The location of Steven's house was quite secluded.
Following the directions from a passerby, Ace arrived at a two-story house on the edge of the island. Seeing the locked door, Ace knew that Steven was definitely not home.
"Gengar."
Ace released Gengar again, and Gengar phased through the door to open it from the inside. Ace cautiously entered, carefully checking the door to make sure Steven hadn't placed any traps to protect his home from thieves.
Once everything was confirmed, Ace took out a pair of disposable shoe covers and put them on, along with disposable rubber gloves and a head cover before entering the house.
As soon as he stepped into the living room, Ace noticed that Steven was truly obsessed with stones. Many of the decorations and items in the display cabinets were rock-themed. These included not only precious Evolutionary Stones and Pokémon fossils but also some very ordinary rocks. However, these rocks all had beautiful patterns or excellent natural shapes, a testament to Steven's passion over the years.
Ace could guarantee that if he took all these stones, Steven would go into a rampage and relentlessly pursue him.
"But if he loves stones so much, why doesn't he specialize in Rock-type Pokémon? Why focus on Steel-types?"
Ace didn't understand, but he didn't dwell on it. After a quick look at the living room, he headed straight for Steven's study, while Gengar went to his bedroom.
In the study, the bookshelves were, as expected, filled with a large number of stones, but there were also some books. Ace took a brief glance but lost interest, as most of them were about rocks.
He opened the drawer of the desk and found some scattered documents. Ace took them out and began to read through them.
After only a little reading, Ace's expression turned serious, and he now knew his next course of action.
The documents contained research data on fossil Pokémon. While they were highly technical and Ace couldn't understand everything, he could grasp about 70-80% of the content without a problem. From these documents, it was clear that Steven had his own research on fossil Pokémon.
In this world, to revive an ancient Pokémon, you need its fossil. The Fossil Reviver machine extracts the Pokémon's genes from the fossil and reassembles them into a new Pokémon. Researchers had already noticed that the revived Pokémon's form isn't completely identical to the ancient Pokémon it came from. More importantly, these revived fossil Pokémon have no memories of their past lives.
Also, the fact that Pokémon revived from fossils generally have a Rock-type attribute indirectly confirmed that the revived Pokémon aren't entirely the same as their ancient counterparts. The long period of being sealed in rock had, to some extent, altered the fossil Pokémon's genes, leading to the current situation.
As Ace continued reading, a thought came to his mind.
How do fossils form Pokémon?
Ace had used Blaine's Fossil Reviver machine and had personally witnessed Aerodactyl's hatching process. But one question had always lingered in his mind: Why did Aerodactyl hatch at level 25?
If a regular Pokémon Egg hatched, the Pokémon would undoubtedly be level 1. Yet, Pokémon revived from fossils start at a higher level. Initially, Ace suspected that the Pokémon's level before death was somehow preserved, but now that he confirmed the revived Aerodactyl had no memories of its past life, he discarded that idea.
But if it was a genetic cultivation process, why wouldn't it result in a level 1 Pokémon, but a level 25 one?
Soon, a specific term caught Ace's attention.
"Life force..."
Ace's brows furrowed. Suddenly, a few scattered clues connected, and everything made sense!
"If 'life force' is the same as Rayquaza's 'Life Energy,' and the genes absorb a small amount of this Life Energy to achieve rapid growth, then it makes sense for the hatched Pokémon to be at a high level."
Ace murmured to himself, and he also thought of Blaine's Fossil Reviver machine. Blaine's machine should have a similar structure, but it couldn't have been using Rayquaza's Life Energy.
Ace remembered that before Blaine's change of heart, he was a Team Rocket scientist who specialized in genetic research. It made perfect sense that during his research, he would extract the life force from his test subjects. This also explained why the two known civilian Fossil Reviver machines were in the hands of the Devon Corporation and Blaine. After all, one had a massive supply of Rayquaza's Life Energy, and the other had a large amount of life force collected from previous genetic research.
As for the League's Fossil Reviver machine, its core function undoubtedly also used life force to revive fossils.
Next, Ace went through the remaining documents. The content was more or less the same, mostly revolving around the issues with fossil Pokémon.
"So, the next target is the Devon Corporation."
Ace put the documents back in the drawer exactly as he found them, based on his memory. He then carefully checked the other desk drawers and soon found a small wooden box in one of them.
Opening the box, he saw three Key Stones placed inside. This was his mission objective.
"Jackpot! It looks like the mission can be completed."
Ace immediately closed the small wooden box and slipped it into his fanny pack. He continued his careful search for a moment and soon found another wooden box with three more Key Stones in a different cabinet.
Soon, Gengar also returned to Ace's side, holding a small wooden box as well. Unsurprisingly, it also contained three Key Stones.
"So many?"
Ace frowned slightly, a bad feeling flashing through his mind.
A system notification popped up: "Key Stones retrieved. Current count (9/12). More than half have been recovered. Do you wish to submit the mission?"
"No."
Ace was slightly startled, but he immediately chose "No." This was the first time he had seen the system offer to complete a mission before he had collected all the items.
"It seems now that the Kanto region is stable, the system's requirements for me aren't as strict."
Ace carefully put away the remaining small wooden boxes. Based on the system's prompt, it was easy to guess that the remaining three Key Stones, which would be in a single box, were 100% on Steven's person.
Ace had to get the remaining Key Stones before Steven discovered his house had been robbed. Otherwise, once Steven found out, he would definitely be on high alert. If that happened, trying to get the remaining Key Stones would be incredibly difficult!