In a Black World — after catching Articuno, Ash and the others bid farewell to Todd.
Before leaving, Todd also sent a photo to Ash.
It was of a heroic bird.
Though bearing some injuries, its handsome figure was undeniable!
Undoubtedly, this was his Pidgeot.
Ash hadn't expected his Pidgeot to look so impressive in a photo!
He wasn't boasting—he felt there probably wasn't another Pidgeot in the world as handsome as his!
After carefully preserving the photo, the group continued toward Ecruteak City.
Along the way, Ash and the others came across a sumo wrestling competition.
The prize was a year's supply of regular Pokémon food, plus a rare item—a King's Rock!
The King's Rock had many uses; it could be held as an item or used to make certain Pokémon evolve.
For example, Misty's Poliwhirl and any Slowpoke could use a King's Rock to evolve.
So Ash was quite interested in this sumo wrestling competition.
He traded Pignite for Snorlax and signed up.
Thanks to proper training, Snorlax would wake up on its own when a battle was needed, so Ash used Snorlax to defeat opponents all the way to the finals.
In the finals, Snorlax faced a powerful Croconaw!
The opponent's strength was not to be underestimated at all!
But Snorlax had more than just strength. Its most powerful trait was its astonishing flexibility despite its enormous mass!
Thus, even though the opponent's Croconaw was immensely strong, when it met a Snorlax equally strong yet supremely agile, it was ultimately defeated!
In this way, Ash obtained the King's Rock and the year's supply of Pokémon food.
Ah… the latter reward could practically be crossed out, because Snorlax ate the entire year's supply on the spot, so the reward Ash actually received was just the King's Rock.
This made Ash want to ask the organizers: was your "year's supply" calculated based on a Togepi's appetite?!
For Snorlax to finish it in under thirty minutes, this "year's supply" was truly questionable.
After getting the King's Rock, Ash asked Misty if she wanted her Poliwhirl to evolve into Poliwrath or Politoed.
As for Politoed… it was cute, and its Abilities weren't inferior to Poliwrath's. Poliwrath was more handsome.
Not counting Hidden Abilities, the two were actually similar, except one focused on ranged attacks, the other on melee combat.
Misty thought for a while and finally chose to let Poliwhirl evolve into Politoed!
It wasn't that she thought Politoed was cuter—the main thing was… Ash said that if Misty needed it, he'd give her the King's Rock. So, Misty wanted to use the King's Rock given by Ash to evolve her Poliwhirl!
Deep down, she simply regarded this item as a token of affection from Ash!
Without further ado, after receiving the King's Rock, Misty traded it from Ash for the evolution.
Thanks to years of training during their journey, Poliwhirl had almost fully developed the power of its first stage, so evolving directly was fine.
After a simple trade, Misty's Poliwhirl successfully evolved into Politoed!
After evolving, Politoed also possessed genuine Gym Leader–level strength. This "Gym Leader level" didn't refer to some mediocre Gym just making up numbers, but the actual mainstay strength of top-tier Gym Leaders!
Though those Leaders weren't quite Elite Four level, their strength surpassed over 80% of the people in the world!
Hence, their title was used as a rank.
In other words, the current Politoed could be said to surpass the Pokémon owned by 80% of the world's Trainers!
If Misty went back to be a Gym Leader now… there was no doubt the Cerulean Gym would jump from the weakest, most pathetic Gym in Kanto to one of Kanto's top Gyms!
But Misty had no intention of going back yet—she wanted to stay with Ash forever!
After evolving Politoed, Ash and his friends continued on their way.
Later, as they traveled, they encountered a Rhyhorn that could ride waves!
Now, Rhyhorn was a Ground- and Rock-type Pokémon, so it should, in theory, be very afraid of water!
However, the Rhyhorn they met showed no fear of water at all!
It had even learned to surf!
Naturally, Ash wouldn't miss this opportunity!
He immediately challenged the Rhyhorn to a battle.
The Pokémon he sent was, of course, Croconaw.
After a fight, Croconaw finally defeated the Rhyhorn.
Although the opponent wasn't afraid of ordinary water, Water-type moves were still quite effective—though their power might have dropped from 4× to 3× or even 2×… but this was enough to show how special this Rhyhorn was!
If he could raise it… it could likely become part of his main team!
Immediately after, Ash and the others helped a person named Eri blast through a tunnel and successfully reached the next city.
After catching the Rhyhorn, Ash temporarily sent it to the Oak Ranch.
