[Location: Admin's Aerie Tower - Verdant Rise, Canopy Crest (Floor 16)]
Content creation was no easy task.
It takes a rather bold and courageous mindset, not to mention investment. Creating yourself a channel on some kind of social media platform was fairly straightforward, it was what you did with it afterwards that tends to get complicated.
Fortunately, the whole idea of the internet was really no different from his old world, so understanding how to navigate it was as easy as breathing for Colt. Most of the websites, although didn't share the same name, either were similar or could easily be found with a simple search.
YouTube was called PokeTube.
Twitch was called RotomCast.
Twitter was called Chatter.
Heck, even a platform like TikTok had its pokemon world equivalent in the form of PikaPop! Colt was never someone who engaged in TikTok, but he could at least understand its appeal, whether that appeal was good or bad,
Probably why he stayed away from it.
In any case, after getting all the basic foundations set up, the most important part of this shindig was what he was now in the middle of completing. The setup was the shell, and now he was dealing with the meat, that being the actual content.
Colt was currently on the sixteenth floor of the Admin's Aerie Tower, and it hadn't been too long since he began climbing. The level of the pokemon weren't any different compared to the tutorial tower, so it was a relatively casual ascent through the first ten floors.
As expected, the boss that appeared upon reaching Floor 10 wasn't Zorua, but instead was replaced with a leafeon. That wasn't the only difference either, unlike the tutorial tower, it seems that groups of floors were separated into specific biomes or zones.
The current zone was Verdant Rise, and the specific area was called Canopy Crest, and if he were to hazard a guess based on the themes he had seen thus far, Floors 1-10 were mainly that of forest outskirts, and upon entering Floors 11 to whatever it was, the environment remained forest themed, but he had now found himself in an extensive natural jungle gym.
Ramps made of vines, bridges of bark, ropes of vines to swing from place to place, and even occasional gusts of wind to knock him off his balance. Compared to the first few floors, the level of danger was much higher already.
Assuming that the current 'zone' remained themed around forest biomes and similar, then it may be safe to say that the Aerie Tower functioned on a systematic progression of levels. Of course, that's assuming that if he reentered the tower, the first zone would still be the forest theme.
In any case, he was also curious as to how many floors consisted of a zone. Was it 25? 50? Or even 100?
The Aerie Tower's structure aside, Colt hadn't managed to record much suitable footage. He didn't mean that he lacked a substantial amount, but more specifically that he lacked any footage that he'd want to show. Aside from the boss from Floor 10, the others weren't any worth noting.
Compared to the boss, even though the pokemon on these higher floors were now comparable if not even stronger than the Floor 10 boss, they obviously were still far inferior in terms of strategy. Aside from the boss, there hadn't been much footage that showed his skills as a trainer.
Speaking of that, Colt had decided not to immediately jump straight into live streaming, instead opting to try and build himself a presence on the platform first.
This was also to prevent another issue, and that was Zorua. He didn't want to expose Zorua to the public just yet until he was more than strong enough to protect himself, this was the kind of burden that came with not only being a rare pokemon, but a variation that doesn't exist in the modern world.
By recording footage instead of live streaming, the risk of accidental exposure was prevented as what footage will be seen was entirely under Colt's control. Did hisuian pokemon still exist in this age? Yes, but a majority of them are either unconfirmed or so scarce they're no more than urban legends.
Zorua may very well fit in the latter of that category.
'Then again, I suppose that isn't too bad...' Colt thought to himself as Ralts and Zorua finished off the remaining enemy pokemon on the current floor. 'Instead of just a video of purely just battling, I could make it into a movie cinematic or something.'
Looking at his rotom phone that was constantly hovering around recording everything from different angles, Colt once again couldn't help but admire just how convenient it was. Recording while focusing on battling certainly wouldn't be ideal, but fortunately that wasn't an issue he needed to deal with.
Just to be clear as well, even though a lot of the footage did have Zorua appear during the battles as they climbed through the floors, as stated before, could easily be filtered out. Colt simply recorded it anyway so that he himself could reflect and look back on it himself.
"Alright, nice job, you two." Colt nodded while ignoring the prompt that appeared to advance to the next floor as the two pokemon rushed back over to his side. "The pokemon we've been encountering are getting noticeably stronger now, so stay on your guard."
Using the Master's Pokedex, Colt was naturally able to see that the levels of the pokemon now were around the same as the leafeon on Floor 10, and were no doubt going to go above and beyond the higher they climbed.
During their ascent, Ralts had now reached level 18 while Zorua grew to level 20. Not only that, Colt had better solidified his views on the fact that he couldn't rely solely on purely the game knowledge that he possessed.
Unlike Ralts, Zorua had not learnt any new moves while the former had learned both Draining Kiss and Psybeam. Granted, Ralts absolutely refused to use Draining Kiss under any circumstance, but he still learned it either way.
