Chapter 242: Advanced-Rank Trainer Basalt
"He succeeded that quickly?"
In the monitoring room, Captain Wang's mouth twitched. He had been planning to wait for Basalt to fail, then step in to offer a little guidance and get on his good side. He never imagined that Bronzong would succeed in opening a spatial gate all on its own.
The other examiners were also baffled. A candidate opening a spatial gate during the Advanced Trainer exam... this was a situation they had never encountered before. How were they supposed to handle it?
They all instinctively looked at Examiner Jensen, as he was the chief examiner for this session.
Fortunately, Basalt didn't do anything out of line. Although Bronzong had successfully opened the gate, he had no intention of leaving. The rules of the assessment were clear: he had to stay for the full duration. Leaving early might cause unnecessary trouble.
So, Basalt simply had Bronzong close the gate and quietly waited for time to run out.
A little over two hours later, the assessment ended. The candidates' guardian Pokémon appeared and guided them to a designated location. Before long, a larger, more stable spatial gate opened, and the remaining candidates all left the secret realm.
Fourteen candidates had entered, but only ten came out. The other four had clearly run into a crisis that forced their guardian Pokémon to intervene, resulting in their elimination. Among them, of course, was the female candidate from the night before.
...
After leaving the secret realm and returning to the Metro City Certification Center, the eliminated candidates left directly. The ten who passed were asked to hand over their Pokédexes to have their information updated. A Pokédex was essentially a trainer's ID card, containing all their records.
"Congratulations. From this moment on, you are all Advanced-rank Trainers."
For the first time, Examiner Jensen's face was not stern. He congratulated everyone with a broad smile. The successful candidates were all beaming with joy.
Ronan suggested a celebration, but Basalt declined, eager to go home and share the happy news with his family. The best moments, of course, had to be shared with them.
But when he got home, he found his parents looking upset.
"Mom, Dad, what's wrong?" Basalt asked, confused.
"Basalt, someone posted online accusing you of using dirty tricks to attack someone during the exam, causing another candidate to fail," his mom said, her face full of resentment.
The post included photos of Basalt and his three Pokémon, with one clearly showing Lileep's roots binding the Dodrio. The pictures didn't lie. Although the story hadn't gone viral yet, based on the current situation, most of the uninformed netizens were siding with the female candidate. It wasn't looking good for Basalt.
"She's really that malicious," Basalt muttered, his expression changing slightly, but he wasn't worried.
He was all too familiar with this tactic: cherry-picking photos that supported one side of the story and writing a misleading, manipulative narrative to go with it.
Unfortunately for her, Basalt had a full video of the entire incident, including the ugly expression on her face as she threatened him. It was more than enough to prove what had really happened.
"The trainer certification exam is a process for the League to select sufficiently strong trainers. If your strength is lacking, you should go home and work hard to improve yourself for next time, not rely on other candidates to save you. Besides, I had no obligation to help you."
He typed out a short message, uploaded the video, and tagged the blogger who had exposed him. After that, he didn't bother with it anymore. He needed to cherish the time he had with his parents.
But the moment his text and video went up, it caused a huge uproar online. Public opinion instantly flipped.
As for the female candidate, she was socially executed and regretted it to her very core. How could she have known that Basalt had recorded the entire thing?
Fortunately, the incident hadn't had enough time to ferment, so the impact was not widespread.
...
The night passed without incident.
The next morning, Basalt took a trip to the Pokémon Department Store.
"Welcome, sir. How may I help you?" a pretty saleswoman greeted him with a professional smile.
"I'd like one Poison Gem, medium-grade."
"A medium-grade Poison Gem?"
The saleswoman's eyes lit up. This was a big sale. A regular Type Gem cost around a hundred thousand, but a medium-grade one was ten times that price. A single gem was worth a house.
She hadn't expected the unassuming Basalt to be such a big shot.
Ignoring the saleswoman's excitement, Basalt added calmly, "Also, do you have a Toxic Orb here?"
Hearing this, the saleswoman's breathing quickened.
A Toxic Orb. This was an extremely valuable held item, even more expensive than a medium-grade gem, with a market price of ten million.
The only problem was, because the item was so valuable and rarely purchased, they didn't have one in stock here in Metro City.
"Sir, if you need one, we can have it transferred from our headquarters in Centralis City immediately. It will arrive within a day. If that's inconvenient, we can also deliver it to your home."
