Chapter 6. Game Rule Field
Natsume hugged the little jar in his arms and sprinted back to his room.
Door shut.
Bath.
Change of clothes.
Light the incense.
One fluid motion.
Soon, the small room filled with a faint, mist-like smoke.
In the haze, Natsume, heart pounding with excitement, pulled out those ten scratch-offs.
These were the fruits of five years in Pallet Town, racking his brains and working together with the town's selfless Pokémon to conceive ten entry-level research tasks and complete them.
These ten scratch-offs were precious.
Staring at the scratch-offs printed with a red-and-white ball, Natsume felt his eyes sting, and tears would not stop flowing.
A thin mist spread.
Natsume wept like a spring.
"Ahem… all right, let me see what extraordinary reward you meant, system!"
Natsume wouldn't ask for much.
Just give him ten alpacas and he'd be happy.
Right away, with the timing, terrain, and people all aligned and the ritual proceeding smoothly, Natsume did not hesitate.
After two deep breaths, he used his fingernail to scrape open the red-and-white ball print on the first scratch-off.
In an instant, a fierce golden light burst forth.
At the same time, a pleasant voice rang in Natsume's mind:
[Ding—Congratulations to the host for opening a red-and-white ball scratch-off and obtaining a Poké Ball ×1!]
"Huh?"
Looking at the Poké Ball that appeared out of thin air, Natsume froze for a beat.
Then he scraped open a second scratch-off.
[Ding—Congratulations to the host for scraping open a red-and-white ball scratch-off and obtaining a Poké Ball ×1.]
Natsume's expression shifted subtly.
Unconvinced, he scraped open the third.
Poké Ball +1.
Fourth.
Poké Ball +1.
All the way to the tenth and last one—every single one was a Poké Ball.
Plop!
A tear splashed onto the Poké Balls scattered all over the floor, and Natsume suddenly felt that maybe the bond between him and the Pokémon of Pallet Town was not as deep as he imagined.
Scraping open the final scratch-off, a voice exactly the same as before resounded in his mind.
Maybe he was too angry, because Natsume felt dizzy and light-headed.
[Ding! Congratulations to the host for scraping open a red-and-white ball scratch-off and obtaining a Pokémon gam—]
"System, this is the 'extraordinary reward' you were talking about?"
Natsume's vision went black, and he collapsed onto the bed at the side.
The night passed without incident.
Morning of the next day.
Natsume woke to Ash Ketchum's worried voice.
"Nurse Joy, Natsume woke up!"
His vision was a little blurry, but Natsume could vaguely see Ash shouting as he ran out.
Ash ran out, and the room immediately fell quiet.
Natsume stared straight at the ceiling, scenes of last night's joyful ten-pull flashing through his mind again and again.
Could it be that he, Natsume, really had such terrible luck?
Five years of effort, in exchange for ten Poké Balls!
Just ten!
He'd gotten more than that back at Professor Oak's Laboratory before he even set out.
Hm?
Strange.
This didn't look like his original room.
Natsume suddenly realized the ceiling was a little different from his room's.
Before Natsume could think further, the door beside him opened again, and Nurse Joy in her uniform came in.
Seeing Natsume awake, Nurse Joy covered her face in exasperation and couldn't help saying:
"Honestly, how did you manage to get gas poisoning in a room at the Pokémon Center?"
Last night, this place had just been attacked by Team Rocket.
This morning, they found someone on the second floor with gas poisoning.
Next to her, Ash brought Misty over too:
"Yeah, Natsume, your eyes are all smoked puffy.
You didn't notice?"
Natsume's head was foggy, but after hearing them, he pieced it together.
He got gas poisoning?
Oh?
Natsume raised an eyebrow, opened his system panel, scrolled for a while, and finally found a task.
[SSS-Class Task—Artificial Pallet Superhuman Physique Research.
Test Subject: Natsume.]
Opening the task, it displayed Natsume's current status:
[Strength: 0.05 Ash]
[Intellect: 100 Ash]
[Agility: 0.05 Ash]
[Electric-type resistance: 0.5 Ash]
[Fire-type resi—]
This task had triggered the first time Natsume met Ash Ketchum after arriving in Pallet Town, and the unit of measurement was "Ash."
