"So that's how it is."
Brock raised a hand and gently rubbed Ninetales' head.
It was difficult for Silas to tell what Brock was thinking from his eyes, the slits were simply too narrow.
"What a pitiful child…"
Before Brock could even finish speaking, Ninetales had already started enthusiastically licking his face with its tongue.
The corner of Silas's mouth twitched slightly.
Well, calling a two-hundred-year-old Ninetales a "child" wasn't exactly wrong.
Strictly speaking, this Ninetales had barely interacted with many people throughout its life. There were many obvious signs of immaturity in its mentality.
At the very least, a normal Pokémon that had lived for over two hundred years would probably avoid humans altogether. They usually preferred living freely in the wild and fully understood how tempting their existence was to humanity.
Thankfully, this Ninetales' special ability involved illusions. On top of that, the people it had encountered now and in the future were Silas and Brock. Otherwise, it likely would have already been forcibly captured again by someone else without a second thought.
Of course, the fact that a Elite-level Ninetales was hiding deep within such a remote forest also meant that very few powerful Trainers would stumble upon it by accident.
"However, I don't think you're suitable to follow me."
While stroking Ninetales, Brock suddenly said something that genuinely surprised Silas.
"Why?!" Lokoko reappeared immediately, her voice filled with agitation.
"Mii…"
Ninetales also let out a low whimper beside her.
Brock dusted himself off and stood up.
"Let me guess. Silas called me here because I look very similar to this senior, right?"
He pointed toward the portrait hanging inside the small room nearby.
Even though his eyes were tiny, his eyesight was apparently excellent. He had already noticed the portrait from a distance.
"Yeah." Silas nodded. "Wouldn't it be good to find this guy a new home?"
He honestly didn't think there was anything wrong with his idea. Ninetales itself clearly wanted this as well.
Brock smiled gently.
"It's a good idea but it shouldn't be me."
He raised a hand, signaling for Ninetales not to panic.
"It's precisely because I look too much like your former Trainer that this wouldn't be good for you."
His voice was sincere and warm.
Although Brock tended to chase after beautiful women on sight, he truly was a very gentle person.
If not for that, he never would have eventually gone from being a Gym Leader to becoming a Pokémon Breeder and a Pokémon Doctor trainee.
For someone outside the Joy family, becoming a Pokémon Doctor was an incredibly difficult path.
Silas's eyes flickered slightly. He roughly understood what Brock meant now.
For once, Brock completely ignored Lokoko's illusion. He slowly crouched down before Ninetales and looked directly into its eyes.
"Because I resemble your previous Trainer so much, you'll definitely treat me as though I were him or at least partially."
"That would trap you in your memories of the past forever."
"I believe those two hundred years of memories haven't been pleasant for you at all, right?"
Yes.
A lone Pokémon spending two hundred years in solitude while being unable to travel far from the estate.
Anyone would find that unbearable.
Especially while constantly waiting for a Trainer who would never return.
Ninetales' ruby-red eyes gradually became misty.
Just like before.
This human who resembled its former master was just as gentle.
For a while, silence filled the manor.
"ROAR—"
A distant Pokémon cry suddenly echoed from outside.
Silas found it oddly familiar, though he couldn't immediately identify it.
"That's Aerodactyl," Brock explained while turning toward him. "The one discovered in the Great Canyon last time."
Silas blinked.
"Wasn't that one beaten half to death by Professor Oak's Dragonite…?"
He remembered it clearly.
That unlucky Aerodactyl had only just awakened before Dragonite slammed it straight into the ground.
Granted, considering the difference in strength between them, even if Aerodactyl had fully recovered its ancient apex predator power, the result probably wouldn't have changed.
Still, the beating back then had been absolutely brutal.
What Silas didn't understand was why Aerodactyl was now in Pewter Gym's possession.
Brock answered his confusion:
"My grandfather applied to both the League and Professor Oak, so he became Aerodactyl's temporary Trainer."
After thinking about it, Silas found that surprisingly reasonable.
Kanto didn't really have any particularly strong Flying-type Gyms, so leaving a Rock/Flying-type Pokémon like Aerodactyl under the care of the Rock-type Pewter Gym made perfect sense.
"I thought Lance would take it away."
Silas insisted he wasn't mocking Lance.
