While the Pokémon were doing their morning training and Reiji was preparing lunch, his thoughts were entirely focused on coming up with a training plan for Wingull.
The trouble was, he couldn't figure one out.
After all, he'd always intended Wingull to serve as his weather setter, support unit, and transportation. But none of those roles could be fulfilled until it evolved. As it was now, Wingull didn't have the Drizzle ability, couldn't carry passengers, and couldn't help Poliwag train its own ability.
Beyond practicing Water Gun and Flying-type moves, Reiji couldn't think of anything else Wingull could work on.
"Huh? Wait a second," he muttered, tossing some water plants into the bucket for the dumb thing inside as he prepped lunch. That's when he spotted the Wishiwashi in the water.
Wingull could learn Water Pulse—and Wishiwashi could teach it.
On Wingull's proficiency panel, Water Pulse was one of the grayed-out moves in its learnset—meaning it was compatible, just not unlocked yet.
The proficiency panel didn't just show potential levels. It listed every known move a Pokémon could learn, their descriptions, and ability notes. It was basically a living Pokédex.
"Wishiwashi, come up here," Reiji waved toward the bucket. He planned to have Wingull learn Water Pulse by copying it.
But when Wishiwashi popped its head out, Wingull was nowhere to be seen.
It had been perched on the rooftop a moment ago. Where'd it go?
"Wingull! Wingull!" Reiji called toward the sky. No response.
He stopped calling. It probably hadn't vanished or anything—unless it didn't want honey anymore.
Plenty of Pokémon wanted honey. He didn't need Wingull specifically. He just didn't know if it'd be back in time for lunch.
"Eh, forget it then, Wishiwashi. Go play."
Reiji felt a little awkward calling it up for no reason, so he fed it some honey as compensation and let it get back to arguing with Magikarp.
He had recently discovered that Wishiwashi could easily overpower Magikarp. It probably figured out that the dumb one was all bark and no bite—just a Magikarp with Splash.
Still, even if Wishiwashi was weak, it could use Water Pulse. So technically, it was a notch above Magikarp.
Morning training ended quickly, and lunch was ready soon after, but Wingull still hadn't come back. So Reiji gave a simple command:
"Butterfree, fly up and take a look—can you see where Wingull went?"
"Muuu~ii." Butterfree nodded and soared into the sky. She did a sweep of the surrounding forest canopy but couldn't spot any trace of Wingull.
She returned to Reiji, shaking her head to signal no luck.
"Huh… Where could Wingull have gone?" Reiji muttered. He gave up trying to guess and called everyone to eat. No point waiting around.
Just as he was handing out grilled fish to the team, Wingull finally arrived—late as ever—with something clamped in her beak. Under the sunlight, the item sparkled with a dazzling ocean-blue glow.
"Wingull! Where'd you go? Here—this one's yours." Reiji quickly set her portion of lunch in front of her as she landed on the table.
But Wingull didn't look at the fish.
Instead, she stepped up to Reiji and gently set down the object in her mouth—a transparent, gem-like blue stone.
"A blue gem?" Reiji picked up the glistening object, still slick with Wingull's saliva. Its rich azure hue resembled the sea itself. He had no idea what it was for.
In human society, it might sell for some money. But here, it was just a shiny rock—probably Wingull's way of returning the favor for all the honey and food.
He looked at the gem for a while, saw no use for it, and set it aside without much thought.
It was only when he noticed Poliwag, Krabby, Magikarp, Wishiwashi, and Wingull all staring at the gem with hungry, burning eyes that he realized something wasn't right.
[Water Gem]
A small gemstone containing dense Water-type energy. Extremely attractive to Water-type Pokémon.
Purity: 76.92%
"…Holy crap. Seriously?" Reiji was stunned when the proficiency panel displayed the item's data.
This little blue rock was basically catnip for Water-types.
Only now did he realize that this wasn't just a pretty decoration—it actually enhanced a Water-type Pokémon's control and affinity for Water-type energy. It might even increase their potential. This was a rare and valuable item.
And Wingull, being a Water/Flying-type herself, would've benefited greatly from it. Yet she gave it away.
"Wingull… are you really giving me this gem?"
"Wuu-oh." Wingull nodded. This was her way of saying thanks.
Honestly, on the way back, she had been tempted to eat it. That gem reeked of sweet Water energy, and her mouth had practically flooded with drool.
But she kept thinking about something even sweeter than the Water Gem—honey. That helped her resist the urge to gobble it down. She'd eaten a Water Gem once before. Gave her a bad case of indigestion.
Cravings and taste were two different things.
The Water Gem stirred a psychological craving—it whispered to her, Eat me... eat me...
Honey, on the other hand, provoked a physical craving. Just a whiff of its floral sweetness made her stomach scream, Eat honey! Must eat honey!
So between the two, honey won out.
Only Water-types who'd never seen a Water Gem before would be unable to resist its pull.
Seeing all four Pokémon around him eyeing the gem like treasure, Reiji quickly wrapped it in an old cloth and hid it away in the treehouse.
He had to seal it up to keep its scent from attracting other wild Water-types nearby.
When he returned, he clapped his hands and shouted, "Alright! Lunchtime, let's go! Forget about the rock. Nothing happened. Just food."
