After the meeting was over, Axel wanted to find a quiet place to relax, but was not so lucky.
"Hey, Axel!!! When did you come?", came a voice.
He turned around and saw that it was A and B coming towards him.
"Oh, just an hour ago. How are you guys?"
"We are doing okay, but you forgot us completely. You didn't even give us a call.", said A.
"Oh, come on. I was busy, and you didn't call me either. What are you guys doing nowadays?"
"Oh, we are helping the family. A is now an instructor at the school, and I am responsible for taking outside missions. But mom and dad are never proud of us.", sighed B.
"But why?"
"It is all because of K. He went on challenging gyms, and became more powerful than both of us. Mom always scolds us, giving K as an example."
"Haha, then you should start working hard. By the way, I invited K to join my mercenary team. If K joins my team, he might surpass you even more."
"Really? Damn!!! What are we going to do now? Can we join your team too?"
"Of course, do you even have to ask?"
"Ok, I am ready to join your team."
"Me too."
Axel could not believe that he had managed to get two friends to join his team so quickly. He didn't know how good they had become, but he welcomed them because he trusted them.
Axel had a lot of things on his plate. First of all, he would have to start concentrating on his young Pokemon. He felt bad that they were not getting his attention. He was also planning on challenging the Johto gyms for experience.
Then there was this new war. He was chosen as the leader of the Venu family. So, he had to select the team, train them, and make them ready for the war, which could start at any time.
Finally, he had to think about the tide battle. Axel had not forgotten about it, and could not delay it either.
Thinking about the tide battle, Axel remembered that the system rewarded him with a Daycare tab and a mercenary tab. He had looked at the Daycare Tab but not the Mercenary Tab.
"System, open Mercenary tab."
---
Name: Fairy Tail
Total members: 120344
Teams:
1. Thunder team
2. The Sun team
3. Grass team
4. Poison team
5. Flying team
6. Teleportation Team
7. The Protect Team
8. Dream Team
Loyalty: 70/100
Security: 40/100
Offence: 20/100
Overall power: D++
Rank: 239
Skills: None
---
The tab looked simple and easy to understand. Axel could press on each of the team members, and it would further expand on how the team was performing, how efficient they were, and provide details about each member of the mercenary team.
"This is actually cool. With this, I don't need constant reports from Ashmita."
He also noticed that the loyalty score was 70/100, which he believed was quite good, considering they were just starting out now. But the security was only 40/100.
"What does this security mean?"
He clicked on it, and it showed the brief description of the security.
"Hmm, so it means how good we are at protecting ourselves from outside forces."
But the offence was rated as 20/100, which was extremely low. But he could understand. The team had only trained on how to defend a city, not on how to attack it.
The overall power was rated as D++, and the rank was 239.
What does this rank mean?
He tried clicking on it, but there was no description.
'Did it mean that there are 238 organizations that are better than Fairy Tail? But how is that possible?', thought Axel.
The number of mercenary teams was relatively small. Even if he counted massive organizations like the league, the expedition team, and other famous organizations, the number should not be that high.
But what he was most interested in was the skill section of the Mercenary tab. Currently, there is no skill, but the section suggests that one could be introduced.
Now, what kind of skill would a mercenary team have?
"System, how can I acquire new skills?"
Surprisingly, the system responded.
---
Ding!
Skills can be acquired in two ways. First, the host will have to develop the skill personally. Another way to obtain it is to improve your overall power. When your power reaches rank C, you will gain a random skill. You will receive another one when it reaches rank B, then rank A, rank S, rank SS, rank SSS, and rank X. In total, you can get seven skills this way.
---
"But what kind of skill would I get?"
This time, the system didn't respond.
"Yeah, I was expecting the silent treatment."
Axel didn't think of developing the skill himself because he didn't know what kind of skill a mercenary team would have. He decided to monitor the growth of his team through this tab and improve their development.
As he was planning his next move, he saw a young man running towards him. The man looked nervous and frightened.
"Hey.. Hey.. Stop. What is happening? Why are you so scared?"
"I… I have to talk to an elder. It is an emergency."
"What happened? I am also an elder. I am just not wearing the badge."
Each elder had a badge that symbolized who they were, but since Axel had come here in a hurry, he didn't have the time to put on the badge.
The young man finally looked at him and recognized him. He was so frightened that he didn't even recognize Axel Blaze.
