"Donghuang is so big. Where should I go to find him? That's a good question."
Iono already had a huge following of die-hard fans. They had long since grown used to her doing whatever struck her fancy on stream, and instead asked what she planned to do next.
After all, the other person wasn't anyone famous. Having a Meowscarada and planning to enter a competition barely narrowed things down at all.
The only major official competitions were the regional conferences and the Pokémon World Championships, but beyond those, there were more scattered recreational tournaments than anyone could count.
"Iono just wants to travel and pad her streaming hours while she's at it... as if! Iono takes every Iono Zone stream very seriously! First, let's use the process of elimination.
"This year's Donghuang Conference only just ended, and the Pokémon World Championships haven't started yet. The biggest upcoming competition in Donghuang should be... the Pangoro Academy Cup!
"That uploader is a college student too, right? Then it's settled! We're leaving right now. Destination: Tianfu, Donghuang!"
As she spoke, Iono pulled a suitcase shaped like a square Bellibolt out of nowhere and began packing live in front of her enormous audience.
"What if we don't run into him? Then I'll take you to visit the world's biggest Pancham breeding center instead! I hear everyone there can breathe fire. It's bound to be super fun~"
Iono was a woman of action. She had already bought her plane ticket and planned to fly straight to her destination. As for the Levincia Gym...
Since its Gym Leader was away working on her side hustle, it was temporarily closed, of course~
According to the theory of "Six Degrees of Separation," under optimal conditions, you only needed to go through six people to meet anyone you wanted.
But that was only a theory. At least, none of the people in Iono's stream knew an obscure nobody like Xin Mu.
While getting ready to leave, Iono even said she might run into him at the airport.
But that would never happen. Unless the train station and airport were built together in the same city, Xin Mu would never spawn anywhere near an airport.
At that very moment, Xin Mu was still on the high-speed train, listening to a storytelling performance.
Normally, he didn't listen to those, but this world's historical and cultural works... were a little different from what he knew.
Something both familiar and unfamiliar to him was playing through his earphones.
"Zijing, did you know that I encountered an ancient divine beast on Nanping Mountain, named Suicune? This beast was born of the essence of the north wind. Summoning wind and rain is as easy for it as reaching into a pocket!"
With that, he led everyone up to the Seven Star Altar. There, Zhuge Kongming lit three sticks of incense and raised the Jade Jue from his waist above his head. In an instant, countless rays of blue light burst from the sea of clouds!
A dragon's cry shook the heavens, and an enormous beast, blue from head to toe, came striding over the waves!
Its tails resembled flowing clouds curling over the surf, and the crystal on its forehead cast a frosty glow across the Yangtze River in broad daylight. Zhuge Liang bowed to the ground. "Suicune, sorry for the trouble, but please lend us three days of east wind!"
The divine beast raised its head and let out a long cry. Countless whirlpools suddenly formed on the river, and the northwesterly wind wheeled around in midair, becoming a fierce southeasterly gale!
Huang Gai's fire ships rode the wind straight toward the Cao Camp, while Suicune summoned the raging waves of the Yangtze River to drive them onward...
As the saying went... without Suicune stirring those fearsome waves, how could a thousand ships have burned to ash at Red Cliffs!
Well, the burning of Red Cliffs and borrowing the east wind were familiar enough. It was just that this east wind... had been summoned by Suicune.
Xin Mu had no idea why Suicune would be in this region. The canonical Pokémon setting had never mentioned Donghuang either.
Besides, with so much time having passed, it didn't seem unreasonable for these special Pokémon to roam around.
There were all sorts of other strange stories too, such as the Hegemon King traveling west into the Fengdu Deathlands and obtaining Spectrier as his mount on a snowfield.
Emperor Gaozu of Han won Meloetta's favor, and his enemies were besieged on all sides by the songs of Chu...
Auspicious omens had originally served only to signify the mandate of heaven, but here, that role seemed to have been assigned to the more mysterious Pokémon. All the famous historical figures had connections to powerful Pokémon.
History had changed considerably too. After the Three Kingdoms period came the Donghuang League's Magical Beast Era, and the League system had endured to the present day.
"Meow~ (Is it really that interesting?)"
Meownei was curled up in her airline seat, licking the pudding the owner had given her earlier.
Watching Xin Mu laugh every so often, Meownei couldn't understand what was so interesting about those tongue-twisting stories.
At first, she and Xin Mu had shared a pair of earphones, but she had stopped listening after deciding it was boring.
"It's actually pretty interesting. There's plenty of absurd stuff too."
History could never escape unofficial accounts. Those accounts weren't necessarily authentic, but they were definitely wild.
An eleven-hour train ride was hardly short. Although the scenery outside kept changing, even that could grow tiresome.
After a while, Meownei lost interest in the view outside.
One perk of business class was the free meal at mealtimes. Of course, compared with the wildly inflated ticket price, that meal was worth very little.
It was only because the fare could be reimbursed that Xin Mu was here. Otherwise, he would probably still be in a second-class carriage.
"Meow... meow~ (It's not good. Not as good as what that spiky-haired guy made.)"
Meownei held a portion of multicolored Pokémon food. Most of the time, she ate the same things as Xin Mu, or simply ate some Berries and replenished her energy through Synthesis, which was unique to Grass-type Pokémon.
But she didn't mind specially prepared Pokémon food either, and occasionally ate it as a snack, like cookies or chips.
"He's a professional breeder, after all. We can buy some more from him the next time we run into him."
There was no point expecting anything specially prepared on a high-speed train. Brock was responsible for feeding a whole bunch of younger siblings and Pokémon, after all. His cooking was far better than this mass-produced stuff.
"If you don't like it, leave it. Want some of mine?"
"Meow~ meow? (It's not so bad I can't swallow it. It'll do. What are you looking at?)"
Meownei leaned over from the other side of her seat and stared, a little bored, at the screen Xin Mu was scrolling through.
"Just browsing. How about I buy you a phone too?"
"Meow~ (No. I want to share yours.)"
Meownei firmly rejected the suggestion. What mattered to her wasn't looking at the screen, but doing it together. Then she suddenly spotted a topic that interested her and raised a paw to stop Xin Mu from scrolling past it.
[As we all know, literary works contain plenty of fictional elements, such as Lü Bu. Yet the incident of him shooting the halberd at the camp gate really happened.
Why was he so powerful? Based on my research, his mother might not have been human, but a Decidueye from beyond the pass...
He inherited that talent, along with certain habits. So Diao Chan most likely wasn't human either, but...]
Yes, this one was good. Meownei found it quite interesting.
The journey was long, but business class was fairly comfortable. When Xin Mu grew sleepy, he handed his valuables to the still thoroughly energetic Meownei, put on an eye mask, and settled down for a nap.
Meanwhile, in the second-class carriage farther back, Old Liu, who had paid his own way, was having a much less pleasant time. Two people beside him were arguing over adjusting their seats, and their shouting had frightened a nearby child, whose crying never seemed to stop.
All Old Liu could do was rub his temples helplessly and stare at his watch, hoping time would pass faster.
Before you continue