(Grey's POV)

  I was sitting in the Pokémon Center lobby, staring at the ceiling and replaying that Chansey fight in my head over and over again. Honestly, I was in a slump. When Nurse Joy came over with my team, she actually thought I'd lost the match based on the look on my face.

  "You okay, Grey? Koga is a tough wall to climb for a first badge," she said, setting the tray down.

  "I won," I muttered. "But I'm not exactly happy about it."

  She looked surprised. "You won? Then why the long face? Most kids are jumping for joy when they get a Soul Badge this early."

  "Because it was a mess," I told her. "I was frustrated with how close it went. I had a plan, and that blob almost ruined everything. It felt like I barely scraped by."

  Joy gave me a look—the kind of look someone gives a kid who's overthinking things. "Listen, Grey. If you have unreasonable expectations for every fight, you're going to burn out. You need to enjoy small victories when you get them, otherwise, you'll never actually enjoy this life. A win is a win."

  She was right, technically. I needed to get out of this headspace. When I let Axew out, he looked just as depressed as I was. I could tell the fight had rattled him. He even flinched when he saw the Chansey helping Nurse Joy behind the counter. The trauma was real.

  "Hey, buddy, look at me," I said, opening a bag of the high-grade food. "You did great. You didn't even notice it in the heat of the battle, but you actually increased the number of Dragon Dances you could stack up. The training worked. And don't worry about the blob—we'll figure out a way to deal with it. Maybe I can find a TM for a fighting-type move to give you some better coverage."

  Axew seemed to relax a bit after that, but the battle had taught me a lesson: I was too reliant on him. I had two other Pokémon who needed to pull their weight. My next stop was Celadon, and I decided right then that I wasn't just going to challenge Erika—I was going to do the Challenge Mode. That meant fighting every single gym trainer before I even touched the leader.

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  Why? Mostly because I had a petty grudge.

  See, I'm from Celadon. My mom works at the perfume store there. I had the grades, I was top 4 in the exam, and I had the local connections they usually look for. But the Celadon Gym wouldn't even let me apply for a sponsorship. The reason? I wasn't a girl. They have this whole "shrine maiden" aesthetic, and because I didn't fit the look, they tossed my application without even looking at my stats.

  If I wasn't good enough to be one of their "sponsored" trainers, then I was going to be the guy who walked in and beat the entire gym from bottom to top.

  I didn't feel like walking back up the Cycling Road, so I found the biker gang from before. They told me they had a trip planned back to Celadon that evening, so I had a few hours to kill. I headed out to Route 18 to get some last-minute training in.

  I spent the afternoon battling local trainers. I won against five of them, which felt good for the ego, but I lost to two guys who were clearly on their second run of the season. One had a Scyther that was just a blur, and the other had a Marowak that caught Axew with a Bonemerang I didn't see coming. Even so, Axew put up a hell of a fight, and I could see him getting better at adapting on the fly.

  We got to work on some new moves:

  Axew: I started pushing him to learn Dual Chop. He already knows how to use both arms for Cross Slash, so using draconic energy for two consecutive hits should be an easy transition for him.

  Shellder: We kept working on Rapid Spin. I'm trying to get him to use it as a defensive move combined with Water Gun—sort of like a rotating shield of water I saw in an old league match on TV.

  Exeggcute: I finally broke out that reusable Toxic TM. If that Chansey taught me anything, it's that stalling works. Exeggcute is perfect for it—set up a Reflect, use Confusion for evasion, and let the Toxic do the work.

  By late afternoon, I headed back into the city. I had a bit of money now from that nugget, so I decided to actually live a little. I found a local park and just sat there for a while, letting the Pokémon out to relax without any "battle" pressure.

  I hit up a food stall and tried some of the local Fuchsia cuisine—it was some kind of spicy glazed skewer that actually cleared my sinuses. It was nice to eat something that wasn't instant noodles or dry rations. I also stopped by the PokéMart to restock on the basics: Potions, Antidotes, and some fresh supplies for the road.

  I ended up talking to a few other trainers hanging out near the fountain. Most of them were complaining about how hard the Fuchsia Gym was, and I just sat there, nodding along while secretly feeling the weight of the Soul Badge in my pocket. It was a weird feeling—being ahead of the pack for once.

  As the sun started to set and the red lanterns of the city began to glow, I heard the roar of the biker engines near the gate.

  "Ready to head back, kid?" the leader shouted, revving his bike.

  "Ready," I said, hopping on.

  As we sped away from Fuchsia and back toward the neon lights of my hometown, I wasn't thinking about the scenery. I was thinking about the Celadon Gym.