He would often rotate it with the Pokémon at the ranch for training, but most of his focus was still on cultivating his newly caught Pokémon.
Thus, time passed quietly, and half a month went by. During this half-month, the footage was mostly summarized with text and images, but it was enough for everyone to understand the progress Ash and the others had made in over ten days.
First, Sabrina finally caught a new Pokémon—an Eevee!
Actually, Sabrina already had a male Eevee in her party, and she wanted to raise that Eevee into an Espeon!
Who said psychics could only catch Psychic-type Pokémon?
Wouldn't it be nice to train an Umbreon, which could not only fill a defensive role in the team but also be used against Ghost- and Psychic-types?
It was worth mentioning that the newly caught Eevee was also female, and Sabrina's male Eevee was also female… but Sabrina still caught it with a Love Ball, not for any particular reason, mainly because it was cute~
With this, Sabrina successfully had six Pokémon, and the strength of Misty's team had also improved to varying degrees.
The biggest improvement was Brock's.
His Graveler successfully evolved into Golem, Golbat evolved into Crobat, and Onix had now tempered its body to the point of perfection through repeated training.
It only needed a Metal Coat to evolve perfectly into a Steelix!
Pineco and Omanyte were both on the verge of evolution!
Therefore, over the past ten days, Brock had improved the most!
As for Ash… all three of his Johto starters had successfully evolved!
Bayleef, Quilava, and Croconaw—these were Ash's three new starters!
Among them, Quilava turned out to be the fastest to evolve, which surprised Ash.
After Quilava evolved, as if out of rivalry,
Bayleef and Croconaw evolved one after another!
As the saying goes, competition breeds motivation.
It was precisely because Quilava evolved first that it drove the不服输 (不服输) evolutions of Croconaw and Bayleef.
But don't get it wrong—these three Pokémon had basically evolved perfectly, not in a rushed manner. Even after fully developing the power of their first stage, they might not have evolved.
In the end, evolution still needed a trigger.
What triggered Quilava's evolution wasn't clear, but the trigger for Croconaw and Bayleef was undoubtedly stimulated by Quilava's evolution!
After such significant growth, the group finally arrived in Ecruteak City!
...
[Brock: Damn, is that me? Golem, Crobat, an Onix ready to evolve anytime, and Pineco and Omanyte about to evolve… Is this the result of someone's relentless training?]
If it weren't for the text summary just now,
Brock wouldn't have known he was already so formidable!
You know, even by the Silver Conference, the Geodude in his party was still a Geodude. His Onix was also far from the one in the footage. As for Pineco, it had evolved into Forretress, but… there was a gap of nearly three or four months between him and his counterpart in the footage!
In terms of overall strength, the him in the footage was clearly stronger!
This was what they called…
When someone around you is training relentlessly, won't you also involuntarily start training harder?
The him in the footage was undoubtedly led by Black Ash into the relentless grind together!
So, you never know how much potential you have until you push yourself!
[Misty: I don't even recognize myself anymore… If I hadn't watched the 'me' in the footage grow bit by bit, I wouldn't have believed that person was me.]
Besides Brock, Misty also lamented her own growth.
Strictly speaking, her starting point was almost the same as Black Ash's.
The her in the Black World and the her in the White World both started traveling with Ash not long after he began his journey.
Now, the other her had, in less than a year, already left her current self far behind.
If they waited until the timeline in the footage reached the Silver Conference… she was afraid she'd be even further behind!
Indeed, the results a person achieves when they work hard versus when they don't… are really very different!
...
In a Black World – After arriving in Ecruteak City, Ash and his party first went to the Pokémon Center to rest and learn about the Ecruteak Gym Leader, Morty. Using the Pokémon Center's convenience to gather information had become a habit for Ash.
Morty was a Gym Leader specializing in Ghost-types.
His ace Pokémon, Gengar, was very different from his gentle appearance—it was a fierce Pokémon!
After roughly understanding the opponent's strength, Ash considered the Pokémon in his party.
He felt… this battle probably wouldn't require calling back his old partners.
He should be able to win with the Pokémon currently with him!
However, the next day after resting, when Ash went to the Ecruteak Gym to challenge,
Morty said he couldn't accept challenges in his current state…
The reason was that Morty's Ampharos was sick. This childhood playmate being ill left Morty with no heart for Gym battles.
However, the Gym's trainee trainer had gone to the neighboring city, Cianwood City, to get medicine. Morty said he could accept challenges once Ampharos recovered.
