Chapter 79 - Kanto League Round 1 ! Mismatch!!

Indigo Plateau, the place where the Kanto's Pokemon League Tournament are held each year. At long last, one of the biggest event for all Pokemon Fans and Trainers that have been awaited for a year long time would start in less than 24 hours.

Rize and Ryussei have arrived at the reception centre to confirm their registration and booked a room to stay during the League Tournament season. Trainers that participate in the tournament got the privileges of staying in the luxurious dorm of the League and many other facilities including full course meals all for free.

"Your registration of participant is done! You are participant number 11." Said the reception counter lady with a warm friendly manner and handed Rize some sort of card and a guide book to him. "And this is your identity card, it functioned to be your room key as well. Please take note that the opening ceremony will be held after dinner on 8 P.M. For more information please look at the Pokemon League guide book. Thank you and have a nice day. All the best for you and we hope you enjoy your stay."

Rize and Ryussei then split up from here on as from then onwards they will be opponents. They went to their own room seperately.

"So my room's number 11 too huh, I guess they determined it from our participant number to make it easier." Rize talking to himself while looking at his identity card or room key.

When he arrived at the front of his room door, a friend of his just came out from the room next door which was room number 10.

"Rize! You made it to the League!" Satoshi greeted Rize with spirit.

"Yeah! I owe you one for giving me a wake-up call that time at the Viridian Forest."

"Nahh.. that was nothin, we ought to help our fellow friends when they're in trouble shouldn't we? Anyway we are rivals now! Let's all do our best in this tournament! I gotta go for some training to further perfecting my moves and plan for strategy now. See ya!" Satoshi left after.

Rize then inserted his room key to the card slot on the door's body and the door automatically opened by itself to the side. It was a slide door. The room lifted up its reputation to be cozy and luxurious. The bed is a nice comfort fluffy queen size bed, the furniture are of high quality and neat, not forgetting the extra clean bathroom. After settling down with his stuffs, Rize immediately went out warming up and exercising with all of his Pokemon in preparation for the big match.

Time flew, the clock appointed at 8 P.M sharp and a fireworks was launched to open the opening ceremony of the Kanto Pokemon League Tournament. All 128 participating Trainers have gathered on the field and after several rules and announcements the big result board started to show all of the Trainers pictures and randomly spin and matched up pairing Trainers to compete.

The spinning have stopped, every Trainer eagerly searched for their first round opponent. Rize found his picture and was shocked to see who is his first round opponent. It was Shigeru, Prof.Oak's grandson and Satoshi's number one rival. He is known to be a prodigy and many had made assumption and prediction that he will be the champion of this tournament this year just like he did in the Junior League Tournament two years ago.

From a distance across, Rize could see Shigeru was looking at him with an annoying smile and look, looking down on Rize as if he had found a delicious duck and a guaranteed victory. Rize immediately went and locked himself in his room to think of a battle strategy on how to win against this most terrifying opponent on his first round tomorrow. On his way back, he met again with Satoshi and Satoshi wished him the best of luck to battle against his rival.

"How can I got such an opponent in my first round?! How am I going to win?!" Complained Rize to himself. He couldn't have come up with any strategy as he have no information regarding Shigeru at all and he was slept without any battle plan for tomorrow.


                                      ---------The Next Day---------
The Kanto League Tournament finally started and it was broadcasted internationally throughout the whole region to watch in television live! Rize's mom in Hoenn and some other of his friends from another regions have tune in to the broadcast to watch his battle.

"Kanto Intermediate League Tournament's fifth's first round match is about to begin!! Pokemon battle fans, let's welcome our two competitors to the arena! On the red corner we have Shigeru! Prof.Oak's prodigal grandson!!" Shigery come forth and entered the arena and the whole stadium cheered for him.

"On the green corner we have Rize! He have come from a far away Hoenn region to compete in this tournament, he must be one passionate Pokemon Trainer!!" The commentator finished his lines and the battle was about to begin. The result board was turned on displaying Rize's and Shigeru's picture with three blank squares. The blank squares indicates the Pokemon that is going to be use in this battle.

The referee take his stand on his referee's spot and begin the match. "It's three on three Pokemon battle with free substitution. Trainers please sent forth your Pokemon at the same time after I finished counting to three! 3! 2! 1! Begin!"

"Alakazam come forward!"
"Gyarados let's go!"

Shigeru sent forth an Alakazam while Rize sent out his Gyarados.

"Alakazam the Psi Pokemon and the evolved form of Kadabra. It is a Psychic type. The spoons clutched in its hands are said to have been created by its psychic powers. Its highly developed brain is on par with a supercomputer. It can use all forms of psychic abilities."

"Done checking on my Pokemon? Come attack us!" Shigeru taunted Rize to attack confidently.

Mocked by Shigeru, Rize lost his calm and ordered Gyarados to attack with its Hydro Pump attack. Gyarados fired its Hydro Pump towards Alakazam.

"Alakazam use Psychic and send the water away from you!"

