Chapter 51: Huablue Gym and I share the same enemy. (Patreon)

Among the Kanto region's Gyms, the Cerulean Gym ranked near the bottom, and many Trainers called it the easiest Gym to challenge.

When it came down to it, the reason was that the previous Gym Leader had died in an accident without leaving anything behind.

And Misty's three older sisters truly had no talent as Trainers or Breeders.

They could only rely on the Near-Champion-level Gyarados their father had left behind to hold up appearances. Aquatic ballet shows boosted the Gym's popularity and earned the funds to raise Pokémon, and they held on like that until their youngest sister was fully grown.

Misty, though, was a little different from how the anime portrayed her. She had grown up at her sisters' side, so saying she hadn't noticed the situation at all would be a joke.

The girl never said it out loud, but she had always been quietly working to better herself.

In real terms, she had been traveling for only a little over three months, yet her first Pokémon, the Staryu she'd brought from home, had not only evolved but already reached the Veteran level.

That pace might not look especially fast, but it was in fact blisteringly quick.

The Cerulean Gym wasn't short on money, but the truly good items were mostly priceless on the market. They could only be exchanged for League points, or obtained through barter.

The three Cerulean sisters held the Gym Leader qualification, and all the savings of the past few years had barely stretched to two high-quality Water Stones for Misty.

One had already been used on her Starmie. The other she planned to keep for some high-potential Water-type Pokémon she might catch in the future.

There were actually quite a few Elite-class, and even Gym-class, Pokémon inside the Cerulean Gym.

But much like the Near-Champion-level Gyarados, the most they ever did was lend a hand when the League came to inspect. The rest of the time, they never listened to the four sisters' commands.

And to win those Pokémon's approval and become their Trainer, you had to defeat them in a real fight.

Misty's talent as a Trainer was decent, but she was still a long way from fully grown.

At the very least, the tactic Renan had casually mentioned that afternoon was one she had never heard of or thought of, even though she lived in Cerulean City.

From that alone, the boy across the dinner table was clearly well ahead of her as a Trainer.

If she could steal a trick or two from him in the days ahead, maybe she could take over the Cerulean Gym sooner.

That was what Misty thought, and it was what she did.

However, over the next two full weeks, she was startled by Renan's ascetic way of life.

Every morning, as soon as he got up, he prepared breakfast for the many Pokémon living in the Cerulean Gym.

Then he set the training schedule for Charmeleon, Nidorino, Pidgeotto, and the Squirtle Squad that the Blazing Town police station had temporarily left in his care. Some of it was conditioning, some of it was improving move mastery and power.

After that, he ran off to the open ground outside the Cerulean Gym to learn new psychic moves.

Around eleven, he returned to the Gym to prepare lunch.

In the afternoon, he picked the morning's training back up.

After dinner, he didn't continue training.

But he still spent about two more hours massaging his partners' pressure points to ease their fatigue.

At that point, Misty had assumed the day was over.

Then one night at eleven, on her way to the bathroom, she passed the guest room Renan was staying in and found, through the crack under the door, that the light was still on.

Out of curiosity, the girl knocked, and saw a notebook spread open on the writing desk not far from the door.

She knew it was a little rude, but Misty still couldn't resist asking what he was doing.

Renan didn't refuse to answer, mainly because Misty and her sisters were all Trainers who specialized in Water-type Pokémon.

"My uncle gave me a training notebook on Charizard. I'm studying it."

The girl asked again, "Um, who's your uncle?"

Renan glanced across at her, his tone calm. "Yulong Lance."

Misty: "!!!"

How could any Trainer in Kanto not know the Elite Four?

True, the dragon-type Elite Four member Yulong Lance had lost year after year to Lorelei, the Ice-type Elite Four member he idolized, and never managed to become Champion. But that was down to type matchups plus the four-move limit in official matches.

If it were an anything-goes fight to the death in the wild, who would win and who would lose was anyone's guess.

Once she knew Renan was Yulong Lance's nephew, much of what had been puzzling Misty suddenly made sense.

At ten years old, some people showed up late on the day of their journey, and some were blind enough to abandon the starter Pokémon the League gave them.

And then there were people who were already Novice Breeders, Elite-level psychics, and fairly high-level Trainers on top of that.

It wasn't that the gap in talent was truly so enormous. One side had resources, and the other didn't.

Seeing the envy on the girl's face, Renan explained, "My father and Uncle Lance were colleagues, and my mother was a distant relative of the Yulong clan. But when I was very young, they had an accident."

Misty understood the feeling all too well. If there weren't photographs left at home, she wouldn't know what her own father looked like either.

So she spoke up to comfort him. "Um, I'm sorry for your loss."

She never expected the reply from across the room: "You too."

Misty: "?"

Renan looked at the girl in front of him. "When Gym Leader Violet mentioned the late Cerulean Gym Leader earlier, I went and looked into it on purpose. Your father died in the same accident as my parents."

"To put it more bluntly..." He paused for half a second, and his expression turned a little grave. "The Cerulean Gym and I have the same enemy."

Renan wasn't stretching the truth. On his second day in Cerulean City, when he went to pick up the package Lance had sent, he had used the computer at the Pokémon Center to connect to the League forum. Through its search function, he had found the list of the dead from the accident eight years ago.

In the notice, Misty's father and the names of the previous owner of his body's parents were quietly listed side by side.

The announcement stated that everyone involved had been arrested afterward. But if you dug into the wording and picked at the details, it was easy to see that the real mastermind had never shown himself.

Add the fact that Kanto's largest underground organization was Team Rocket, and a lot of things were practically nailed down and plain as day.

Misty, of course, harbored intense hatred for the enemy who had killed her father.

It was just that she and the Cerulean Gym were far too weak right now. Even if she wanted revenge, she couldn't possibly get it, and she didn't even know who the target was.

Still, toward Renan, who shared her circumstances, her attitude grew noticeably warmer.

She even phoned her sisters, far away in the Hoenn region, and after talking it over, they sent out a Water-type Pokémon egg, the reward for the temporary caretaker task, more than a week early.

"Since you've decided to enter the Indigo League, the sooner you start raising Pokémon, the better."