For now,… he recommended that Ash and the others go to neighboring Cianwood City to challenge the Cianwood Gym instead.
They were quite close anyway.
Ash and the others readily agreed.
The next day, Ash's group arrived in Cianwood City by boat and went directly to find the Cianwood Gym Leader, Chuck.
Regarding Chuck's information, Ash had already collected it earlier and confirmed it on the way.
He specialized in Fighting-types, and his ace was Hariyama. More importantly… he was Gary's master!
Before Ash set off for the Silver Conference,
Gary had said that after challenging the Indigo Plateau Conference, he went to learn from the master of the Cianwood Gym, Chuck.
The result was also obvious.
The latter's Hitmonlee had shown amazing fighting skills back then, even having an intense battle with his Infernape. Though it lost in the end, that didn't negate Gary's progress.
So Ash had looked into Chuck and found he wasn't just the Cianwood Gym Leader but also carried the legacy of a line of martial artists. It seemed there were people like Chuck in Hoenn and far-off Galar who carried this fighter's legacy. In short… he was a Trainer who was very good at teaching!
Of course, being a good teacher was one thing. In an actual battle—
Ash didn't even need to use Infernape as his trump card; he only used Bayleef to defeat the opponent's Poliwrath and Machoke with a combination of softness and strength!
The next day, Sabrina also effortlessly defeated Chuck's team using Alakazam.
After all, the Psychic type was the nemesis of the Fighting type!
Regarding this, Chuck said—
"Are you really Gary's friends? You really don't give me any face at all!"
Ash could only smile and scratch his head. Reasonably… he really hadn't expected Gary's master to be this… not weak, but perhaps not at the level he'd assumed.
It seemed the other person was quite outstanding at teaching, but for his own strength… he still needed more training to improve!
After obtaining the Storm Badge from the Cianwood Gym, Chuck recommended that Ash and the others go have some fun at the nearby Whirl Islands.
Recently, the Whirl Islands were holding the triennial Whirl Cup.
The winner would not only receive the item—a Mystery Water—but also be granted the title "Hero of the Whirl"!
Ash wasn't interested in the latter title—in the end, it was just an empty name—but the former… he couldn't ignore it!
So Ash called Morty to inform him they'd return to challenge the Ecruteak Gym in a week or so.
However, Morty said that timing would be perfect!
Although Ampharos had started recovering with medicine, it would still take some time to fully heal—just enough time for Ash and the others to participate in the Whirl Cup.
The next day, Ash's group of four bid farewell to Chuck and set off for the Whirl Islands.
While on the boat, the Team Rocket trio, whom they hadn't seen in a while, appeared again!
Well… it wasn't that they hadn't seen them for a long time.
In fact, before going to Ecruteak City, these three had been causing trouble constantly with all sorts of strange robots and endless schemes.
However, Ash had thwarted them one by one.
With the power of Aura for detection, all their tricks and schemes seemed so clumsy.
Honestly… the Rocket trio deserved at least one-third of the credit for Quilava and the others' evolutions.
After all, with their experience packages, the Johto starters might not have evolved so quickly otherwise.
This time, Team Rocket continued their desperate attempt to capture Pikachu, but Ash didn't blast them off immediately. Instead, he waved at them.
"This is the sea, and there are whirlpools and turbulent currents around. If you get blasted off into the sea here… you might not make it out alive."
"So… let's take a break for now. Enjoy a rare luxury cruise, just like a vacation. Relax and unwind, okay?"
After speaking, Ash leaned on the boat's railing to admire the sea. The Rocket trio looked at each other.
Although they were used to being blasted off, it was really dangerous out on the sea!
Otherwise… maybe listen to the twerp and take a break on the boat?
As the three hesitated, a waiter brought over several fruit platters and food.
Tempted by the delicious food, the Rocket trio hesitated no longer. They sat cross-legged on the bow, with the sea breeze blowing, and started eating.
"The twerp's right, meow. You really need to relax properly, meow~"
"Mhm… it's been… munch… so long since I ate such good food!"
"Chomp chomp… Twerp… chomp… we won't bother you until we finish eating… chomp chomp..."
Ash and the other two watched the three Rockets devouring their food and couldn't help but feel a little amused.
These three… how long had it been since they'd had a proper meal?
"You wouldn't… spend all your funds on those messy robots, leaving you unable to afford food, would you?"
Ash's somewhat puzzled question made Team Rocket freeze mid-bite…
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