Caster pedaled his bike with the wind rushing past his ears, in a perfectly relaxed mood.
Sure, he'd just made it through a rough situation, but he'd come out the other side with a Pokémon egg full of potential. By any measure, he'd gotten the better end of the deal.
His Rotom Phone floated ahead of him, guiding the way toward Fuchsia Gym.
"Rotom Phone, start the stream!"
He wanted to warm up the audience before reaching the gym.
"You got it! Poké-Live stream is now active. Take it away!"
Rotom was sharp as ever. The second the stream went live, it swiveled the camera toward Caster and even threw in a soft, easygoing background track to set the mood.
"Wait, OldFish is streaming again? His schedule has been all over the place lately!"
"Let's go, boys!"
"You've got some nerve showing your face, FishBoy. You caught a Dratini and you're still walking around? Some people have all the luck!"
"FishDaddy! What about trading for that Dratini? I'm serious, I cleaned up my act and everything!"
"FishKid, don't say we didn't warn you. Dratini are rare Pokémon. Watch your back for hunters. If they come for you, losing the Dratini will be the least of your problems."
With his follower count now past a million, even a small fraction with notifications on meant hundreds of thousands of viewers. The moment the stream opened, the chat went absolutely wild, comments flying by in a nonstop flood.
"Heading to challenge Fuchsia Gym today, so I figured I'd go live early."
"Trade the Dratini? Not a chance. Every one of my Pokémon is my partner, and no amount of 'cleaning yourself up' is going to change that. Oh, you want to throw money at it? Still no."
Caster picked out a few comments to respond to and let his audience know what today's stream was all about: the Fuchsia Gym challenge.
"Fuchsia Gym? Isn't the Gym Leader there Koga?"
"Yeah! Koga runs Poison-types, and her moves are a nightmare. One slip and you're poisoned and stuck dealing with a status condition. This gym is no joke!"
"If you're lucky, maybe you'll run into Lady Aya. That red outfit of hers, I just love it."
"Lady Aya, my queen! Last time her Venonat beat me, she stepped on my face and told me I was worthless. Uwaaah, I want Lady Aya to do it again!"
"Someone get that weirdo out of the chat!"
Things started out normal enough, with people talking about Fuchsia Gym in a perfectly reasonable way. But once the conversation shifted to Koga's sister, the female ninja Aya, the chat went completely sideways. Someone even dropped a photo of her.
Green hair, a pink outfit, a striking face, and eyes that looked down on everyone like they weren't worth her time. She clearly had a devoted following among a very particular crowd.
"Aya, huh?"
Caster raised an eyebrow. He remembered the character from the anime but wasn't especially impressed.
Chatting with his audience while he rode, Caster soon pulled up in front of a large complex of old, imposing buildings.
Ancient. Serious. Unmistakably formidable.
This was Fuchsia Gym.
"Heads up, streamer! Fuchsia Gym is loaded with traps. One wrong step and it's over."
"Don't tip him off. Let FishBoy find out the hard way!"
"Agreed! Agreed!"
"Stop loitering at the entrance and get in there!"
"Streamer, who are you sending out first? Dratini? We want to see Dratini!"
Before long, the chat had made up its mind: they were going to sit back and watch Caster get destroyed. To help that along, they flooded the comments with bad advice and misdirection, hoping to throw him off.
What they didn't know was that Rotom Phone was a living, thinking creature, and it had been reading the chat on Caster's behalf the entire time, flagging anything important. Their little scheme had been figured out well before it could do any damage.
Even so, Caster played dumb. He locked up his bike and strolled inside with Pikachu at his side, keeping the stream going and chatting with his audience like everything was completely normal.
"Since everyone wants to see Dratini, I'm happy to make that happen. Dratini gets the first slot!"
He walked into Fuchsia Gym with a big, easygoing smile on his face.
Dratini had taken a hit during the fight with Chou-Ei, but nothing serious. A few sprays of Potion had it mostly recovered, and the boost from the Energy Orb had done the rest. It was fully ready to battle.
The chat buzzed with excitement.
Through the outer courtyard and into the main building, Caster's footsteps landed on the wooden floor.
Almost immediately, a round, fuzzy Pokémon appeared in front of him. Purple all over, with claw-like mouthparts, large red compound eyes, two white antennae, and grayish-brown hands and feet.
Venonat, the Bug and Poison type.
"Veno..."
It let out a quiet cry, then turned and trotted deeper into the gym on its small feet.
The chat lit up right away.
"Streamer, follow that Venonat! It's the gym's guide Pokémon!"
"Exactly! You have to keep up. If you lose it, you won't get to face the Gym Trainers. That's part of the evaluation!"
Caster already knew this. Even so, he quietly bent down and murmured, "Pikachu, see if you can pick up any electrical currents nearby."
"Pika?"
Pikachu tilted its head, confused at first. Then its ears twitched, and its expression shifted.
Pikachu's ability was Lightning Rod, which let it absorb and redirect electrical energy, making it incredibly sensitive to even the faintest trace of current in the area.
And right beneath the floorboards ahead, it was picking up a powerful surge, coiled and ready to discharge.
No question about it: an Electric-type Pokémon was hiding underneath.
"Pika! Pika!"
Pikachu tugged urgently at Caster's attention, pointing out the suspicious floorboards one by one.
"Nice work, buddy."
Caster grinned and stepped around every single one of them without breaking his stride.
The chat groaned in unison.
"Ugh. With FishBoy's track record, he was basically guaranteed to step on a trap and get fried by an Electrode. But we forgot one thing: Pikachu's Lightning Rod makes it a walking electrical detector. What a waste!"
"Whatever, that part's done. But there's plenty more ahead, and there's no way FishBoy makes it through all of it clean. Stay tuned for the screaming, everyone!"
While the chat vented, nobody noticed a pair of eyes watching Caster quietly from the shadows.
Through the first room, Venonat led Caster into what looked like a corridor.
"Veno..."
Then it suddenly bolted, covering ground in quick hops until it was completely out of sight.
"Streamer, hurry up! Keep up with Venonat or you'll miss your window!"
The chat erupted, pushing him to run.
Just a short distance ahead, a clear glass wall was waiting for an unsuspecting victim.
Walk into it without noticing, and you were in for a very unpleasant headache.
"No rush. Something tells me that Venonat is pretty patient. It's probably waiting up ahead rather than just ditching me."
Caster laughed and kept moving at his own pace. The chat was screaming at him to speed up, so naturally he slowed down, walking with one hand trailing along the wall.
A moment later, his fingers touched something solid and invisible.
"Oh, look at that. There's a wall right here. You'd walk face-first into that and not even see it coming. Heads up for anyone planning to challenge Fuchsia Gym in the future."
He delivered the warning with the most wholesome expression he could manage, and the chat absolutely lost it.
But since he was already on guard, every trap that followed, the shifting wall panels, the trick window shutters, the shuriken traps, was spotted and avoided without a second thought, leaving his audience more miserable with each one.
Watching him sidestep everything without a scratch somehow felt worse than watching him get hit.
Then a laugh rang out from somewhere in the darkness.
A pink silhouette stepped forward from the shadows, cool and composed.
"Born in darkness, living in darkness. That is the destiny of a ninja."
"Ninja Aya, stepping in."