First Battle

Just as he was lost in thought, several more lines of transparent text popped up.

[Pokémon: Ekans / Gender: ♀ / Level: 15]

[Ability: Shed Skin / Type: Poison / Status: Joyful]

[Bonus Attributes: 0 / Friendship: 80]

[Moves: Acid lv2 / Poison Sting lv2]

[Bite lv1 / Poison Fang lv2]

Bonus attributes! Move levels!

"What's wrong?"

While Heiduo was thinking, Serea asked from beside him.

"Oh! I'm a little excited." Heiduo blinked, realizing this was not the time to think about such things. He could continue mulling it over after returning to the dormitory.

The moment he looked away, the transparent words turned into three small dots and remained in the lower-right corner of his vision.

He stroked the Ekans on his body. It was coiled around him, its head exploring everywhere as its forked tongue lightly flicked across Kurozawa's body, seemingly sniffing for something.

It was said that snakes had an extremely keen sense of smell, though they collected scent particles from the air with their tongues in order to distinguish different odors.

"So you really are a young lady." Heiduo smiled faintly. He had guessed that Ekans was female, but he had not expected to be right.

Ekans hissed and wrapped itself tightly around Heiduo's neck.

Serea watched Heiduo and Ekans acting so intimately. Her expression did not change, but she reached out and stroked Zubat's head.

"Pokémon are like that. If you treat them sincerely, they'll trust you without reservation."

Heiduo was deeply grateful to Serea. Without her, he would probably have been completely at a loss right now.

He said, "Thank you. You've helped me a lot... I thought carefully about what you mentioned before, and I think it's very necessary. Does what you said still count?"

Since Serea had helped him so much, it would be a little wrong to keep stringing her along.

Serea froze briefly before saying, "Of course it counts!"

"Pleasure working with you." Heiduo extended his hand to Serea. He had not expected Team Rocket to have someone so warmhearted.

Why had she joined this organization?

Could she be putting on an act? No way, right?

"Pleasure working with you."

Serea lightly shook Kurozawa's hand. There was still little expression on her face.

The secret observation room.

"How many have successfully brought their Pokémon under control?"

The squad captain sat in a boss's chair with his feet propped on the heavily mechanized command console, radiating an imposing presence.

"Five in total, Captain Lan!"

Amid the dense array of surveillance feeds, a Team Rocket grunt in a black uniform sat before the monitors and reported to Lan.

It was hard to believe that such a muscular brute had such an elegant name as Lan.

"Which ones are they?" Lan asked with his eyes closed.

The grunt enlarged several surveillance feeds. There were four screens in total, with Heiduo and Serea conspicuously among them.

He reported, "They are Heiduo, who has Ekans; Serea, who has Zubat; Ji, who has Rattata; Jieli, who has Zubat; and Guifu, who has Geodude. Serea was the fastest, while Guifu was the slowest."

Upon hearing those names, Lan let out a long breath.

"Open the doors."

The grunt froze, then said in alarm, "Captain! They haven't returned their Pokémon to their Poké Balls yet!"

"Open the doors!" Lan repeated.

The grunt decided to obey and pressed a red button on the console.

Bang!

A muffled sound came from outside.

Bang!

A loud crash echoed throughout the entire gymnasium.

Heiduo, who had been chatting with Serea in an attempt to glean information from her, jumped in fright.

The two turned and saw that the tightly shut doors had opened.

A bad feeling rose in Heiduo's heart.

"Zubat!"

"My Geodude! Don't run away!"

"Come back, Spearow!"

Wails and cries of alarm began to erupt across the field.

Heiduo's heart trembled as he quickly looked at the Ekans on his body.

What greeted him was a pair of wide snake eyes and the increasingly tight coils around him.

"Did that scare you?"

Seeing that Ekans had no intention of leaving, Heiduo relaxed his tense body and gently stroked its scales.

As he did so, Heiduo suddenly noticed a patch on Ekans that did not feel quite right. Looking closely, he found a scar more than ten centimeters long. It looked exceptionally vicious on Ekans's body.

His brows furrowed slightly. Seeing his expression, Serea suddenly said, "Since the doors are open, I'll head back first. And since we've formed an alliance, shall we meet at the training ground at ten tomorrow morning?"

Meet at ten?

"...All right." Heiduo agreed. Serea was probably thinking of getting familiar with battling while also building up their teamwork.

By now, nearly everyone in the gymnasium had left. Most had gone to chase after their Pokémon, while a small number planned to return to their dorms before opening their Poké Balls.

The two headed toward the exit.

They had only made it halfway when two boys blocked their path.

"I'm Jieli!"

"My name is Guifu!"

The two boys spoke in unison. "Let's have a Pokémon battle!"

Heiduo looked at the two of them. Their eyes were filled with zeal and a thirst for battle. Beside them stood a Geodude eager to fight and a Zubat flapping its wings in the air.

"Sure!"

Before Heiduo could say anything, Serea agreed without hesitation.

