"Now commencing the official Gym battle for the Cascade Badge between the Cerulean Gym's Trainer Kael and the challenger Gary Oak from Pallet Town. Each side may use three Pokémon. When all Pokémon on one side lose their ability to battle, the match will end!"
The referee finished announcing the rules and then shouted loudly, "Both trainers—are you ready?!"
"Let's make this quick," Gary sneered, curling his lip. "Cerulean Gym's famous for being the weakest anyway. Might as well let it become the second stepping stone on this young master's road to becoming a Pokémon Master."
Gary took the Poké Ball hanging around his neck and, with the practiced posture of a seasoned thrower, hurled it forward.
"Go! My baby!"
A well-developed Squirtle appeared on the floating platform above the pool. Its jet-black eyes were lively and alert, its sea-blue skin smooth and glossy, and its shell thick and sturdy. Just from its size alone, it was clearly larger than the average Squirtle.
As expected of one of the Kanto starters from Professor Oak's lab—its quality was practically flawless.
In the Kanto region, the three starter Pokémon provided to new Trainers were Charmander, Squirtle, and Bulbasaur. Their natural habitats were tightly controlled by the League, which distributed them uniformly to regional research labs as starter Pokémon for beginning Trainers.
Scarcity drove value. The stricter the League's control, the higher the market price of the starters climbed. With two-stage evolutions, excellent potential, and powerful final forms—and with wild encounters being exceedingly rare—it was no surprise that, in recent years, there had been frequent reports of audacious poaching rings sneaking into League-protected habitats to steal starters.
From Kael's professional bounty-hunter perspective, Gary's Squirtle—judging by its condition alone—would fetch no less than 2.6 million on the black market.
What an arrogant little punk, Kael thought, mildly irritated. He shrugged and tossed out his first Pokémon.
Plop.
Feebas splashed into the water.
Over the past three days, the poor thing had lost fourteen consecutive matches, almost all of them going down in a single hit. There was no helping it—Feebas was simply too weak. It had no offensive moves, pitiful stamina, and couldn't even swim for long before exhausting itself. No wonder its species preferred to stay motionless at the bottom of the water for hours on end.
"Huh?" Gary glanced curiously at the unfamiliar Pokémon, then burst out laughing. "What kind of Pokémon is that? It looks… ugly. Hey, you're not trying to fool me with some misshapen Magikarp knockoff, are you?"
Strangely enough, despite being beaten badly over the last few days, Feebas never showed anger when attacked. But whenever challengers mocked its appearance, the little Pokémon would frown, its emotions briefly wavering.
Kael had deliberately avoided having Lulu establish a deep telepathic link between himself and Feebas. Instead, he observed it with a detached attitude. After all, the road to evolving into Milotic was filled with uncertainty—no one could guarantee that a Feebas would successfully evolve. Kael needed to be prepared for every outcome.
...
The first round ended without any surprises.
At Gary's command, Squirtle dove underwater and slammed into Feebas with a Rocket Headbutt, sending it flying straight out of the pool. Feebas was instantly knocked out.
Fifteen losses. Zero wins.
"Tch," Gary shook his head in dissatisfaction. "I knew Cerulean Gym was weak, but this is just embarrassing. I didn't even use ten percent of my strength."
"Gary! Gary! You're amazing!"
"Gary! Gary! You're so cool!"
The fangirl cheer squad erupted once again.
"You did your best," Kael said softly as he picked up the unconscious Feebas, gently stroking the swollen red bump on its head before returning it to its Poké Ball.
"The battle," he murmured, "has only just begun."
With a sharp, stylish snap of his fingers, Kael signaled the next phase.
Snap.
On the far side of the pool, the water suddenly churned violently. A dark shape shot out of the surface at blinding speed, leaping high into the air before landing steadily on the floating platform.
A faint ripple spread quietly from beneath Sneasel's feet. Any sharp-eyed Trainer would immediately notice how precisely it controlled its own power.
"Another Pokémon I've never seen," Gary said, picking at his ear with the same look of disdain. One clean opening-round knockout had already inflated his naturally arrogant personality to the extreme.
Kael had long since learned that showing weakness first often produced exactly this effect—especially against rookie Trainers fresh out on their journeys, fearless and overconfident. Let them score an easy win, and they'd immediately start feeling invincible, handsome, unstoppable—never stopping to wonder why a Gym Trainer would open with a Pokémon that had no offensive moves whatsoever.
After three full days of mowing down rookies, Kael had perfected his routine for dealing with these sky-high–ego teenagers.
And now—
It was time to let them taste despair.