"Ding-ding~"
"Charizard, could you get the door?"
"Roo!"
"Hrrrr!"
Auron was elbow-deep in the fried chicken prep, hands full. He called for Charizard.
Both Charizard answered at once and went to open the door.
"Hello — you folks ordered the prepared crawfish."
"Yep, just hand it over to Charizard here."
The delivery driver handed the large styrofoam box of crawfish to Charizard and flashed a smile.
"Enjoy your meal!"
Charizard stood there愣了一下, caught off guard, but gave an instinctive nod.
After the delivery driver left, Charizard carried the crawfish into the kitchen.
"Thanks, bud."
"Roo~"
Charizard set the box down and scratched the back of its head bashfully.
Auron didn't notice — his attention was still on the fried chicken.
For the coating, Auron patted the chicken down in flour, dipped it in water, then gave it another heavy dredge. That was the trick for getting that crispy, ruffled texture like proper fried chicken.
Once the oil was hot, he dropped in the drumsticks and wings. Wings went in for about five minutes, drumsticks around eight — that was the sweet spot for texture.
*Sizzle—*
The drumsticks hit the oil. A short wait, then scoop them out, double-fry, and the fried chicken was done.
*Slap!*
Auron swatted Dratini's tail away from behind him.
"That's the third one. You really think you're still getting dinner?"
"Jii~"
Dratini fixed him with those wide, innocent eyes and nuzzled against Auron's leg, trying every trick in the book to get a fried drumstick.
"Get, get — none of that. Tonight's got way too much good food. If you stuff yourself on drumsticks now, you're going to regret it later."
Auron turned sharply away, refusing to look Dratini in the eye. He was scared he wouldn't be able to hold out.
Because if he caved now and let Dratini eat its fill, come bedtime Dratini would be whining and squirming and writhing with regret right next to his head…
"Jii~"
Dratini gave the basket of fried drumsticks one last mournful look before Auron shooed it out.
With the fried chicken done, Auron used the remaining oil to flash-fry the crawfish.
The quick oil bath made the crawfish meat firmer and more succulent.
Just had to be careful not to overcook it.
From there it was simple. Spicy crawfish and thirteen-spice crawfish came together fast — both done by tossing the seasoning and crawfish together in one pot.
The garlic-butter crawfish took one extra step: only half the garlic in at the start, fried until fragrant, then the other half added right before serving.
Thank goodness he'd picked the biggest house on the block — all because of Snorlax.
Big house meant a big kitchen. Plenty of room to run the gas stove and electric pot at the same time.
One gas burner, two pots, plus an electric pot — three crawfish pots going at once.
"Ding-ding~"
"Coming!"
Auron had barely called out when he saw Charizard sprinting to the door and throwing it open.
He had to admit — the way Charizard strode up with that confident waddle was honestly pretty endearing.
"Thanks, Charizard~"
Charizard swung the door open to reveal Serena Elm standing there.
She gave Charizard's head a pat and thanked it with a warm smile.
Charizard instantly went red and bashful.
"Tch!"
Beside her, Jace's Charizard shot its counterpart a look of pure contempt, nostrils flaring with disdain.
*(Honestly, so embarrassing for our species…)*
"Come in, come in! Big dinner tonight — the crawfish are almost ready!"
"Crawfish — amazing! How did you know I was craving crawfish, Lu Ze?"
Jace rocketed in from the back of the group, eyes shining as he locked onto Auron.
Jace's Charizard, watching its trainer carry on like a complete clown, turned away and started facing the wall.
*(This is somehow even more humiliating…)*
"Crawfish with beer — the whole reason I ordered crawfish was for the beer. You having some has nothing to do with it."
Auron calmly extended an arm to block Jace. "Go sit down. A few of you, come help me carry stuff out."
"On it."
At the word "carry," everyone mobbed the kitchen doorway.
Auron passed dishes one by one, and they ferried everything to the table.
Pokémon on one table. The humans on another. And Snorlax had its own entire table.
Meats of every kind were stacked in the center of all three tables — grab and grill at will.
"Cheers!"
"Cheers!"
Everyone raised their cups. Cola and beer clinked together, and the whole group drank deep.
The Pokémon tried to follow suit, lifting their own juice boxes for a cheers.
Though only a few of the Pokémon could actually manage the gesture — the Coalossal, Arcanine, Scorbunny, Cloyster, Trubbish, and Deino couldn't toast to save their lives, lacking hands to hold cups with.
As for Chansey, the one providing the juice, she was far too busy eating the meat Charizard was grilling for her.
Charizard would put away several pieces before Chansey finished one. So Charizard just kept piling more onto her plate.
On top of that, Charizard skillfully cracked open crawfish shells with its claws and delicately picked out the meat inside, laying it right in front of Chansey.
Chansey never looked up — whatever appeared in front of her, she ate.
As for Crawdinator, contrary to Auron's worries, it wasn't turning up its nose at the crawfish at all. If anything, it was going at them the hardest, with a particular weakness for the thirteen-spice flavor.
Electabuzz had been watching Crawdinator with a mischievous glint, grabbing a crawfish right in front of it and chewing exaggeratedly to show off.
Who knew Crawdinator didn't care in the slightest — it just picked up a crawfish with its claw, tossed it straight into its mouth, shell and all.
That really took the wind out of Electabuzz's sails. What was the point of flexing if the other guy didn't even need to peel?
Crawdinator: You wouldn't understand. Shell is full of calcium!
"Oh right — Uncle Cyrus told me yesterday. The Black Mystery Zone near Jinshi now requires a Junior Trainer Certificate just to enter. We're probably going to need to get certified before we can go."
The group looked at Auron with some confusion.
"Why do they need a certificate this year? That wasn't a thing before."
Auron shoved six peeled crawfish into his mouth in one go, chewed, and said, "Because some rookie trainer went into the Black Mystery Zone recently and got himself killed in there. That's why they put this policy in place."
"Fair enough."
Everyone nodded along — all except Jace, who let out a low whistle.
"Man… thinking back to that Mystery Zone we went into back then. We were so lucky. I genuinely can't believe we had the nerve to go in. In hindsight, it makes me shiver."
"Nerve?" Auron laughed. "Your old man's Ludicolo, Noctowl, my dad's Gengar — *that's* where our nerve came from. But yeah, we were lucky. The one we went into wasn't especially dangerous."