Heiduo stared at her in disbelief. "You accepted that quickly?"

"Pokémon battles are inevitable. You can't avoid them," Serea explained flatly.

Heiduo was silent for a moment, then nodded. "Fine. You're right. This was bound to happen sooner or later."

There was no way they had been given Pokémon merely to keep as pets. Team Rocket likely wanted to cultivate their battle abilities.

After all, Team Rocket's opponent was the Pokémon League—a terrifying force made up of Gym Leaders, the Elite Four, and countless Elite Trainers. How could a bunch of grunts possibly stand against them?

If Heiduo wanted to continue getting by in Team Rocket... no matter where he went, Pokémon battles were extremely important in the Pokémon world.

"Quit dragging your feet already!"

Jieli, the boy, sounded impatient.

Heiduo remained unmoved and asked calmly, "How do you want to battle?"

"Of course, one-on-one!" Guifu hurriedly shouted.

Jieli immediately followed. "Right! One-on-one!"

Heiduo and Serea exchanged looks. She nodded at him, signaling her approval.

"Fine!"

The moment Heiduo spoke, Jieli and Serea looked at each other and ran off into the distance one after another.

Why? Because the Zubat on Serea's shoulder had already flown into the air and begun dancing around Jieli's Zubat.

But they did not seem to be getting along very well, because Serea's Zubat was emitting threatening low-frequency sounds at Jieli's Zubat.

Humans could not hear those low-frequency sounds, but they were the primary means of communication among Zubat.

"They're doing their thing, and we're doing ours!"

Guifu licked his lips.

Geodude seemed to be Ground type and Rock type. Going by Ekans's Poison type, this seemed extremely unfavorable.

Heiduo felt a trace of unease. He had never memorized the type chart and had no idea how Poison type fared against Ground type plus Rock type.

From what he remembered, Poison type seemed unable to beat Rock type.

He did not know about Ground type.

Still, Heiduo had an advantage. Normally, after receiving a Pokémon, it was impossible to immediately know all four of its moves like in the games and anime.

Just as Heiduo was thinking, Guifu had already run out of patience.

"You really are slow! Geodude, use Tackle!"

He shouted excitedly, and the Geodude beside him immediately sprang into action.

With a loud roar, Geodude suddenly charged at the Ekans wrapped around Heiduo.

"Damn!"

Heiduo was startled by Geodude's sudden attack. He had miscalculated! And hadn't Geodude supposedly been slow?

But the Ekans on him was clearly faster. It instantly slipped free from Heiduo's body, nimbly dodged Geodude's Tackle, then whipped its tail hard against Geodude's head!

Bang!

Geodude was abruptly knocked to the ground, yet it was completely unhurt.

Geodude's body was less than half a meter away from Heiduo.

"You!"

Heiduo's face turned livid. Guifu had attacked without caring that Ekans was still on him.

But he was not an idiot who only knew how to complain. He quickly shouted, "Use Bite!"

However, Ekans did not attack immediately like it would have in the anime. Instead, it turned to look at Heiduo, its movements hesitant.

It was as if Heiduo had made a bad call.

"Hahaha, looks like your Ekans doesn't listen to you very well!" Guifu laughed loudly. "Geodude, use Rock Throw!"

The moment he finished speaking, a dark brown glow lit up in Geodude's hands, and a fist-sized rock rapidly condensed into shape.

Geodude hurled the rock at Ekans with all its strength.

Watching the rock hurtle toward it, Heiduo's thoughts raced. Then he suddenly understood. As Rock-type Pokémon, their physical defense was always high. Bite was obviously a physical attack, so it probably would not deal much damage to Geodude!

So that was it!

Heiduo suddenly understood. Then he saw Ekans effortlessly dodge the speeding rock, looking thoughtful.

Rock types had high physical defense, but they were generally slow. If he relied on Ekans's speed, could he kite Geodude?

Right! The other requirement for kiting! Long-range attacks!

Heiduo stared at the three dots in the lower-right corner of his vision. Sure enough, they enlarged and turned into several lines of transparent text.

Acid!

"That's right!" Heiduo clapped his hands excitedly and looked up at the bewildered Guifu. "Ekans! Use Acid!"

"Your Pokémon won't listen to you!" Guifu said somewhat arrogantly. He crossed his arms and stood there, waiting to watch Heiduo make a fool of himself.

Unfortunately for him, not only did he fail to see a joke, he instead watched Ekans spray a stream of murky dark-purple liquid at incredible speed.

Geodude was drenched from head to toe.

"Roar!" Geodude let out a pained howl.

Heiduo's eyes lit up. Acid was highly effective—it had dealt quite a bit of damage!

"Nice job, Ekans!" he could not help praising it.

Ekans raised its head and hissed, "Hiss!" Clearly, it was very pleased by Heiduo's praise.

"Impossible! Just now you—" Guifu's expression changed drastically as he roared, "Geodude, use Sand Attack!"