Pokemon: An Icy Path

Chapter 28

I left the land of my dreams to wake up to an empty room. It felt weird not to have any of my pokemon near me, but I understood that they needed a checkup. I slowly climb out of bed and go into the bathroom to take another shower to clean off the sweat from when I was sleeping. I don’t normally sweat when I meditate as it seems to increase the ice energy I produce, but sleeping means no regulation on my energy, causing me to sweat like it is the middle of summer in New Orleans. 

While I let the cool water slide across my skin, I start to think over what we need to do while we are in Cerulean City. We need to stock up on our supplies, sign up for the gym, train our new pokemon, win our badge and decide our next stop. There really isn’t much for us in this city besides getting the badge, so it should be a fairly quick stay. I step out of the shower and head over to the desk to grab my phone. I notice that it is hardly two in the morning, yet I am wide awake. I decide to use my two gacha spins to see what items I might get.

[Congratulations host, you have received an Aspear Berry.]

[Congratulations Host, you have received fifty meters of soft silk rope.]

I raise my eyebrow at the fact that I received rope again as the items appear in front of me. On the table in front of me a round yellow fruit with green circles on it appears next to two bundles of rope. One rope is neon green, so bright that I swear that it is glowing, and one a deep black color that seems to absorb light. On the two bundles is a small note. I pick up the note and see that it has some beautiful hand writing on it that says; Rope is only intended for intimate uses. I chuckle at that as someone was not happy that I used the rope to tie up someone that didn’t turn into fun time.

Tossing the note towards the trash, I notice that it dissipates into a flurry of snowflakes once it leaves my hand. That was a cool effect, I wonder if I will be able to do that someday. Glancing at the stuff on the desk, I decide to put it away later and start doing a slow yoga routine. Even though I don’t know everything about yoga, I still remember some of the more basic positions that help improve my flexibility. I set my music player to start playing some lofi music and I start to zone out as I go through my routine. I don’t feel like training today as we just arrived in the city so it should be a day of fun. 

As I finish up, I check the time and find that only two hours have passed. I sigh and close my eyes for a moment. I really need to find stuff to do at night. Ever since I started my cultivation I have needed less and less sleep. I’m afraid that at one point I will no longer need to sleep even though my pokemon will. I grab some clothes out of my bag and toss them on before heading downstairs to the lobby. Like you would expect at this time of the morning, the lobby is completely empty except for Nurse Joy who is manning the counter. I decide to check to see if my pokemon finished with their checkup.

“Good morning Nurse Joy. I was wondering if my pokemon are ready to be picked up?”

“Good morning, you are up early. Can you please provide me with your Trainer Id so I can check for you?” I offer up my phone with my ID already showing for her. It only takes a couple of seconds for her to look up my pokemon before she responds. “It looks like everyone is okay. There are no injuries and everyone is happy. Give me a moment and I will bring them out to you.” I give her a nod as she disappears into the back of the center. A short while later, Nurse Joy returns with a tray with three pokeballs that have a snowflake on them. “Here is everyone for you.” 

I thank her as I grab my pokeballs and head back to my room. Once the door to my room closes, I let out everyone from their pokeballs and soon a number of happy cries greet me as my pokemon see me. I give each one a hug before I sit down on the bed and everyone takes their position. Chingling being as small as he is and the newest member settles down in front of my feet with a gentle jingle. 

“We need to decide on a name for you, don’t we Chingling? It’s not fair that you don’t have a name to call your own.” Chingling answers by giving a single chime that I am taking as an agreement. I think for a moment then I believe I have a good idea. “How about Lono? It is the name of a god of music from where I come from.” Chingling starts to bounce around happily at getting a name. “Lono it is then.” I say with a smile. As he starts to calm down, I grab the remote for the TV from the desk and start flipping through the channels to find something to watch.

I’m not sure how long it is before my phone goes off with a notification of a message. I grab my phone and see that it is now past eight in the morning and I have a pair of messages from Flannery and Bea to let me know that they are awake and to meet for breakfast. I rouse my sleeping pokemon and get up from the bed. I pet Zephyr for a few minutes before I put her back in her pokeball as she is too big to have out in the city proper. I head down to the lobby with Skadi and Lono trailing behind me. I look around but I don’t see the two girls yet so I find a table for us and sit down while ordering a coffee for myself and some food for my pokemon.

It’s not long before I spot the fire-red hair of Flannery coming out of the stairwell, followed by Bea. The pair see me and wave before heading to the counter with Nurse Joy to retrieve their pokemon as well. They soon join me at the table and we talk about what our plans are for the city. We all agree that besides the gym battle, there really isn’t much to attract our attention. After we register for our battles today, we will walk around to see what we find. We get up after we finish our breakfast and head out of the pokecenter to the next most prominent structure of the city.

The pokecenter we chose is the closest one to the actual gym itself so it didn’t take long before we reached a circular white building decorated with all sorts of water type pokemon and underwater flora. It honestly reminds me of an aquarium, especially because the windows that are visible hold all sorts of underwater flora and fauna as well as some of the more peaceful species of water type pokemon.

We find the line for registration and quickly join it. The line moves quickly as registering for a battle doesn’t take long. The three of us decided to have our battles all on the same day, one right after the other. This would make it so we couldn’t watch each other battle, as we would not be able to get into the stands quick enough, but it would also lower the time we would need to spend here before we head off to the next city. 

When we reach the counter, our registration takes no time at all as I don’t have an issue with any of my pokemon and I already registered once before. All they need to do is scan my Trainer ID and tell them how many pokemon are going to fight. We were able to get back to back timeslots two days from now as everything before that was all booked up. 

Once we all register, we head out of the mass of people surrounding the gym and decide to explore the city. While we walk around we do some window shopping to see if anything catches our eye. Besides everything being water themed, there really isn’t anything special about the wares in the city. None of the water themed items give me the same tug that winter or snow themed items do. The three of us chat quietly as we walk along and explore the city.