Of course, his knowledge wasn't perfect, so maybe Zorua wasn't supposed to learn anything at this current level.
Assuming that he was indeed correct though, that only helped confirm that video game knowledge could only be used as a secondary or semi-primary reference. Ralts's and Zorua's current movesets already suggested that.
"The first boss was on Floor 10, I wonder when the next one will appear. I guess I'll know when we reach the next respite area..." Colt muttered to himself before shaking his head. " Alright, I think we... what's wrong?"
Colt blinked in confusion when he noticed Ralts's rather uncomfortable stance, shifting around a bit on the spot and with his head lowered and looking at the ground. Zorua only noticed after Colt pointed it out, to which the former gave his companion a confused look.
After hearing Colt's voice, Ralts stiffened slightly before looking up, hesitating and seemingly pondering on what to try and say. Colt just crossed his arms and waited for Ralts to speak, to which the latter did after a few seconds.
Ralts began gesturing different things along with giving a few cries, and naturally, it was difficult for a human like Colt to try and make out what Ralts wanted to convey. Although he couldn't understand, he could at least tell that Ralts seemed concerned and perhaps confused.
"...You're wondering why I'm disappointed with you two, aren't you?" Colt asked after remembering how ralts were a species that were sensitive to emotions. Hearing this, Ralts froze before nodding. "I see, that explains it then."
Zorua seemed to understand the flow of the conversation as he too looked up at Colt with a worried look on his face, though confusion was very much also a part of it. As far as Zorua was aware, they've all been doing fine so far.
"I am indeed rather disappointed, and I won't hide it from you." Colt shook his head before sighing. Hearing this, Ralts and Zorua just waited for him to continue, though they did seem to slump a bit. "During your battles, especially with Leafeon on the tenth floor and after, I noticed something... concerning. In fact, I noticed it when we battled against you, Zorua."
Hearing this, the two of them seemed more confused as they gave each other confused glances. Colt frowned a bit, and while he didn't want to sound harsh, he knew that if he didn't bring up this issue then it may become a horrible habit in the future.
"Tell me, are you two puppets?" Colt asked in a blunt and calm tone. Despite his tone, Ralts and Zorua felt his words with evident impact. They gave him surprised and doubtful looks. "No? Then where exactly are your natural instincts as living beings?"
Seeing the confused looks of his two pokemon, Colt could only sigh before glancing at the timer on the notification. Seeing that he still had sufficient time, Colt quickly continued speaking as he crossed his arms over his chest.
"You are not puppets, and I'm no puppeteer. You are the pokemon, and I'm the trainer. We work together to produce results on the battlefield." Colt spoke up as his two pokemon listened carefully. "However... I may give you instructions on what to do, but that doesn't mean you lose the ability to make your own. If you sense or see incoming danger, you try and dodge. You shouldn't need me to tell you to move, it should be your survival instincts doing that. Unless I say otherwise, make the decisions that you believe are correct. As a living being, the right to make your own decisions is something you inherently possess."
Kneeling down in front of Ralts and Zorua who seemed to still be processing what he had said, Colt didn't give them much time to do so as he continued speaking. Looking at them with a fixed and firm gaze, Colt continued.
"I may be your trainer and you may be my pokemon, but you have just as much right as I do when it comes to making your own decisions." Colt didn't blink even once as he spoke. "No one can take that right from you. Not me or anyone else, never forget that."
Colt went silent as he let those words finally sink into their minds, and only after they blinked as they stared up at him in surprise that he gently rubbed the tops of their heads before slowly standing back up.
"My job as a trainer is not to control you, but to guide you. You are the soldiers, and I'm the strategist. Both serve vastly different roles, yet both equally important." Colt smiled before sighing as he stretched his arms upwards. "Let's make it work, shall we?"
Hearing this, Zorua and Ralts looked at each once again before smiling as they both gave joyful cries of approval up towards Colt. Seeing this, Colt let his own smile form at the corner of his mouth, a bit of 'enlightenment' was all they needed.
"Alright, then let's end our run for the day."
"...?"
"We already have decent enough footage for a few clips, we're not trying to create an entire video here." Colt explained after seeing Zorua and Ralts's confused looks. "Even if you guys can still keep going for a few more floors, I can't say the same for myself."
After swinging around for so long, Colt was quickly reaching his limit.
Even though he was rather athletic, he was certainly no pokemon, he was still a human being. With the drastic changes in the environment and the constant need to run up and down, as well as swing around the forest on the floors past Floor 10, he definitely couldn't last much longer.
As Colt said before as well, he wasn't looking to produce a full twenty or so minute video, he was only looking for a few good clips to upload to the channel. Similar to YouTube, PokeTube also had a function similar to shorts, and that was a shortcut he was more than willing to use.
Clips were short and people were more willing to watch it due to their short duration, humans had a certain level of attention span after all.
Not that he wasn't ever going to not make full-length videos, but they would probably only be made if he was covering certain topics and not just a mini movie of him battling non-stop. As for live streaming, he wasn't sure yet if he was going to go through with it.
