The route from Vermilion to Saffron was a long, winding ribbon of pavement cutting through a landscape of rolling hills and sparse woodland. The air was warmer here, thick with the hum of insect Pokémon. Eliana kept a steady pace, the rhythm of her pedaling a soothing monotony that allowed her to sink into her own thoughts. Her back was a still a map of color, however the pain was no longer there. She had three Pokémon now, and her Ralts had evolved into a Kirlia. All in all Vermillion had been a wonderful stop.
Kirlia's thought cut through her reverie, calmly pointing out they were being observed. He looked at her from his position in the bike's basket.
Kirlia projected, a thread of contempt woven through the thought, there were only two up near the trees up ahead.
Eliana smiled to herself, Must think I'm an easy target. She sen out her own senses, confirming it was only those two. No other life, aside from Pokémon were around, the perfect opportunity to have some fun.
Kirlia agreed, wanting to test out his new form.
As they rounded a bend, two figures stepped out from the dense undergrowth, blocking the road. They appeared to be younger than any thugs Eliana has encountered so far, that wouldn't change the lack of mercy she held for them.
"Hold it right there," the first one said, a lanky youth with aan unfortunate case of acne. He held an Poké Ball like it. "This is a toll road."
Eliana looked over it, only to be disappointed to find out that it was completely empty. She brought her bike to a smooth stop and dismounted. Kirlia floated down to stand beside her. She rolled her eyes with a smirk before asking, "Is it?"
The second one, a burly boy with a shaved head and a knitted cap, puffed out his chest. "Yeah, it is. Hand over your cash and your Pokémon, and we might let you walk away."
Eliana's gaze drifted from the acne-scarred boy's empty ball to the shaved-head boy's face, and then to the space between the trees behind them. "Are you sure?" she asked, her voice a velvet murmur. "It seems to me you're the ones in the wrong place."
The shaved-head boy scoffed. "What are you gonna do about it? Your little dancer thing can't do anything? We're with the Camper Boys, we own this route!"
"The Camper Boys?" Eliana's smile widened, a predator's delight. "I haven't heard of you guys before."
Before they could react, she gave a single, sharp command. "Kirlia."
The world around the two grunts dissolved. The road, the trees, the sky—it all twisted into a dizzying, nauseating kaleidoscope of screaming color. The two boys cried out, stumbling back, their sense of balance completely annihilated. They weren't hurt, not yet. They were just lost, trapped in a prison of their own scrambled perception.
While the two boys tumbled around in panic, Eliana searched their minds for more information about these so called Camper Boys. After only a few seconds Eliana came back out of their minds pretty annoyed, these two were the only members. What a waste of her time.
She gave another mental command, and the illusion snapped. The world returned to its normal, sun-drenched state. The two boys were on their hands and knees, gasping for breath, sweat beading on their foreheads.
"How... how did you do that?" the lanky one stammered, pushing himself up.
Eliana just walked over to them as Kirlia followed behind her, she then kicked the lanky one's legs out from under him, sending him sprawling into the dirt. She put her foot on his chest. She then turned her gaze to the other one. "You've ruined my mood for the day. So you're going to do what I tell you, and you're going to do it quickly."
The burly grunt, seeing his partner on the ground, finally let go of his bravado. "Okay, okay! What do you want?"
"Everything," Eliana said simply. "Give all your money and any valuables you have. That should be enough to make up for this waste of an hour." Eliana failed to mention that they would also lose their lives because if she did surely wouldn't give her their money.
They didn't hesitate. They emptied their pockets, handing over a pathetic wad of bills, a few cheap watches, and a half-eaten bar of chocolate. Eliana took the cash and the watches, leaving the chocolate. She was an opportunist, not a scavenger.
"Please," the lanky one begged from the ground. "Just let us go, we won't tell anyone, we swear."
"Don't worry, I know you won't," Eliana said, her voice dropping to a near-whisper. The two began to thank her as she turned to Kirlia.
ᗜ⩊ᗜ, Kirlia's horns began to glow with a faint, malevolent light. The boy on the ground started to tremble, his eyes going wide as the psychic pressure closed in. The other one tried to run, but his legs wouldn't obey. He was frozen in place, a puppet whose strings had been cut.
A single, focused pulse of psychic energy from Kirlia, and their minds simply... broke. Their bodies went limp, their eyes vacant, their lives extinguished without a mark on them. Unlike when Kirlia was still a Ralts, there was no blood anywhere, the attack was clean and efficient.
With a gesture, Kirlia lifted the two corpses, pulling them into the undergrowth and arranging them beneath a thicket of ferns. He then used a burst of psychic force to erase their tracks from the dirt road, leaving it pristine and undisturbed.
They continued on their way, the sun now high overhead. The encounter had left Eliana feeling restless. It had been too easy, too brief. It hadn't even been a challenge, just a tedious interruption. She craved a real fight, a real test of her team's new power.
Eliana felt the two mentioned Pokémon respond from their PokéBalls. Raichu was quite agitated, she had been looking forward to stretching her limbs but the two boys didn't even have a single Pokémon. Staryu seemed more confused than anything, it didn't really care about the situation, asking when they would be in a room again.
(ᵕ—ᴗ—), Kirlia pointed out that they would be in Saffron City soon and there would be way more opportunities there.
This would be one of the shortest trips of her journey as the Underground Path would make the trip a little under an hour. From her research the place was quite corrupt, you could even kill someone in broad daylight but nothing would happen. Eliana was honestly excited to explore the place, people would surely underestimate her and that would make it all the more fun.