The Pokémon's name had "dragon" associations, and it could fly wasn't that basically Lance bait? Especially since Lance's future main team genuinely did include an Aerodactyl.
Apparently, though, that Aerodactyl wasn't this one.
Brock chuckled.
"Mr. Lance said this Aerodactyl was still too weak for him. Most of the time it wouldn't even be able to fight properly, and it wouldn't suit its nature."
As one of the apex aerial predators of ancient times, Aerodactyl possessed an extremely savage temperament.
To it, endless battle was the true purpose of life.
Even if it fully recovered, a mere peak Elite-level Aerodactyl still wouldn't be able to handle the enemies Lance faced, no matter how experienced it was.
In that case, it was better to let a more suitable Trainer raise it.
At the very least, the internal battles within Brock's grandfather's team were enough to keep Aerodactyl extremely satisfied.
"Still, Mr. Lance also took quite a few Aerodactyl fossils from the Great Canyon," Brock continued. "He's probably planning to revive and raise another strong Aerodactyl through Silph Co.'s restoration technology."
At the mention of this, Brock's expression became rather strange.
"Seriously though, that technology basically didn't exist before. I can't believe it appeared so quickly."
Back then, Silas had specifically asked Brock to investigate research progress on fossil revival.
Brock had confidently assured him that such absurd technology didn't exist and barely received any funding.
Then Silph Co. suddenly appeared and slapped him in the face with a fully functional version.
Silas laughed.
"That's perfectly normal, isn't it? This is Silph Co. we're talking about. Besides, the technology still isn't fully perfected."
Originally, he had planned to make money by reselling fossils.
Now, though, it seemed unnecessary.
"What about that Solrock?"
"That belongs to my grandfather too," Brock replied. "It's one of his ace Pokémon."
"Oooh~ No wonder you got here so quickly."
The two old friends continued chatting naturally after not seeing each other for quite a while.
"Um…"
Lokoko, who had remained silent for a long time, finally spoke.
Both she and Ninetales lowered their heads slightly.
"If you don't mind, I still wish to follow you."
She was speaking to Brock.
Before Brock could answer, Silas interrupted first.
"Are you sure? Even if you don't follow him, I'll still release you like I promised."
Ninetales and Lokoko smiled simultaneously and shook their heads firmly.
"I'm already tired of living alone. I want to find a new master."
As it spoke, Ninetales subconsciously glanced toward the portrait of its former Trainer.
If that's the case you'd probably be happy for me too, wouldn't you?
Brock still looked like he wanted to say something.
Silas shoved him forward and stuffed the old-style Poké Ball into his hands.
"Then what are you waiting for? Go! It's your turn!"
Rejecting an opportunity like this?
Silas truly felt like he was worrying himself sick for his friend.
Honestly, he deserved an award for being such a good friend.
Brock shook his head helplessly before looking at Ninetales.
"If that's truly what you want, then that's for the best."
"But if you ever change your mind later, tell me anytime. I'll respect your wishes."
As he spoke, he pointed the old-style Poké Ball toward Ninetales.
"Return, Ninetales!"
Brock suddenly opened his eyes wide, successfully transforming his permanently closed eyes into tiny bean-shaped dots.
Human and Pokémon stared silently at one another.
This time, the old-style Poké Ball finally reacted.
A red beam shot out, and Ninetales was recalled inside.
"So that's how it is." Watching the scene unfold, Silas finally confirmed his theory. "It's not that you couldn't return to the Poké Ball you only wanted to return to your own home."
Lokoko appeared in the air once again.
Separated by the Poké Ball, her figure had become much fainter and more illusory.
"Thank you very much for your help." Lokoko bowed slightly toward Silas. "Please take good care of me from now on."
The latter sentence was directed at Brock.
Brock's eyes returned to their usual narrow slits.
"Likewise, please take care of me too!"
Ninetales' power quickly receded.
It wanted to sleep peacefully for once to have a proper rest inside its own home without worrying about anything else.
Silently, Brock placed the old-style Poké Ball into his storage bag.
"You're not planning to replace it?" Silas asked.
Unlike modern Poké Balls, old-style Poké Balls couldn't shrink down in size, making them rather inconvenient.
Brock shook his head.
"Forget it. Maybe later."
Convenient or not, what mattered most was what the Pokémon itself preferred.
Silas walked back toward his cooking area.