For years in a row he made little progress, but there were not-insignificant findings—for example, taking repeated attacks from weak to strong Pokémon gradually increased various resistances, and any resistance below 0.5 would slowly decline naturally.
In a long list of resistances, Natsume flipped to Poison-type resistance.
[Poison-type resistance: 0.2 Ash]
Hm?
His Poison-type resistance had dropped from 0.3 Ash to 0.2 Ash.
No wonder he kept wanting to cry last night—turns out the gas really did get to him.
Natsume had thought the deep bond between him and the Pokémon of Pallet Town was about to awaken some kind of power against his will.
So it wasn't that his luck was bad, nor that his bond with the task Pokémon was lacking.
It was purely because the "incense" wasn't doing its job!
Natsume thought it over.
He definitely couldn't use that gas-bomb "incense" again.
Nope.
The fortune it brings is awful.
Wonder how Torkoal's would be?
Natsume fell into thought.
Watching the dazed Natsume, Ash covered his face.
"Pika!"
On Ash's shoulder, Pikachu copied him and facepalmed in sync.
Right then, Ash—just ten years old—finally understood why everyone told him to keep an eye on Natsume.
If he hadn't noticed early this morning, Natsume might have kicked the bucket somewhere deserted.
Turning his head, Natsume looked at Pikachu on Ash's shoulder and gave a small nod.
It seemed that, after last night's tempering by Team Rocket, the bond between Ash and Pikachu had strengthened quite a bit.
"Um!"
Under Natsume's gaze, Ash suddenly turned to the side—to a wide-eyed, astonished Misty—and said:
"Um, Misty, you can see Natsume's condition.
We might need to rest here for a day.
If you're in a hurry to get to Cerulean City, then—ah!"
Before Ash finished, Misty grabbed him by the collar and hoisted him up:
"What, are you trying to send me away so you don't have to compensate me for my bicycle?"
Seeing Natsume and Nurse Joy both look over, Misty let go of Ash, pouted, and snorted:
"Hmph, I've got plenty of time to waste on you!"
"Th-then fine.
In that case, Natsume, you… huh?
Natsume, where did you go?"
Scratching his head, Ash looked toward the bed at the side, only to find, to his surprise, that Natsume was gone.
He had definitely been there a second ago!
"Hey now, this patient needs to rest quietly!"
Seeing this, Nurse Joy was worried too.
Real hands-off, then vanish in a blink.
Afraid Natsume would accidentally die in some empty corner, Ash hurried out to search.
Natsume's original room.
"Roto!"
With the Rotom Phone's voice, a faint light appeared in the room.
"Whoosh—"
Light flashed, and Natsume's figure emerged.
Using the Rotom Phone's Teleport, Natsume returned to his room.
He was here to retrieve those ten Poké Balls.
His luck was already rotten.
If he even lost those ten Poké Balls, Natsume would feel even worse.
"One, two… nine—eh?"
Natsume's hand, mid-reach for a ball, paused in the air.
Strange.
Where was the tenth?
He searched left and right, but Natsume couldn't find the tenth Poké Ball.
It couldn't have been stolen.
Team Rocket had indeed shown up last night, but Ash and Misty drove them off.
Even if there were thieves, they wouldn't take just one Poké Ball.
Could it be that his tenth reward wasn't a Poké Ball?
Hope rose in Natsume's heart.
He vaguely remembered that he didn't actually hear what the tenth reward was before he blacked out.
With excitement, Natsume opened his system inventory.
Poké Balls ×10086, Bricks ×88, Custom specialty sleepwear ×12, Sanitation worker uniform ×3, Replica Team Rocket Executive uniform ×3, Team Rocket Grunt uniform ×3.
Aside from the things he had prepared beforehand, there was nothing newly added inside.
Could he even pull "air" as a reward?
Refusing to accept it, Natsume opened his system panel.
The moment the panel appeared, Natsume froze.
On the once clean and tidy Research Institute panel—besides the saved tasks—there was now a small new module.
[Pokémon Game Battle Field]
[During a battle, you may select to deploy the field and pull both sides into the Pokémon Game Battle Field.
All battle rules proceed according to the games!]
"Oh—"
Seeing this, Natsume narrowed his eyes.
So that means he, "Potion Elite Four" Natsume, could solo a Legendary Pokémon now, right?
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