Once Iris accepted the fact that the Gyarados was her Little Splasher, she was beyond ecstatic. Iris was a complete aesthetics-chaser; there was no doubt about it. Every ti she saw a cute Pokémon, she would beg Will to find a way for her to cuddle with it. But that didn't an she only liked "cute" types. Domineering types, cool types... as long as it looked good, she liked it. It was just that those types often looked very strong, and she was usually too scared to approach them.
But her Gyarados was different. She was familiar with it. For days on end, she had carried the endlessly splashing Magikarp all over the palace. So, after confirming its identity, the first thing Iris did was to ride on its head and parade it around the capital, startling many of the residents.
Iris's mother was also a formidable woman. Ignoring the Gyarados's ferocious face, she dragged Iris ho for a sound spanking.
Of course, Will only heard about these events from Liz the next day. He had been asleep and had missed all the fun. But in any case, Iris's Gyarados finally had a proper ho and no longer had to wait all day in the palace's backyard pond for Iris to have ti to visit.
...
The Palace Treasury.
The palace treasury was located in the first basent level of the palace. Below it was a second basent level, with an entrance under the throne and an exit leading to a certain spot on the plains outside the palace. It was ant to be used as a shelter in case the kingdom was overthrown. Currently, the only human who knew of its existence was Liz. Besides her, there was only him, a Pokémon.
"Let's see what kind of treasures are in here."
Will went to the treasury alone. Although he already had a way to obtain a Razor Fang to evolve Scorp, who was to say he couldn't find another one in the treasury? Then he wouldn't have to make a special trip back to Jubilance Town. And perhaps there would be other useful items.
He opened the large wooden doors of the treasury. The sight that greeted him was not a glittering mountain of gold. This didn't surprise him. Every world has its treasures, and every era has its context. In the world of Pokémon, gold... wasn't worthless; its value was still high, but not as high as it was on Earth. And in this era, where humans were still fighting over iron mines, the amount of gold that had been excavated was very, very small. The currency people used now was still a "silver coin" made of a little silver and a lot of impurities.
So, the "gold" content in the palace treasury was very low. Will could hardly see any golden light at all. What he saw were large chests, about ten of them, filled with miscellaneous items.
"Turns out Liz is poorer than I thought."
Will glanced at the vast but barren treasury and realized he had been under a misconception. He had assud that as the queen of a nation, Liz must be incredibly wealthy, the richest woman in the Dragonite Kingdom. He was wrong.
Looking at the reality of the situation, the Johto region was only so big. Even though the Dragonite Kingdom had unified it, its territory wasn't that large, and the treasures on this continent were naturally not that plentiful. Moreover, the Dragonite Kingdom had only been established for ten years. Before that, it was just the Dragonite Tribe. How many treasures could be collected in just ten years? Liz was not the kind of tyrant who would plunder the wealth of her people. So, the palace treasury really didn't have mountains of treasure piled up.
Will opened all the chests and dumped their contents onto the floor to search. And he did indeed find so good things. For example... a type of stone.
"A Dusk Stone..."
Will found many blackish-purple, crystal-clear gems on the floor. They were quite beautiful; a translucent purple substance encased a pitch-black mass within. To the people of this era, these were probably just pretty jewels. They certainly hadn't discovered the special effect a Dusk Stone has on certain Pokémon.
In the Johto region, the Pokémon that can use a Dusk Stone are... Murkrow and Misdreavus.
"Very good. If I run into one, I can catch it," Will nodded with satisfaction.
Both of these Pokémon were worth raising. Setting aside their performance in the gas, in reality, they were extrely practical and powerful Pokémon, especially at night, when their natural advantages would be amplified. A Murkrow, cloaked in black, could beco one with the darkness, able to spot anything that reflected light, and they were exceptionally cunning. A Misdreavus could hide its form in the shadows, appearing and disappearing like a ghost.
To be precise, a Murkrow would be skilled at guarding Liz at night, while a Misdreavus would be skilled at assassinating enemies at her command.
"What else is there? Let's see..." Will grinned, in a good mood. He had just started and had already found a treasure that could expand his choice of targets. Of course, he was still hoping to find sothing that could increase his own strength.
"A Dragon Scale. Tch..."
Next, Will found a scale. It was mainly blue, with a bit of an iridescent sheen at its sharp tip. This item was used to evolve a Seadra into a Kingdra. It was useless to him. He also had no plans to catch a Seadra for Liz to raise. A Gyarados could at least move on land like a snake, and its speed wasn't too slow. But a Seadra... its speed on land was probably about the sa as a Dratini's. The wars of this era were mainly fought on land, so it was not a wise choice to raise an aquatic Pokémon with poor mobility.
After that, Will searched carefully again. At least among the things he could recognize, there was nothing else useful. Of course, that was because he didn't recognize most of the items. The real-life items might look different from their icons in the gas, which was why he couldn't identify them.
"A pity. All I found was a Dusk Stone that I might not even get to use," Will sighed and turned to leave.
The Dusk Stone would only be useful if he actually caught a Murkrow or a Misdreavus. But unfortunately, both of those Pokémon were hard to find. A Murkrow's movents were erratic; it would sleep whenever it was tired, day or night, so you could encounter one at any ti. A Misdreavus, on the other hand, only appeared at night, and its species had no sense of territory.
Its Pokédex entry stated two things: "Scaring people is its reason for living; it never misses a day of practice," and, "It seems to use the red orbs on its neck to absorb the fear of others, which it uses as nourishnt." So, they wouldn't stay in one area; they would run all over the place. Wherever they could scare other creatures, that's where they would go. With no fixed habitat, they were even harder to find.
"Oh well. If I find one, I'll catch it. If not, my original targets are still good. First, I need to sort out the situation with Blaze and the others," Will decided, returning to the ground floor.
He was preparing to leave the capital in a day or two and first had to set up a future training path for Blaze and the others.
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