to your nest," the person on its back said before jumping down.

The Charizard looked at everyone and gave a slight mocking smirk before flying away.

"Well, sorry about that, my partner has a few attitude issues," spoke the old man.

He wore brown pants, a red shirt and a white lab coat, one look, and you could recognize who he was.

The world-renowned Professor Oak.

No one spoke but listened to him; his presence made the kids not talk about a word.

"I welcome all of you to my training camp where you will learn about pokemon and get to play with them as well. At the end of this training camp, we will have a small friendly pokemon tournament, the top three will be given great rewards," he explained the curriculum of the entire training camp in a single breathe, and throughout the whole time, a smile never left his face.

"Now then, the ranch is open, and everyone is allowed to have fun; the Pokemon training rooms will also be available to every one of you. The main motive of this camp is to explore yourselves and grow stronger. We will create some simple tasks, and if you complete them, you can use the credits earned for different things, like TMs, Weapons for personal use, Weapon skills and the like."

"Our main goal here is to prepare you and your pokemon for the final tournament that will be held in a month. You can choose to ignore the tasks and have fun; the decision will be yours."

"Any questions?"

As he finished what he wanted to say, he asked if anyone had any doubts, and a few raised their hands.

"What is your question, Ash?"

"What type does your Charizard have?"

Silence.

Everyone looked at the boy with brown hair and a red cap as if he was the dumbest thing known to humankind. Even Prof. Oak looked at him with a weird face, but he shook his head and gave the answer.

"It's a Fire and Flying-type."

"So cool; I will catch one for myself too."

Then Prof. Oak looked at another kid who had a question.

"Are we supposed to pay for training rooms with credits or money?"

"Neither, they are on the house, and you can use them for free till the end of the month."

All of them just nodded their heads nonchalantly except Alan, who was too stunned to speak. A training room? And for free? And for a month?

He could not believe his ears.

Training rooms were specially designed to help pokemon master their moves as they had machines that could help train the pokemon better than training alone. However, to use them, one had to pay a lot of money, but now he could use them for free till the end of the month?

There was only one thought that came to his mind, 'I am going to abuse the heck out of it.'

It was an opportunity that might not come again, along with tasks that would earn him credits for rare things.

This was precisely what he was hoping for from a training camp.

"Now that I have said what I wanted to, I will declare that the Training Camp has officially begun; I hope you enjoy it and learn new things."

As soon as his words ended, he disappeared from where he stood, leaving behind an excited group of kids. Soon a dozen or so adults walked in, clearly the staff that would help them with specifics.

One of them walked to the front and spoke to the kids.

"My name is Zack, and I will oversee this camp; the ones behind me are the staff that will be available in case you need help. You will no longer be staying in dorms but rather in that forest," he said while pointing at a forest some distance away, "you don't need to worry, you will not find a pokemon higher than level 10, and even those would be if you go deep inside the forest."

"Make sure you don't cross the boundary we have made, further that would be really dangerous. The people behind me will set up stalls in few minutes, the credits you earn, you can use those to buy different things from them. Any questions?"

No asked anything, except Alan who raised his hand right away.

"How do I use the training rooms?"

"You can visit stall number 14, the person there will guide you to the training rooms. Anymore questions?"

"Will you be selling pokemons for credits or their eggs?"

"No pokemon would be sold, only the things that could help your current pokemon would be sold here through credits."

"Are there things we can buy with money instead of credits?"

"You can buy the Training Enhancements for you and your pokemon with money at cheaper than regular price but if you use credits it would be even more cheaper."

As no one asked anymore questions after that, the man bid them farewell and all the kids dispersed, doing what they wanted to with most going to the ranch to look at the pokemon raised by Prof. Oak.

Alan walked to stall number 14 when he heard a small ring in his pocket.

[Pokegram Notification:

Cynthia: Are you not going to the ranch?

Alan: Nope, I need to train Eve and myself. A training room outside the camp would be expensive and specially one at the level Oak Laboratories have.

Cynthia: Fair enough. I will see you at lunch?

Alan: Text me first.

Cynthia: Okay! See you later.]

While he texted Cynthia, he had reached the stall #14 where a man in a white coat sat with an Alakazam standing beside him.

"I would like to use the training room," said Alan, straight to the point.

The man typed in some number in his computer before he gave a nod to his pokemon.

"Enter the room number 1, you can use it however long as you may wish."

As soon as his words ended Alan disappeared from the place and soon reappeared in a hallway with numerous metal doors on each side and numbers written on top of them.

"So that is number 1," said Alan as he approached his designated room and stood in front of it.

The metal doors opened and a the training room appeared in front of Alan's eyes.

'This will be a tough one month.'