Solaceon wasn't like Hearthome. No lanterns, no smoke-filled streets. Just dirt roads lined with fences, fields rolling wide, and the smell of hay mixed with fresh earth. Farmers shouted to one another across paddocks, and the cries of Pokémon carried through the hills. It wasn't a city, not even a town in the way Oreburgh or Eterna had been. It felt older, simpler.
The Daycare stood in the center: a broad farmhouse, its fence posts worn smooth by years of use. Beyond it stretched grazing fields and pens where Pokémon moved in easy patterns. I felt the package heavy in my pack as I walked up the dirt path.
A woman met me at the door, apron dusty, hair tied back in a knot that had long since come loose. Her eyes swept me once, sharp as a drill, before softening at the sight of the cord-bound package.
"You've brought it," she said. Her voice was brisk but warm. She pulled the cords free with practiced fingers and checked the seal inside. Her nod was firm. "Good. Medicine for our stock. You've done well."
She slid a purse across the table—my pay. The coins clinked, heavier than what I'd had yesterday but still light compared to what my team needed. I tucked it into my pack, feeling both relief and disappointment.
Before I left, she gestured for me to follow her through the back door into the paddocks. The fields stretched wide, dotted with Pokémon. A cluster of Mareep grazed lazily near the fence, their wool thick and golden. A small flock of Pidgey pecked in the dirt for scattered feed. In the far corner, an old Rapidash stood with its head bowed, flames on its mane dim but steady, as if it carried the years in silence.
"This is what the Daycare is for," the woman said simply. "Not for your kind. Trainers train their own partners. Always have, always will. We look after the little ones, the old ones, or the ones who don't fight at all. Families leave them here when they can't keep up."
Her eyes turned to me, sharp again. "Yours wouldn't belong here. They're not pets. They're fighters. They're yours."
I swallowed, looking out at the pens. A pair of hatchling Eevee tumbled over each other in the grass, rolling until the caretaker's whistle pulled them apart. A Machop watched from another field, but its arms hung loose, too young even for sparring.
On my belt, my Poké Balls shook faintly. Tyrunt restless, Luxio sparking, Grotle steady but awake, Honedge a sharp weight in my shadow. I laid my hand across them in turn. She was right. They didn't belong here. They belonged with me, on the road, where every step forward was ours to claim or fail.
The woman nodded once, as if she'd read my thoughts. "Then keep walking, boy. Your path isn't in these fields."
I left Solaceon by dusk. The purse at my hip clinked with coin, but it wasn't enough. The badge in my pocket pressed like a promise. My team waited on my belt, heavy, eager.
The road north stretched long and dusty, toward Veilstone. Toward Maylene. Toward the next trial that was ours alone to face.