Buson looked like a tough guy, but he cracked easily.
"W-we came here to..."
To make money.
Conquering the world came after making a fortune. From top to bottom, Team Rocket's hunger for money was unmatched by any other villainous organization.
Team Rocket had once assessed Orre's "commercial value" and concluded that illicit methods would struggle to turn a profit there, while legitimate ventures required heavy investment and offered painfully slow returns.
Team Rocket's overseas expansion had gone poorly in recent years. Giovanni would never pour that much money into the bottomless pit that was Orre.
So the plan for an Orre branch base had been shelved.
Then again.
Why had Team Rocket suddenly changed its mind?
First, the land itself had changed in a short time.
Even in the Pokémon World, black soil was a scarce resource.
Team Rocket wanted to dig up vast quantities of it and sell it. They had even found buyers; all they needed was to finish building the branch base and start digging.
Then there were...
Rare, endangered plants.
Botanists had recently discovered numerous plants in Orre's forests that were endangered or on the brink of extinction.
Team Rocket intended to steal and sell them.
There were also rumors of exceptionally rare-earth deposits in Orre. If Team Rocket could mine them, that would mean another staggering payday.
They coveted Calyrex, who had brought about all these changes, too.
After the brothers Basho and Buson failed in their last raid on Meteor Village and were captured, they had fallen out of favor within Team Rocket. They took on this important mission to redeem themselves.
Who could have imagined that, before they had even gotten started, Baimu would show up alone and flatten their entire base?
Even if Baimu let them go, Team Rocket wouldn't.
Unlike