"We still have close to a week to complete the mission, that is if we're aiming for that hidden reward. At current rate, I think we can do it." Colt nodded confidently as his two pokemon also seemed to share his sentiment. "Respite areas obviously aren't common, and might even only show before boss floors. If that's the case, we'll have to bring some food and water of our own on the next run."
On perfect timing, a familiar groaning sound was heard as both Ralts and Colt looked at Zorua. While the ghost-type didn't move or have any visible reaction, the red hue forming on his face was more than enough to say everything.
"...As I said, we'll need food and water of our own." Colt smirked teasingly as Zorua's blush deepened as Ralts gave a small laugh. "I'm getting a bit hungry myself, so let's get on out of here and get something to eat, shall we?"
____________
[Location: Levincia City - Seabreeze Café]
After having left the Aerie Tower, Colt checked the status after leaving and had noticed that his progress had been reset. This meant that he couldn't just go back to that floor after leaving, which further confirmed that he needed careful preparation before starting.
A supply of food and water was a necessity if he or anyone else was going to try and climb as far as possible, and based on all the Respite floors he'd seen thus far, literally only being the one just before Floor 10, food wasn't provided and only water was.
There were even separate restrooms and couches to rest on, but food didn't seem to be provided.
Aside from that, Colt had found out the primary difference between the Admin's Aerie Tower and the general Aerie Tower that customers would use. Compared to the latter, the Admin's Aerie Tower allowed him to not only catch the pokemon inside, but even items could be taken out.
'Even then, items aren't exactly abundant. At least not on the lower floors...' Colt thought to himself as he took a sip from the cup of coffee he had ordered. 'The difference in difficulty between the floors is becoming more obvious as well.'
Colt looked down at both Ralts and Zorua who were on the table, they were enjoying a plate of alfajores, a sweet treat or desert that could be described as a sandwich cookie of sorts. While Ralts was enjoying it openly, Zorua was more obscured.
The latter was currently completely wrapped within Colt's hoodie, and only Zorua's face would occasionally be visible whenever he poked his head out to grab another cookie. This was to prevent anyone passing by from seeing him, and Zorua didn't seem to mind at all.
"The conventional training purely through battle simply isn't going to cut it, we actually need to focus on building the fundamentals outside of combat..." Colt muttered to himself as he placed his cup down. "The question is... how?"
It's true that traditional training methods that even humans use to train their bodies work for pokemon, but Colt wasn't just wanting to focus on that. If the Aerie Tower was going to go up in difficult even more than it already has, basic training simply won't work.
He needed to focus on training even the core fundamentals and even biological aspects of his pokemon if he wanted a chance or even a true upper hand in battle. For Zorua, it was his illusions, and Ralts's was his psychic abilities.
'Kind of like training a motor function, it eventually may become autonomous.' Colt thought before glancing at Ralts, who blinked after noticing as he gave Colt a confused look. 'If Ralts can use his psychic powers to the point of it being instinctive, we could save substantial amounts of time in battle. Every single in a battle is crucial...'
During their previous run, he had noticed on multiple occasions where Ralts would have to pause for a moment before being able to activate his psychic powers. This was obviously due to Ralts needing to concentrate to produce those abilities.
He wanted to train and perhaps even to a degree remove that weakness, but the question now was how would he go about training Ralts's psychic powers? Meditation was an obvious one, but the thing was that he had no experience whatsoever with it.
'I'll look online later, maybe there are some generous experts who've shared some experience.' Colt thought, but with some obvious doubts. The strongest of the strong probably don't reveal their training secrets, and those who do share are either generous or scammers... "In the meantime, we can try the more traditional method to see if it makes any progress."
The most traditional was obviously weightlifting but using psychic powers. If psychic abilities truly were like a muscle, perhaps manipulation of objects with gradual increase in size and weight may prove to be effective.
As for making those psychic abilities autonomous...
"Ralts, we're going to do some training after this." Colt suddenly spoke up as Ralts blinked before reacting and nodding with a confused but determined expression. "I'll figure something out for you too later, Zorua. We all need training, including me."
After saying that, Colt slowly stood up from his chair before stretching his arms up into the air, relaxing as a satisfied sigh escaped his mouth. Taking out his rotom phone, Colt quickly navigated through the internet before he found himself on a map.
"Let's see here..." Colt clicked his tongue multiple times casually as he seemed to be searching for something. "Alright, even if this world mainly consists of pokemon battles and all that, but if memory serves, there should still at least be one of those shops in this city..."
After a few quick searches, Colt had a small smile appear on his face. Sensing Colt's subtle but sudden rise in positive emotions, Ralts curiously looked up at his trainer as Zorua too looked up from within the hoodie after noticing this.
"Jackpot." Colt grinned slightly before switching off the rotom phone. "Let's go, you two. We have some shopping to do!"