[Pokemon World] Mage Quest

Diamond's smug look returns, the lofty title taking their mind off of their mortality.
"I think the best thing to do is to take the gym leader tour in this region. It'll give us a good cover, a good reason to keep moving, and it'll give some much needed training opportunities to be able to take on Team Abyssal when we find them."
Diamond takes out their phone.
"The gym leader in this town is supposed to be used to noob trainers, since its so close to the trainer's school or some shit."
They scroll a little bit. "...these comments aren't sure if its a bug type gym, a grass type gym, or a dark type gym. What the fuck. These things are usually the most obvious thing about a pokemon gym."

"Maybe, maybe not. At least I should have most types covered between Slope, Sunburst, and Pory."
Nick checks their ultradex for a refresher on their pokemon team's stats.
Slope is level 30, Sunburst is level 20, and Pory... is level 5.
They'll probably be fine.
"And yeah, that was pretty much the plan already. I've been wanting to go on a pokemon journey since I was old enough to understand the concept of one."

Eventually, breakfast arrives. Nick did manage to get that waffle + egg + sausage combo plate after all.
"Time to dig in!"

"Sounds good to me!"
Nick checks their phone for a moment, connecting to the memos to relay some information back to their old friends.


Unfortunately, it wound up being a night two months forward, so very few people actually said much to them.

After a little while of that, Nick starts eating.

Nick tosses up all three of their pokeball, letting out their pokemon.
They are greeted by the inquisitive and impish bugfrag Porygon, Pory, the chipper but careful larvesta, Sunburst, and the affectionately relaxed slowpoke, Slope.
"Alright! we're gonna do some training today! y'all ready?"

The pokemon cheer in anticipation, though slope takes a moment to reply.

"Okay. Pory, I want you to watch closely. Slope, you can hang back and chill for a bit, you're plenty strong for now. Sunburst though, it's your turn to get up front and fight."

"larvesta!" Sunburst seems a little unsure, but otherwise seems willing. They scuttle a bit closer to their trainer.

Nick nods and then takes a few steps into the grass, looking around for any local pokemon.

A deerling with a green doily-esque coat cautiously steps towards the group.
"...deer?"

Nick spots the deerling and springs into action!
"Sunburst, use ember on that deerling!"

"larvesta!" Sunburst shoots out an ember at the deerling! It's super effective!

However, despite yelping at the fire, the deerling stands strong!

"deer!" the deerling prances towards sunburst and delivers two kicks!
honestly it doesn't look like either kick did all that much.

"Sunburst, suck that deer dry with leech life!"
Sunburst then leaps upon the deerling and bites down hard! In barely any time at all, sunburst manages to siphon the energy from the deerling, toppling it to the ground!

"Excellent work, sunburst!"

Sunburst lets go and hops up and down a few times, fully healed by the leech life!
"larvesta! larvesta!"

Pory watches intently at this, while Slope idly yawns.
Meanwhile, Nick can't help but get the feeling that they may have forgotten about something...

Roughly an hour passes.
Nick has been directing their pokemon to beat up random wild pokemon this entire time, with short breaks for healing. Pory has gained a good grip of levels even just studying Sunburst in battle. Slope even got a few moments to shine, though mostly to keep the others out of danger.

At this point in particular, Nick and their party is taking a longer break.
Nick uncaptchas some snacks, their sibling's last gift to them-- the entire stock of their stack stand before it would be wiped out forever. Like sure, Aeons and their stand lives on in the new continuity, but it's not the same.
Why did Nick initiate the vast retcon in the first place?
why did nobody try to stop them?
should they have let the end claim them instead of running away?

They need to stop thinking about where they came from. this is a new world, a new home, with new friends.
...but with familiar problems.
despite the fact that Nick initiated it, they were not entirely the only one behind it.
Dylan had etched an important event into the story, and used a half baked idea to get June to fulfill it.

Dylan is the true enemy here.

Nick has to train their pokemon harder.
They don't have time for self pity. they have to stop this man from ruining anything else.

They feed their pokemon some snacks, and also eat some of their own.

You can't train effectively without tending to your needs, after all.

Diamond is busy reading a book when Nick's sudden blurt-out startles them!
"What the fuck is going on?!"
They annoyedly look up from their paperback.

"All this about some mystery?"
They vaguely remember something on the news a day or two ago about the missing dittos, since they're apparently a regional tradition, but Diamond is too annoyed to think on it too much.