[Gastly]
[Type: Ghost + Poison]
[Gender: Male]
[Potential: 46.20%]
[Level: 6.80%]
[Ability: ...]
Potential was up by 2.2, but level had dropped by 0.1.
Great. Not only had its level stopped going up, it had actually started going down again.
"Gastly, spit that stuff back out. I want to take a look."
After logging the third set of data, Reiji wanted to check the purity of the stones.
The four items now looked like this…
[Dusk Stone: A strange stone that allows certain Pokémon to evolve (Purity 38.12%)]
[Spell Tag: A held item that boosts the power of Ghost-type moves (Boost: 19%) (Grade: 39.23%)]
[Ghost Gem: A small gem packed with pure Ghost-type energy; it exerts an irresistible allure on Ghost-type Pokémon (Purity 39.32%)]
The Dusk Stone had dropped by two percent, and the Spell Tag by one.
The first Ghost Gem had turned completely gray; its purity was now zero.
The second Ghost Gem still had thirty-nine percent remaining—down fifteen points.
From these three sets of readings, Reiji confirmed two hypotheses.
First, when potential broke into the advanced tier, the numbers went weird. That was probably the "advanced" threshold messing with the data.
Second, the latter two sets didn't show any anomalies. Looking at total energy consumption, he could roughly estimate how much it cost Gastly to raise its potential, and what the conversion efficiency looked like.
In other words: the Dusk Stone lost two percent, the Spell Tag lost one, and the Ghost Gems lost twelve and fifteen, respectively.
It wasn't that Gastly wasn't pulling any more energy. It was that there was a hard cap on how much energy it could absorb per evolution. With the second and third trials giving nearly identical numbers, he could be confident about that conclusion.
As for the first anomaly, that was probably because Gastly had "felt" the threshold—or because it got too excited and lost control—which led to the outlier data.
Without that odd spike, crossing into advanced might have taken two or three evolution cycles.
He then had Gastly run two more trials, which confirmed what he'd guessed and gave him one more result.
As Gastly's potential rose, the amount of energy drawn from the Dusk Stone and Ghost Gems steadily increased, while the gain in potential shrank, and its level not only stopped rising, it actively dropped.
The second Ghost Gem's thirty-nine percent purity only lasted for two more attempts before going gray, dropping to zero.
Next, he had Gastly spit out all the Ghost-type items and moved on to the Psychic-type set.
As expected, the Psychic-type items were being drained harder too, and Gastly's Psychic-type move proficiencies went up in turn.
At this rate, trying to brute-force Gastly all the way to Mega evolution with pure energy would take a ridiculous amount of resources. Just pushing its potential up to quasi-Elite Four had already cost ten gems.
The Dusk Stone was down to thirty percent purity, the Spell Tag to thirty-five, and the Twisted Spoon to thirty-four.
As for Poison-type items, he hadn't let Gastly touch those yet. He was worried it would get drunk and mess up the rest of the data collection.
The day's research wasn't over. After Gastly's morning evolution tests, its panel now looked like this…
[Gastly]
[Type: Ghost + Poison]
[Gender: Male]
[Potential: 59.97%]
[Level: 5.40%]
[Ability: ...]
Seeing that number, Reiji was suddenly reminded of picking through trash on that deserted island, and the way "point nine nine" had haunted him. It had become a nightmare lodged in his heart. Even a blessing from a Legendary Pokémon hadn't pushed him past that .99 wall, and he had no idea how much energy it would take to break it.
This time, though, he had unlimited chances to try—just like that advanced-tier threshold just now. If the Elite Four threshold wouldn't break in one go, he'd try twice, three times, four times…
He planned to use Poison-type energy for this next step, letting Gastly run several more evolution cycles. He refused to believe that gate couldn't be smashed.
And if Gastly passed out from Poison energy, that was fine too. It could take a good long nap, blending and digesting all the random Ghost, Psychic, and Poison energy inside its body.
The only reason he hadn't stacked them all together earlier was fear of an energy clash. That was why he'd tested Ghost-type first, then Psychic-type, saving Poison-type for the final push over the Elite Four threshold.
Once Gastly had spat out every Ghost- and Psychic-related item, Reiji finally took out the Poison-type tools and had Gastly eat them all. Whether it broke through the Elite Four gate or not would depend on whether Poison energy could carry its weight.
A Toxic Orb, some Black Sludge, three Poison Gems, and three kilograms of poison—Gastly swallowed all of it.
Especially those last three kilos of poison: right after gulping them down, and just before it blacked out, Gastly still remembered to evolve. Its body burst into evolution light.
The result was that Haunter fell asleep mid-evolution. Reiji hadn't expected that. And he didn't dare poke at it either; it had just ingested that much toxic junk. What if he got poisoned?
He recalled Haunter into its Poké Ball instead and opened its panel there. Gastly—now Haunter—had successfully stepped into Elite Four-class potential. The only question was whether that Elite-Four level potential would hold after it devolved again.
With Haunter out cold, he had no way to check. All he could do was store the ball and wait for it to wake up.
And this was only the Elite Four threshold. Beyond that lay the Champion threshold, then the Champion ceiling, and only then Mega evolution.
That was just how it was. Forcing a Mega evolution without a Mega Stone meant doing it the hard way—ramming Gastly's internal energy up to the absolute limit, breaking the Mega barrier with sheer volume, and using that massive energy to strong-arm it into Mega evolving.
After that, Reiji tidied up the trash and empty gift boxes on the floor, then left the storage room with the junk in hand, still wondering when Haunter was going to wake up.
Until it woke up, life went on as usual. He still went down to town to buy a week's worth of fresh ingredients, then came back to the villa to train with his Pokémon while he waited for Haunter to wake.
If Haunter woke up, the evolution research would continue. He'd said he wanted to see Gastly's limit; there was no way he'd quit halfway.
For the Champion threshold, he still had one Dusk Stone at thirty percent purity, seven Ghost Gems, plus the Spell Tag at thirty-five. Even if the Spell Tag didn't have a huge effect, all of that would be the last pile of energy for the final charge.
Man… if he'd known earlier, he would have asked for one more Dusk Stone.
In terms of how efficiently Gastly absorbed these energies, Pokéblocks were definitely fastest, Ghost Gems second, Dusk Stone third, and held items last.
Even if he ran out of Dusk Stones, there was no need to panic. When the time came, he could just go track down that greasy fatty and trade for more stock.
After that, his life slipped back into the villa routine—morning jogs at dawn, then spending the whole day at the villa training his Pokémon.
…
Day nine of the journey north. Gastly still hadn't woken up. Life went on as usual.
Day ten of the journey north. Gastly still hadn't woken up. Life went on as usual.
Day eleven of the journey north. Gastly still hadn't woken up. Life went on as usual.
Day twelve of the journey north. Gastly still hadn't woken up. Life went on as usual.
Day thirteen of the journey north. Gastly still hadn't woken up. Life went on as usual…
(End of chapter)
[100 Power Stones = Extra Chapter]
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