Alakazam's eyes began to shine brightly and used its psychic power to send the coming water force towards him up high to the sky thus the attack failed to hit Alakazam.

"What the! It manipulated our attack! Gyarados fire another Hydro Pump! Don't give it time to rest or counter us back!"

Gyarados fired another shot of Hydro Pump towards Alakazam before it can use any attack to Gyarados.

"If they would have use other attack than Hydro Pump I could just counter their attacks right back to them using Alakazam's Psychic. I guess he's pretty smart." Shigeru grinned despite of Alakazam's situation that will be hit by Hydo Pump soon.

"Alakazam use Teleport to dodge!"


Just an inch before the attack successfully hit Alakazam's body, Alakazam responded quick to Shigeru's command and used Teleport to instantly moved to the right side avoiding the attack.

"How is it?! Admit defeat! None of your attacks will be able to hit my Alakazam! Hahaha!" Shigeru provoked Rize further with his irritating laugh.

"Gyarados! Fire more Hydro Pump until you hit them!"

Gyarados kept firing its Hydro Pump but Alakazam dodged every single one of them with its Teleport with ease.

"Told ya.. Alakazam let's teach them a lesson with a taste of a little bit of your power! Thunder Bolt! Just use a little bit of your power tough.."

Alakazam began to charged, its whole body glowed brightly yellowish and fired a Thunder Bolt attack from its shining spoon and quickly land a direct hit towards Gyarados body and electrocuted it.

"Gyarados!!" Rize screamed in panic.

"Gyarados being both Water and Flying type is extremely weak against Electric attack! Is it still in this match?? Looks like Shigeru have the upper hand as predicted and Rize is in a pinch! This is a total mismatch!" Said the commentator loud and clear that the whole stadium could hear it.

The spectators in the stadium was all amazed by Shigeru's brilliant battle performance and shouted and cheered for him while Rize was in much distress situation.

Chapter 78 - Special Training! Bulbasaur's Deepest Desire

The next day, after defeated by Agatha of the Elite 4, Rize stayed at Ryussei's place until the start of the Kanto league in a few weeks time.

The sun have shone brightly up in the sky as it was half past eight. Rize came out from the house and went to an open field. It looks like he was going to have a special training in preparation for the league tournament.

He spotted a fine plain field that consists of some rocks and the ground was made up of solid soil and it was wide enough of about the width of a regular battlefield to do some training.

"Alright! Everyone assemble!" Rize threw up all of his Pokeballs and summoned every Pokemon that he have captured throughout his journey in Kanto including those that were kept and raised at the Prof's place.

So everyone is gathered. From the left was Kingler then to its right was Poliwrath followed by Butterfree, Sandslash, Pidgeot, Charizard, Jolteon, Bulbasaur and finally Gyarados. All were assembled in a straight line.

"I need to teach them new powerful moves and strengthen each and everyone of them. If not, I won't stand a chance to win the league! Powerful opponents like Reinz, Satoshi are going to be there. What's more there will be other stronger Trainers from around the region and maybe even outside the region as well!"

So he began training each and everyone of them and polished every attack moves that they are able to use and strengthen them.

"Let's see..Poliwrath's moved are Hydro Pump, Ice Beam, Hypnosis and Wake-up Slap. Poliwrath's a part fighting type and its physical strength is stronger than its special attack. Ice Beam need to be replaced by Ice Punch!" Rize talked to himself as he was checking on Poliwrath's stat through his Pokedex.

Just like he trained Swampert to master Ice Punch in the past, Poliwrath was now under the same training learning its new move, Ice Punch, to replace Ice Beam.

Sandslash and Kingler battling style are almost the same as they fight using their pincers and claws. Rize put them together to share and learn each other's move that can be learned in common to both of them. Kingler then thought Sandslash of using the move Swords Dance, a move to boost physical strength in battle.

Charizard and Gyarados are pretty similar. Both are dragon alike but not a real Dragon type. Their only difference was that one is a Fire type and the other is a Water type. Their second type nature is also the same which was Flying type.

Rize wanted to improve Gyarados' Dragon type attack so he told Charizard to teach Dragon Breath in replace of its Dragon Rage attack. Charizard demonstrated its devastating Dragon Breath attack to Gyarados and a wave of scarlet colour breath attack emitted from the orange like dragon Pokemon's mouth and destroyed a medium sized rock on the field and crippled it to pieces.

Gyarados tried to mimic Charizard but it ended up using its old Dragon Rage attack. Learning was a process after all and it can't be mastered as fast and simple as it seems. However, Gyarados was doing its best not to  disappoint his beloved Trainer and kept trying.

Rize's Jolteon got a little problem with its accuracy with its Thunder attack. Although it is a powerful move, it have no use if it can't the target and so Rize was trying to figure to bring solution to this problem and improved on Jolteon's accuracy by training it to shoot some moving target objects.