"Sir, the forest is behaving unusually."
"Unusually?"
"Yes, we usually don't cross the safe line. My team and I were just near the safety line, training. Then, a black smoke started to come out of nowhere. There are no ghost-type or dark-type Pokemon around us. Suddenly, it looked as if reality was trying to break down. It was bizarre.
All of us started to run back, and I found you."
The forest has been a mystery for the Venu family. Once, Axel and his team had ventured inside the forest, but the result was bad. Many of them lost their lives, and the forest started to get more dangerous with each line crossed. So, they decided to leave the forest alone for now till they were stronger.
"I will go to the forest to see what is happening. In the meantime, tell the elders to send help."
Axel could feel that it was an emergency as he ran towards the forest. He slightly cursed himself for not bringing his main team with him. They were actually in the Fairy Tail Headquarters, and he had thought to only bring young Pokemon so that he could train them here.
"Well, how bad could it be?", said Axel to himself as he reached towards the edge of the forest. Axel could see that there were people gathering inside the forest, and a crowd was starting to form.
He rushed in the direction that the young man had pointed out. As he got closer, he felt necessary to call out Togekiss, Primeape, and Feraligatr for his protection
Togekiss flew, but since the forest was so dense, it didn't have the flexibility to fly high. Suddenly, he saw a black smoke coming towards him. The smoke was very different. It was not the smoke from the fire but some other gas.
"Togekiss, don't touch it. It might be harmful.", shouted Axel.
As Togekiss was near the smoke, Axel instructed it to stay away from it, but by that time, Togekiss had already come into contact with it.
The surprising thing was that Togekiss was not affected by it. It felt like a normal smoke.
Axel knew that Togekiss could tell if there was any danger due to its passive move 'Feelings'. So, he trusted it and went inside.
The smoke became thicker, and Axel could no longer see anything inside it. He could only move by using his aura sense to the maximum limit.
With his aura sense, Axel could feel that something was sucking all the air and releasing this gas and that something was just 50 meters ahead. He became ready. He told his Pokemon to be prepared.
"Maybe it is some interesting Pokemon. I will catch it if it lives up to my expectations.", said Axel to himself.
Other than that, there was nothing he could think of.
But as he got closer, suddenly Axel felt that some sort of rope had bound him on his chest and he could not take it out.
"What the hell is this? AHHH"
Axel tried his best to get out of this rope thing, but he could not. He was eventually sucked inside a hole, and everything went blank.
###
After an unknown amount of time, Axel opened his eyes. He felt very sleepy and tired, as if all the energy had been sucked out of his body. Then he looked around and saw an unfamiliar place.
It was very dark out here with only a hint of light from far away. It took him some seconds to get his bearings right. He looked around and found out that all of his Pokemon were next to him, and all of them were unconscious.
Even the Pokemon caught with the master ball were outside. Axel didn't know what was happening and where he was. But he calmed down quickly and thought of his next plan of action.
"Calm down Axel. You are in some sort of a dark cave and your Pokemon are all around you. First, you need to know where you are, and then you must secure a food and water source. The cave will do the job for a temporary house.",
Axel took deep breaths and calmed himself.
He decided to see what was outside the cave. First, he checked his Pokemon and found out that they were okay. They had just fainted like him. After that, Axel stood up and started to move slowly out of the cave.
The ground was uneven with many rocks, pebbles, and other things. Axel could not see properly cause it was very dark. He slowly began to move, his hands touching the wall of the cave. After walking for 5-10 minutes, Axel finally reached the light.
He ran towards the light and emerged from the cave.
He took a deep breath and looked. He was surprised by what he saw. Before, he didn't notice because there was no light in the cave, but now, the world around him looked different. Very different.
It didn't look real at all. The forest, the grass field, everything looked too clean and distinct as if it were animated. Everything looked beautiful. Axel also noticed that the air was fuller, as if it were void of any pollution.
Axel felt that his energy was refilling at an exceptional rate.
"I feel as if the energy here is concentrated. The quality is higher."
He looked around and realized that he was inside a forest.
"What is this place? Where have I come?"
---
A/N: There are more than 60+ advanced chapters in pa-treon along with two new side stories of the novel. If you are interested in reading more and getting ahead in the story, subscribe to my pa-treon channel.
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