Chapter 34:
"Is there any more stamina cubes?"
The young man asked impatiently as he entered the room.
His name was Akira, and he was a professional energy cube review streamer.
As soon as Akira went out, he found a random place to test the effectiveness of this physical energy cube.
He let Beedrill consume more than half of its stamina, then fed it a few stamina cubes. In less than three minutes, its stamina was almost fully restored!
What did that mean?
The D-level physical energy cubes he had purchased from the Pokémon league never had this kind of effect.
Not to mention, those cubes sold for three thousand pokedollar each in the Alliance.
And yet—
The cubes sold in this small shop tasted better and didn't seem to cause the same kind of drug resistance as ordinary energy cubes!
This was the result after he had both Beedrill and his second Pokémon, Snorlax, try them for over an hour.
Even after all the cubes were eaten, Snorlax's stamina could still be restored quickly, and the cubes even gave it a great sense of fullness.
God have mercy.
After discovering this second effect of the cube, Akira could hardly contain his joy.
He had been struggling to afford feeding Snorlax for half a year now.
His savings were gone. The car he had wanted to buy—gone.
Was this energy cube good?
How could he not know?
"Sorry, we've sold out of energy cubes for today. You'll have to wait until tomorrow."
Seeing customers still trickling in, Hayashi Kaede turned the sign around to the side that read: Limit purchase to three per day.
On the back, in clear letters: Sold Out.
Direct and clear.
"Are you kidding me? Sold out in two hours?" Akira stared at the empty glass counter in disbelief.
"I'm really sorry, it's the first day and I wasn't prepared. That's all I could make today. How about I give you some spicy tomato berry instead?"
Recognizing him as the streamer from earlier, Hayashi Kaede filled a plastic bag with a few spicy tomato berry and handed them over.
Akira: "…"
He wasn't even sure how he ended up taking the bag. Right now, there was only one small regret in his heart—
If he'd known, he would've bought three earlier.
Still, knowing there would be more tomorrow morning eased his mood a little.
He'd just come early and be the first in line.
That afternoon…
As the sun grew scorching overhead, fewer people came, and the buzz from the viral video finally began to die down.
Hayashi Kaede sighed in relief. Thinking no more customers would arrive for now, he closed the shop and pulled the curtains across the floor-to-ceiling windows.
If anyone came knocking now, he wouldn't open the door.
"Servine…"
Beside him, Servine called out weakly.
Not everyone had come for the cubes—some had been lured in by Servine's appearance and tried to touch it the moment they stepped inside…
Requests that Hayashi Kaede promptly refused.
"Hahaha… maybe you should just hide in the treehouse tomorrow."
Kaede chuckled, bending down to rub its face—only to pull his hand back quickly when Servine gave him a dangerous look.
Time to check today's harvest.
The system notification sound had barely stopped all day, with Pokémon constantly gaining happiness from eating the cubes.
Eventually, Kaede simply switched the sound off.
Now, looking through the results:
Fertilizer (x300+)
Rare Candy (x60+)
…and the number kept rising.
More importantly, there were several special rewards:
Ground Sand (x5)
Special Scale Berry (x3)
Petaya Berry (x2)
D-level Fire Stone (x1)
…
In total, more than twenty special rewards.
One, however, caught his eye:
[Petaya Berry tree seeds: must be planted near land with extremely abundant energy. Will grow into seedlings in 3 years, trees in 10 years, and bear fruit in 30 years.]
That made Kaede's eyelids twitch.
Petaya Berry was the main ingredient for producing specialty development energy cubes.
The thirty-year wait didn't scare him.
He remembered the system had previously rewarded him with five special-grade Fertilizers.
On top of these special rewards came today's sales.
"Rotom, list them."
"Loto~ This morning's sales totaled… 185,000."
Hearing that, Rotom was clearly in a good mood too.
"Hiss… that much?"
Kaede drew in a sharp breath.
Most of the ingredients for today's cubes came from HappyMart, but the total cost was only a few thousand yuan—paid with shopping cards.
Meaning… this 180,000 pokedollar was basically pure profit.
Looking at his balance, Kaede fell silent.
"It seems… you're not short of money anymore?"
In the Pokémon league, even the cheapest of the three starter Pokémon cost about 300,000 pokedollar.
A hundred thousand poke dollar was roughly what an ordinary person could earn in a year.
"Forget it… I don't want to think about it. Let's plant the Berry trees first."
He shook his head. Better not to dwell on money.
What mattered was still raising his Pokémon.
Servine in particular enjoyed the excitement and tension of battle—he'd have to take on part-time trainer work for it someday.
And then… there was the mystery of his parents' disappearance.
When he became stronger, he would investigate.
By his estimate, his father's Scyther had been no weakling—back in Aokiri City, it was considered among the top gym-level Pokémon.
Logically, it shouldn't have been in danger in an ordinary wilderness area.
Yet his father had vanished—without leaving even a single message.
At the very least… Kaede wanted to know for sure if he was dead or alive.
"Why…"
He sighed, carrying some freshly grown fruits and vegetables toward Takagi-ojii-san's home.
For planting trees, he would naturally borrow the mole rat there.
Sometimes he wondered if he should just buy a Sandshrew from another breeding house specifically for plowing.
But in the end, he decided against it.
The job already belonged to the Sandshrew in Takagi-ojii-san's care—buying another might make that innocent little guy feel replaced. He didn't want that.
Borrowing it went smoothly.
The sandshrew even eagerly supplied him with some Ground Sand.
When Takagi-ojii-san received the fruits and vegetables, he was surprised at how quickly Kaede's plantation was producing.
Kaede could only excuse it as having turned over a piece of land and planted seeds earlier, giving most of the credit to Snivy.
Takagi-ojii-san didn't think much of it, only marveling at how magical Pokémon truly were…
Then, with a sigh for the changing times, he said, "It's a pity during my time, Pokémon studies weren't as common as they are now…"