Finally Rize came to his little Grass type Pokemon, Bulbasaur. Rize planned to evolve Bulbasaur all the way to its final form before the league started. He just train his Bulbasaur focusing on leveling it up on every aspect of its ability and the training goes for days.

Three days have passed ever since Rize started his special training on all of his Pokemon. Each of them all have bear fruits from their trainings. Sandslash can now used Swords Dance and Metal Claw. Kingler can now use Metal Claw as well. Poliwrath have mastered Ice Punch and thought Gyarados to use Ice Beam. Gyarados have successfully mastered the Dragon Breath it learned from Charizard as well.

As for Jolteon, its accuracy was still a problem but they have came up to the solution to replace Thunder with Thunderbolt and now Jolteon's accuracy to hit even moving target was much better. Even tough its power was reduced, Rize sacrificed some power for accuracy.

Everything went quite well except for one. There is just one thing that have been bothering Rize for quite a while and that was because his Bulbasaur have not yet evolved even after the special training.

The league was going to start in two days time and he hoped that at least his Bulbasaur would evolve into its second form, Ivysaur.

Rize thought that asking Ryussei for some tips and advices might help as he raised a Bulbasaur too and have made it all the way to its final form.

"It didn't took me a long time for my Bulbasaur to evolve into Ivysaur. If I remember correctly it was just about three months after I received it." Ryussei told Rize with an expressionless face. "When did you got your Bulbasaur?"

"I got my Bulbasaur at the first month of the year at Viridian Forest. It have been eleven months!" Rize answered with a worried face. "How come my Bulbasaur have not evolved yet? I don't think the level of its power is the issue here, it is strong enough to defeat bigger size Pokemon than itself."

Ryussei scanned Bulbasaur's power level stats with his Pokedex. "Indeed. It is a strong Bulbasaur. Stronger than any average Bulbasaur around. Let's ask the Professor about this problem."

They decided to ask the Professor and went to the Prof's lab where he works. The Professor listened to the problem and decided to do a check up and examined on Bulbasaur's body.

After about half an hour, the examination on Bulbasaur's body was done and the Professor showed the result and explained to Rize.

"Rize, let me be honest and straight forward. Your Bulbasaur will never be able to evolve." The Professor said it in an apologetic way.

"What?! What do you mean Prof? Why did my Bulbasaur will never be able to evolve?"

"When a Bulbasaur was born after it hatched from its egg, its parent would plant a mysterious magical seed on its bulb on its back. That seed was the core of Bulbasaur's growth that will grow and bloomed when it evolved. Your Bulbasaur just does not have that seed on its body and that is why it can never evolve."

Rize began to lose his patient and asked lots of question to the Professor. "How could my Bulbasaur does not have the seed needed for it to evolve! Isn't there any other way to make it evolve?"

"There is one way." The Professor paused for a moment and Rize listened intentively. "You have to find its parent to plant the seed on your Bulbasaur. Aside from that, I didn't see any other way."

After knowing the truth of his Bulbasaur, Rize was depressed. Bulbasaur who was at the back laying on the examination bed heard it all and ran away out of the lab with tears on its eyes.

"Bulbasaur where you going!? Wait up!" Rize shouted and gave it a chase. The Professor and Ryussei followed chasing it as well.

As Bulbasaur's running speed was not so fast, Rize managed to catch up with it and stop it from running away. Bulbasaur was crying all out. Rize gave it a deep hug to comfort it immediately.

"Bulbasaur, I know you're upset to found out that you're unable to evolve. I knew that you really wanted to evolve into a great big Venusaur when I saw the way you look towards Ryussei's Venusaur. I'm just as upset as you are. Who would not want to have a strong Venusaur as their Pokemon? But hey, I like you the way you are now Bulbasaur. Even if you would never be able to evolve, we will find a way for you to be stronger even without evolution! I'm sure of it! Together we can make it! You just have to trust in me, your Trainer!"

Bulbasaur calmed down after listening to Rize. Ryussei and the Professor finally caught up with them.

"Hey Rize, if you want my Venusaur and I could teach you a couple of attacks that could be useful to make your Bulbasaur stronger." Ryussei offered a help out of sympathy towards the poor little Bulbasaur.

"Really?! We will gladly accept it! Right Bulbasaur?" Rize was delighted in hearing it and so do Bulbasaur.

So Bulbasaur was trained under Ryussei's Venusaur in mastering new moves in order for it to become stronger and overcome its weakness in not being able to evolve.


At that very same day, Bulbasaur have fully mastered the moves taught by Venusaur which is Giga Drain in replacement of Mega Drain and Solar Beam. One of the most powerful Grass type attack. Deep down on Rize's and Bulbasaur's heart, they have faith that one day they would meet with Bulbasaur's parent and Bulbasaur will finally be able to evolve.

The training days was over and finally, it was time for the Kanto League Tournament. Rize and Ryussei was ready to leave Pallet Town for Indigo Plateu where the League was held. They excused themselves of leaving with the Professor and Ryussei's parents. Not far from them, Satoshi and Shigeru was also about to leave on their way to the same destination.