Though all the Pokémon still clearly wanted the Water Gem, they held back and waited for his instructions. They trusted him enough to let it go.
As for Butterfree, she wasn't interested at all. She didn't have a Water-typing. To her, the glowing rock was just… a rock.
After lunch, while the team napped, Reiji kept turning the gem over in his mind. He wondered how much potential it could raise, how much it could improve a Pokémon's control over Water-type moves.
Honestly, the gem's recipient was already decided.
It had to be Poliwag.
Even Magikarp had higher potential than Poliwag right now. There was no question who needed the boost most.
Just like honey had limited effect on Pokémon with already-high potential, the Water Gem probably wouldn't do much for strong Pokémon. But Poliwag? His potential was only 34. Tons of room to grow.
If the goal was maximum efficiency, there was only one clear choice.
Not favoritism—just math.
Without the Water Gem, Poliwag's potential might cap out somewhere in the 50s. That would be its hard limit.
Stagnation was Reiji's worst nightmare. He couldn't bear the thought of Poliwag hitting a plateau and staying there forever.
He'd made a promise—to help Poliwag reach the summit. He was going to keep it.
Yeah, he was a fisherman. A laid-back fisherman. The kind who only cared about catching big ones.
But this was a new world, a new life.
He wanted to give it his all—just once.
He didn't want regrets.
And his peak couldn't exist without Poliwag. He wasn't the kind of guy who could just give up and say "Oh well."
A fisherman never breaks a promise.
(Unless it's about catching fish. That part's too random.)
Poliwag was five or six levels away from evolution now—probably four or five days of training.
Reiji really hoped this surprise Water Gem could increase Poliwag's potential and awaken some hidden Water-type talent.
Before this, he had been stressing over the fact that Poliwag would evolve without anything special to aid the process.
Now, at least he had something.
The Water Gem wasn't legendary, but it was still valuable—certainly enough for Poliwag's evolution. If it wasn't, well… there wasn't much else he could do.
He was just a castaway without a trainer license. Scavenging Beedrill honey was already pushing his limits.
Even if the center of the island had great stuff, they wouldn't dare go near it. Rhydon had made it very clear: go there and get stomped.
After the nap, afternoon training resumed.
Butterfree was still doing her Confusion-based water carrying. Krabby practiced triple Water Gun bursts. Wingull worked on her own Water Gun technique.
Reiji decided that Water Pulse training would happen in the morning—if he made Wingull skip Water Gun practice now, she might get mad.
So for the afternoon, everyone focused on Water Gun. The methods were already established. How much progress each one made depended on their own ability and effort.
Reiji didn't fish today, nor did he have Poliwag join the group training.
Instead, he called Poliwag aside to experiment—he wanted to try and trigger Mind Reader.
If the move's description said "sense your opponent with your heart," then clearly this wasn't a visual skill. But even if it didn't use eyes, eyes were still the window to the soul.
Eventually, he came up with a compromise: cover one of Poliwag's eyes and have it practice hitting moving float balls with Water Gun using only one eye.
Left eye first, then right. Then both eyes covered, forcing it to either memorize the float's movement or sense it with something else.
It was all pretty mystical. Reiji didn't know how to train a move like this—he just had to let Poliwag feel it.
If you had to explain it, maybe it was something like echolocation, or hyper memory—remembering the float's speed and wobble patterns. That kind of thing.
"Alright, Poliwag. Water Gun training, version 2. I'm covering one eye. You can only observe with the other. Let's start with a stationary float."
"Yo-yo?" Poliwag was confused at first, but once one eye was covered, it struggled with depth perception and clarity. It had to recalibrate its vision.
"Okay, fire at will."
Pfft—
Direct hit.
Not bad. A motionless target wasn't hard, even with one eye.
"Now try hitting moving targets," Reiji said.
Pfft, pfft-pfft—
Three Water Guns. Only one hit.
So the one-eye handicap definitely reduced accuracy.
"Don't stop. Keep firing until you can hit them consistently."
Pfft-pfft-pfft—
Poliwag kept at it for half an hour. Eventually, its accuracy rose to 80%, thanks to its prior training.
Then Reiji covered the other eye.
Now Poliwag had to rely entirely on memory and instinct to hit moving targets.
Another half hour passed. Left eye, right eye—didn't matter anymore. It maintained over 80% accuracy.
Reiji wasn't looking for 100% perfection.
He wanted to see if Poliwag could hit moving targets under visual limitation—to activate Mind Reader.
This would take immense focus.
Now, Reiji wrapped both eyes with a thin cloth. There were gaps in the weave, so Poliwag could still faintly see the float's movement.
"Poliwag, difficulty up. You can barely see the target now, but you must still try to hit it…"
Reiji tested the blindfold himself. It was like walking through a blurry pixelated world.
Pfft. Pow— First try. Hit.
"Nice! Upping the challenge."
He added another layer to the blindfold. Now the world turned to full mosaic mode—everything was smeared and vague.
"Poliwag, fire."
Pfft, pfft—
Both missed.
Poliwag was still relying on its eyes.
"Poliwag, your eyes won't help you now. You must feel the float. You must lock onto it using something else—use Mind Reader. Predict the float's movement."
(End of Chapter)
[100 Power Stones = Extra Chapter]
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