"Well then, everything's settled. Bye~"
He was exceptionally quick at chasing people away.
Brock looked utterly speechless.
"You're acting way too naturally about this."
"And besides…" He paused briefly. "This place belongs to me now. If anyone should be saying goodbye, it should be me."
"Huh?"
Silas turned around in disbelief, tilting his head.
Brock elegantly spread his hands and gestured around the estate.
"On my way here, I had the Gym purchase this property."
Who knew why the Pokémon League even had records of this old manor in the first place, but the fact remained.
Officially speaking, the estate now belonged to Pewter Gym.
While Brock wasn't as ridiculously wealthy as Steven Stone, he still counted as both a powerful family descendant and a rich family descendant.
"Damn rich people…"
Silas grumbled resentfully.
"I won't head back to Pewter City just yet. You're heading toward Blackthorn City, right? I'll travel with you for a while."
Brock said this while watching Silas pack up the cooking equipment.
Silas tilted his head.
"Sure."
Naturally, he had no objections. Traveling with an old friend wasn't exactly anything strange.
Besides, Brock was extremely skilled at taking care of Pokémon, which meant Silas could relax a bit more.
"Then I'll go retrieve Solrock and Aerodactyl first."
With that, Brock headed outside.
Watching Brock disappear into the distance, Blaziken poked Silas in the waist with one claw.
"Boss are you gonna die before me?"
"Get lost!"
Silas angrily kicked it.
Every day this chicken learned worse habits and kept cursing its own Trainer.
Of course, Silas understood why Blaziken had suddenly thought about something like that after hearing Ninetales' story.
But that kind of thing was far too distant.
He wasn't even eighteen years old yet.
While humans in the Pokémon world didn't live as long as most Pokémon, their average lifespan was still considered relatively long.
As long as nothing major happened, living to seventy or eighty wouldn't be difficult.
Silas didn't say anything further.
Without personally experiencing such things, no one could truly understand them anyway.
Rather than wasting time thinking about death, it was better to focus on becoming stronger.
Brock returned quickly.
After a brief discussion, the two of them set off on their journey together.
"There seems to be a canyon ahead with a small village inside."
Brock compared the terrain with the map booklet in his hands.
After traveling together for only a short while, Silas came to a clear realization:
The reason Ash and the others got lost so often in the future was definitely because Ash himself kept running around randomly.
Even Brock's incredible sense of direction couldn't save him.
"Want to check it out?"
Silas casually picked two Berries from a nearby tree and tossed one to Brock.
Normally, he would've simply avoided the place and continued onward.
But this wasn't a solo journey anymore, so he had to consider Brock's opinion too.
"Let's go take a look." Brock sounded genuinely interested. "Apparently, a Xatu there predicted a massive flood over a hundred years ago."
Silas rolled his eyes.
"And nothing happened for the entire hundred years afterward, right?"
After his previous experiences with prophecy, he had become extremely skeptical of such things.
Then again, no matter how strong Psychic powers were, they probably couldn't be that ridiculous probably.
Still, he didn't object to Brock's idea and casually adjusted their direction of travel.
"How do you do that?" Brock asked curiously.
"Do what?" Silas blinked in confusion.
Brock pointed at the map.
"Finding the right direction without even looking at the map."
He was absolutely certain Silas hadn't checked the map at all earlier.
"One part is using my brain," Silas replied lazily while munching on an Oran Berry. "The other part is that ordinary villagers leave behind traces in the forest. They're not Trainers."
Brock fell silent.
To him, the surrounding environment looked exactly the same as any ordinary forest.
He also understood this was the biggest difference between himself and Silas.
Having grown up in Viridian Forest, Silas possessed an awareness of the environment that ordinary people simply couldn't match.
Not long afterward, the two arrived at the canyon marked on the map.
It was an extremely hidden location.
At the bottom of the canyon, a massive stepped viewing platform had been artificially constructed. Countless people sat on the stone steps, nervously staring toward the opposite side of the canyon.
"What's going on over there?" Silas asked curiously.
"No idea." Brock shook his head as well.
The map certainly didn't include details like this.
A villager nearby turned around and answered their question with a devout expression.
"We are waiting for Xatu's weather prophecy."
"That's it?"
Silas was utterly baffled.
Was there really any need to make such a huge spectacle over a Pokémon predicting the weather?
...
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