Three Forest Bullies

After Yu Lili and the others left, Lu Li first cleared the leftover food from the table. Then, after feeding Feebas a Beauty Spirit Pill, he called a taxi with Tropius.

This time, Lu Li did not go directly to Jinji Village. After having the taxi take him to the suburb, he eagerly released Tropius.

"Finally, I can ride a dragon."

Lu Li looked at Tropius excitedly.

"Finally, I can carry a Trainer."

Tropius looked at Lu Li happily as well.

Today! I, Tropius, will prove my strength!

If an ordinary person dared to ride a Pokémon for travel the first time they used a Flying Pokémon, they would truly be tired of living.

But Lu Li was no ordinary person. As a Cultivator, he was confident he would not be thrown off. Even if he fell from a great height, he would emerge unscathed.

After jumping onto Tropius's back, Lu Li used his energy to adhere himself to Tropius.

This was one of the basic applications of the energy he had cultivated. Its effect was roughly similar to the Chakra of the Naruto World.

"Trop~"

(Are you seated properly?)

Lu Li gently patted Tropius's neck. "You can take off now."

Tropius stood over two meters tall. Although it was not particularly fast in flight, its large size still made it suitable as a riding Pokémon.

Tropius's greatest feature in flight was its stability. Because it was slow enough and had enough wings, it flew as steadily as a table.

Riding on Tropius's back, Lu Li held his phone's navigation in one hand while directing Tropius with the other.

A journey that would originally have taken two hours took Tropius less than half an hour.

Nothing unexpected happened along the way. After landing again, Tropius even had enough energy to fly back.

"Is Tropius's endurance higher than others of its kind because of the Elixir?" Lu Li looked thoughtfully at Tropius, which did not seem the least bit tired.

After putting Tropius away, Lu Li followed the directions in his memory and arrived at a half-ruined farmstead.

Unlike the city, houses in the countryside were generally quite large, since rural residents usually raised livestock to supplement their income.

The courtyard before him was huge, four times the size of his courtyard in Qingfeng City. More importantly, it stood near the edge of the village, and behind it stretched the endless Qingyun Mountains.

Most importantly, Jinji Village was already empty.

Lu Li remembered that when he left Jinji Village, there had still been more than forty households. He had not expected the village to become so abandoned after ten years.

Rural people moving into the cities was practically an inevitable trend.

For people in the countryside, moving into the city was already the best possible outcome. Every year, villages disappeared all over the world. The lucky ones moved into the cities, while the unlucky ones simply vanished—vanished in the literal sense.

If a village was full of ordinary people, even a Normal-level Late Stage Pokémon could slaughter everyone in it.

As for calling for reinforcements?

Even at the fastest, it would take twenty minutes to get here from the city, and that did not even include the time needed to report the situation and gather people. A lot could happen in twenty minutes.

After releasing Tropius again, Lu Li circled above the village to inspect it. Once he confirmed that Jinji Village was indeed deserted, his thoughts began to stir.

"Maybe I can buy this abandoned village and build my own farm here."

Jinji Village actually had excellent geographical advantages. It had mountains and water, but its sole drawback was that it was too far from Qingfeng City. That was also why Jinji Village had declined.

After returning to the courtyard, Lu Li first contacted a decoration company on his phone, then contacted a housekeeping company.

Two hours later.

People from both the housekeeping company and the decoration company arrived. The decoration company's manager was a middle-aged man, while the housekeeping company had sent only a sales representative.

The middle-aged manager asked respectfully, "Hello, you must be Mr. Lu, right? Is this the place you want renovated?"

Lu Li nodded.

"I want you to repair this place, renovate the house, and clean up the area around the estate while you're at it. I want to build a training ground behind the courtyard for my Tropius." As he spoke, Lu Li pointed at Tropius behind him.

The middle-aged manager joked, "That won't be a problem, but this barely counts as renovation anymore. Isn't this more like tearing everything down and rebuilding it?"

Lu Li asked seriously, "You could say that. Can you do it?"

This really did count as tearing it all down and rebuilding it, but Lu Li, who had a fortune at hand, was not worried about money at all.

"I just took a look at the courtyard and the surrounding environment. If we tear everything down and rebuild it all, it will cost around two to two and a half million," the middle-aged manager said.

Lu Li nodded, then made another request. "That's fine, but I want to move in as soon as possible."

"Two days. If you're willing to let us start work today, we can finish by the afternoon of the day after tomorrow," the middle-aged manager said confidently.

"So fast?" Lu Li, who did not understand the market, was somewhat surprised. He even wondered whether the decoration company would cut corners to save time.

The middle-aged manager explained, "We're actually a construction group. Machoke Heavy Industries Group is our parent company, so both speed and quality are absolutely guaranteed.

"Our construction crews have Machoke and even Mr. Mime, which is why we can work so quickly."

Hearing that, the corner of Lu Li's mouth twitched slightly.

Machoke were not particularly rare Pokémon, but Mr. Mime was a Psychic-type Pokémon. Wasn't using one at a construction site a bit wasteful?

"Then I'm relieved. You can start work today." After calculating the costs, Lu Li turned his gaze to the middle-aged woman beside him.

"Once the decoration company is done, I'll need you to clean the entire estate."

The middle-aged woman nodded. "No problem. One day will be enough."

After reaching an agreement with both companies, Lu Li left Jinji Village.

"Hmm?"

Just after flying out of Jinji Village, Lu Li had Tropius stop.

"That direction..."

On a sudden whim, Lu Li directed, "Tropius, go take a look in that direction. It's quite close to the village, and with so many big trees, it might attract some Flying-type Pokémon to settle there."

That forest was too close to Jinji Village. If there really were Pokémon there, it would be best to drive them away in advance. Otherwise, he would be the one to suffer later.

Lu Li did not want his newly renovated home to be destroyed by wild Pokémon.

The moment they reached the forest overhead, Lu Li keenly noticed several big trees below shaking violently.

An orange bird burst out from the canopy. This strange bird Pokémon had a long, pointed beak.

Lu Li recognized it at a glance.

Fearow! One of the notorious Wild Three Bullies.

The other two bullies were Beedrill and Primeape. Together with Fearow, these three kinds of social Pokémon were known as the Wild Three Bullies.

Not only were these Pokémon hot-tempered and highly aggressive, they held grudges especially well. Most importantly, these bullies lived in groups!

"Caw~" After flying out, Fearow let out a vicious cry.