It was clear the saleswoman was very eager to make this sale.
"That's fine," Basalt nodded. "Please arrange it as soon as possible. I'll come to pick it up tomorrow morning."
"Of course!" The saleswoman nodded with a beaming smile and led Basalt to pay with his card. The entire process was flawless.
Watching millions of dollars flow out of his account without even blinking an eye, the saleswoman suddenly thought Basalt was very manly and cool.
With the Poison Gem in hand, Basalt left the department store, found a rental training room, and released Lileep, giving it the gem.
"Nee-nee~"
Feeling the rich Poison-type energy within the gem, Lileep was overjoyed. Once it fully digested the energy from this gem, its mastery of the Poison type would be no worse than an average Poison-type Pokémon. Learning the move Toxic was just around the corner. If it also had a Toxic Orb, it would be even more explosive.
This was the magic of money. Wealth was an absolute accelerator for a Pokémon's growth.
The only thing Basalt was worried about now was that he was running out of money.
"Damn it, I only have a little over ten million left. I'm so poor," Basalt sighed, crying tears of blood. He suddenly found himself missing that generous benefactor from the Alliance.
"Nee-nee~"
After absorbing the pure Poison-type energy from the gem for a few minutes, Lileep entered a "poisoned" state. Basalt was used to this by now.
Then, he released Excadrill, Bronzong, and Larvitar for their daily training.
As for Basalt himself, he went to a corner and dialed Agent Zhou's number.
"Hey, Agent Zhou, are you busy? Heh, it's nothing much, I just wanted to ask you some questions about secret realms and spatial gates."
"Secret realms and spatial gates? Why are you asking about that?"
On the other end of the line, Agent Zhou sounded confused. To open a spatial gate, you generally needed to be at least Pro-level. Otherwise, your power would be too weak to affect the gate at all.
And so, Basalt had no choice but to explain Bronzong's situation.
"What? Your Bronzong can already open spatial gates? For real? Kid, don't mess with me."
Agent Zhou was shocked, his mouth twitching. But considering who Basalt was, he knew he wouldn't lie about this. That kid might be a bit flashy, but he was fundamentally honest.
"Alright, alright. I'm sending it to you now."
A few minutes after hanging up, Basalt received a compressed knowledge pack from Agent Zhou. After decompressing it and entering the password, he began to read carefully.
"So secret realms are divided into five levels: Micro, Small, Medium, Large, and Super-Large, corresponding to the Advanced, Pro, Gym Leader, Master, and Elite Four ranks and above."
Basalt read with great interest. The level of a secret realm was determined by the concentration and quality of the elemental energy within it.
Generally, a Micro-secret realm could, at most, support Pokémon at the peak of the Advanced-rank. This was a physical ceiling that couldn't be broken because the energy level was only so high. Correspondingly, to open the gate to a Micro-secret realm, you needed a Pokémon of at least the Advanced-rank. Of course, that was under optimal conditions. In most cases, trainers who knew how to open spatial gates were at the Pro-level. For example, the secret realm from his exam was likely a Micro-secret realm, and Captain Wang, who was in charge of opening it, was a proper Pro-level trainer.
"In that case, the mining realm must have been a Medium-secret realm," Basalt raised an eyebrow, thinking of the Great Elder, who was at the peak of the Gym Leader-level.
Continuing to read, Basalt learned about the distribution of secret realms. Generally, they were located in sparsely populated areas like great mountains, vast seas, deep forests, and wide deserts, where the elemental energy was rich, and thus the probability of a secret realm forming was higher.
The higher the level of the secret realm, the stronger the Pokémon it could support, and the higher the chance of finding rare treasures. This was why powerful trainers loved to explore the wild. If you were lucky enough to discover an undeveloped, pristine secret realm, the chances of striking it rich were extremely high.
"If only I could discover an undeveloped secret realm," Basalt blinked, his face full of envy. "Looks like I can't fly too fast when I'm traveling from now on. I'll have to get Bronzong to scan with its magnetic field more often. Maybe I'll get lucky."
He was in desperate need of money and resources right now. He just needed one good opportunity to make a fortune.
After training until noon, Basalt fed his four little ones their Pokéblocks, went out for a nice meal himself, and then left the training room, taking a taxi to the Metro City Research Institute.
Today, he had to get Excadrill's "Plow" move sorted out.
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