"...Of course."
Although Clair had no idea what had gotten into her cousin Lance to make him invite her on a trip to Paldea, she gave it some thought.
Then she readily accepted his invitation.
The reason was simple.
As a Gym Leader, she seemed to have hit another bottleneck lately.
Unlike Kanto, where practically every city had a Gym that awarded Badges, the Johto Region's Gyms were distributed differently.
As the final gatekeeper among Johto's Eight Gyms, she should have been responsible for assessing whether Trainers qualified to enter Victory Road.
In fact, Clair had been doing exactly that ever since taking over as Gym Leader from her father. Few rookie Trainers earned her approval, and her pass rate had always been low.
But this year, things had suddenly changed completely.
It was only mid-February. Based on past experience, she shouldn't have had any challengers yet.
Yet reality was the exact opposite.
A batch of talented youngsters had appeared out of nowhere, seemingly speedrunning the other seven Gyms in a single month before arriving in Blackthorn City to challenge her.
And when Clair fulfilled her duties as Gym Leader and set out to test them properly, she quickly noticed something strange.
Didn't these rookies' tactics seem a little too familiar?
Judging by all those bizarre disruptive moves, they'd probably all studied in Teacher Yu's livestream...
And so Clair soon discovered the truth-
Why had the other Gym Leaders been speedrun?
Because Johto was a very traditional place. That was obvious from the cultural atmosphere of Ecruteak City, Violet City, and her own Blackthorn City.
The people here were easygoing and mostly occupied with their own work. Quite a few barely even used their phones.
That was especially true of its Gym Leaders.
Falkner, who aspired to become an investigator