"Rocks?"
Nozomi approached curiously.
He had seen stalls selling books and stalls selling fruit, but this was the first time he'd seen a stall selling rocks.
He walked up to the middle-aged man's stall.
The man before him was not the Flint Nozomi had expected.
Nozomi knew from the TV anime that Flint once set up a stall selling rocks. He had thought it would be Flint calling out to him—but it wasn't.
That only piqued Nozomi's curiosity further. Aside from Flint, who didn't dare return home, there was actually someone else in Pewter City selling rocks?
Seeing Nozomi approach, the middle-aged man smiled even more ingratiatingly.
"You must be here in Pewter City for the first time, young man. Take a look—these are rare minerals I dug up from deep within Mt. Moon. Some of them are even fossils," the man said enthusiastically, trying to sell them to Nozomi.
Nozomi cast a quick glance over the stones.
"Do I look like someone who's easily fooled?"
Although he didn't know much about fossils, that didn't mean he was naive.
Before crossing over, he had been exposed to plenty of science documentaries on TV. Even without expert knowledge, he knew a fossil was supposed to be a stone with embedded remains—bones, shells, or other relics of ancient life.
There was no way the dull, blackish stones before him fit that description.
"Uh…uh," the man coughed awkwardly at Nozomi's words. "These are unverified fossils. You know, the value of a fossil can only be determined by carefully dissecting it. I don't have the money to do that. But I can guarantee—there's a good chance these rocks will yield fossils, or even amber or evolution stones!"
"…."
Nozomi felt like this guy was insulting his intelligence.
"Dissecting," he thought.
If there really were evolution stones in these rocks, Nozomi bet this man would tear them all open, even if he had to take out a high-interest loan to do it.
After all, whatever kind of evolution stone it was…
Just as Nozomi was about to turn away, his gaze was caught by something.
"This is…"
He reached out to point at a massive rock in the corner, completely covered in moss.
"That rock—what is it?"
"Oh, that one? I found it while traveling in the Sinnoh region. The moss on it just wouldn't come off, so I kept it specially. Want it? I can give you a discount!"
The middle-aged man gestured expansively.
"So it really is that…" If Nozomi wasn't mistaken, this moss-covered rock was exactly the one that could evolve an Eevee into a Leafeon.
The moss-covered rock was a special evolution stone. When an Eevee leveled up nearby, it would automatically evolve into Leafeon.
They were sparsely distributed across Sinnoh, Unova, Kalos, Hoenn, and Alola.
No sightings had been recorded in Kanto or the Chengdu region.
There was a corresponding stone covered in ice that allowed Eevee to evolve into Glaceon.
Although Nozomi had only seen this stone in games before crossing over, his Pokémon Breeding Handbook from his previous life described this evolution stone.
Combining his past memories, the handbook's images and descriptions, and the man's explanation, Nozomi was almost certain: this was the moss-covered rock capable of evolving Eevee.
"Ten thousand, right? I'll take it."
Once he confirmed it, Nozomi didn't hesitate or haggle. He paid and carried the massive rock, placing it into his spatial backpack.
Feeling its weight barely increase in the bag, he couldn't help but marvel at the advanced technology of the Pokémon world. What kind of tech tree had they unlocked to create a spatial backpack?
The middle-aged man, seeing Nozomi pay so decisively, was a little taken aback—and suspicious.
Could the rock he just sold really be a fossil or a rare evolution stone? In Pokémon world currency, ten thousand was neither little nor huge.
For this young man to hand over the money so freely… something seemed off.
Still, the sale was done. No amount of regret could change that.
Though he sometimes tricked buyers into overpaying for rocks, as a businessman he had principles. Once sold, items couldn't be taken back or marked up further.
All he could do was admit he misjudged this customer and learn from it.
"I have a question for you," Nozomi asked, the evolution stone safely tucked away in his bag.
"Go ahead," the man quickly composed himself.
"I want to know… do you know where on Mt. Moon I could catch an Onix?"
Nozomi was indeed aiming for Onix.
After acquiring a metal coating, he had been planning to catch an Onix and evolve it into Steelix—or capture a Scyther and evolve it into Scizor.
But after a whole night wandering Viridian Forest, he hadn't seen a single Scyther.
Since he was now in Pewter City, he knew rocky areas were ideal for Rock-type Pokémon. Surely, Mt. Moon would be the perfect spot for Onix.
"Onix? Young man, you're planning to catch an Onix? Listen to me—Onix isn't something you can handle right now," the man shook his head.
To him, Nozomi was probably only one or two years into his training career. Encountering an Onix in the mountains would be a death wish.
Although Onix wasn't aggressive by nature, it certainly wasn't the kind of Pokémon to be trifled with.
"Relax. I'm not planning on throwing myself into danger. I'm just asking on someone else's behalf. Do I look like a fool to you?" Nozomi replied.
"You do…have a point." The man recalled how decisively Nozomi had paid and stuffed the rock into his bag. He wasn't foolish—he was clever.
"Alright, I'll tell you. Southwest of Mt. Moon, there's a mine marked with a warning sign. An Onix resides there! Pewter City's Mining Association offered a huge reward for trainers to capture that Onix, but no one has succeeded yet."
The man explained.
"If your friend wants to try catching it, they can… but be fully prepared. That Onix is strong!"
"Got it. Thanks for the info."
After parting ways with the hesitant man, Nozomi walked through the city streets, glancing at the central building bearing the Pewter City Mining Association's emblem and at Mt. Moon in the distance.
"A reward for capturing an Onix? Where else could you find a deal like that?"
Nozomi murmured to himself, holding the Poké Ball containing Metagross.
As he spoke, he headed toward the Mining Association building. Confident in his own strength, he still wanted to gather some intelligence on the Onix, just as the man had suggested.