Chapter 19: Preparation for the gym
The next day Aoki registers himself for the gym battle which was set for the evening.
There were two types of matches available in this gym, first was a public match in which a lot of people would watch the match while the other was a private match which cost 1k poke dollars extra for this town and may increase later on, it's description was self-explanatory.
Aoki chose the second option.
Not all gyms have both options as some gyms may be small and not fit a lot of people while some may have a lot of income from the gyms so their battle are mostly public.
Misty wanted to do something else so Aoki entered a large field just outside Pewter city and started training his Pokemon.
"Alright, everyone start with the warm-up and then energy circulation. You all have half an hour"
From the information he gathered, Brock is the current Gym leader.
The matches would be two on two with both of Brock's pokemon at intermediate rank as this was his first gym badge. If he had more than 2 gym badges, official or not, it is up to the gym leader to decide the Pokemons he would be using which could be intermediate, master, or elite
Currently, the win rate against him is 15 % even with type advantage Pokemon as Pewter gym is owned by the League alliance.
This is because most of the trainers who challenge the gym have junior-level Pokemon or don't quite understand how ' type matchup ' works in practice, or are overconfident about having water or grass-type Pokemon.
Note that for participating in the Pokemon league, many criteria must be fulfilled. First is getting at least 8 gym badges in which 5 badges minimum must be from the gyms owned by the league.
This rule sometimes changes to 4 badges depending upon the number of trainers participating in each session.
All the Pokemons battles happening are official matches so trainers lose a lot of money if they lose a gym battle.
Losing a gym match can cost a minimum of 5-6 k Pokedollars and the price will increase with each rematch but winning can give up to 40k.
It is said that for becoming a gym leader, one must own an elite Pokemon and at least 3 master level Pokemon.
In case the gym leader is stepping down and giving his position to one of his family members, the family member must have the ID of a gym apprentice and pass the evaluation by the League.
Gym apprentices are trainers who are trained to handle the gym in the absence of the gym leader or become a gym leaders when the current gym leader steps down.
This criterion is set because only a handful of Pokemon can reach the elite rank so the gym leaders can be said to be one of the strongest trainers present in a nation.
If reaching elite level was insane, reaching champion level for a pokemon was almost impossible. There are only a handful of champion-level Pokemons officially known but Aoki has no idea about any of them.
'Maybe professor Oak or Giovani has one. Red and Blue might have one too but they have disappeared a long time ago'
Aoki looked at his Pokemons who completed their warm up so he started to make them master some important moves.
Aoki was confident to solo Block with Bellsprout but he wants Pidgey to evolve during this match.
The next Pokemon he is going to use is Charmander who is forbidden to use any fire-type moves. This should be Charmander's biggest challenge.
'Only by facing difficult challenges, one can truly grow'.
Yesterday he talked with a trainer whose pokemon were defeated by Brock and their reactions were not surprising. Most of them cursed for Brock being too harsh on their Pokemon while some of them were confident in defeating Brock the next time they fought.
Brock has always been Aoki's favorite character from the Pokemon series.
Apart from the fact that he is a simp, he is an ideal travel partner. Aoki has confirmed that Ash exists and would start his journey soon from Professor Oak.
As the Oak family is often about topics on the internet, Aoki found some things that he was not aware of at first.
Professor Oak has a granddaughter named Daisy who started her journey as a pokemon groomer and recently chose Bulbasaur. Daisy has a twin brother named Gary who started his journey at the same time but his starter was unknown.
Unlike Aoki who started his journey as soon as he got his starter, three of them decided to get accustomed to their Pokemons before starting.
Aoki trained his Pokemons till the after and gave them energetic food with some light massage that he learned from the book he bought. Surprisingly Aoki had a talent for massage.
In the evening he met up with Misty and together entered the gym.
The front of the gym was made from large rocks with "PEWTER GYM " written at the top in bold letters.
The gym was one of the biggest buildings in the city making it ideal for holding Pokemon battles.
There was a man at the reception who told them that Brock was waiting for them after checking Aoki's ID.
In every gym, there was a receptionist that manages the slot booking and this man was in that post.
They entered the main hall of the gym which was a large space with rocks and boulders around. Around the gym were large a large number of seats for audience to sit but it was empty today.
On the opposite end of the field stood a guy around the age of 18 with a darker skin tone. He wore a brown shirt and a grey vest over it.
He was standing with his eyes closed as if in meditative state .
He was Brock, the current Pewter Gym leader.
"Hey, Brock! " Misty waved at him.
" Hey Misty, long time no see. I didn't expect you to start traveling . " said Brock opening his eyes.
His eyes were sharp like an experienced fighter.
" You know him ? " asked Aoki
" Yes, we have met multiple times due to being us gym apprentices, although he went after every beautiful girl he saw only to be rejected, " said Misty as she moved out of the field and took one of the seats made for the audience.
"Rejection is common in the noble dream I am walking towards," Brock said out loud in a dramatic tone.
"And what is it ?" Aoki asked
"I will become a harem king !!!!" Brock declared making Aoki get flashbacks from a certain anime.
"So you didn't change one bit…well keep working hard what can I say," Misty said with a light laugh.
Forgetting the thing he just said now, Brock looked at Aoki.
'Damn, a handsome guy. Girls must be head over heels for him all the time.'
'Seeing him I feel my dreams were crushed before I could even move forward.
'Control Brock! you can do it! you will have a large harem! '
" You must be Aoki, the one who won the Junior Cup. I didn't expect Misty to actually travel with someone based on what I knew about her.
I am pretty excited to battle against your Bellsprout, " said Brock.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone