Ronnie reached the outskirts of Cerulean like he was making an entrance on purpose.
His Fearow dipped low over the road, wings loud and confident, then climbed and cut down again in a clean, aggressive arc.
Enzo arrived after him.
Corviknight didn't dive. It glided in a steady line, calm and precise. Enzo sat upright, eyes already reading the city's shape: where the traffic thickened, where patrols lingered, where the canals split neighborhoods into neat lanes of movement.
Proton came in last.
Crobat's landing was functional, not pretty. Proton's boots hit the ground, and he immediately reached behind himself to rub his lower back, jaw tight like he was swallowing a complaint.
Ronnie grinned. "What? Too fast for you?"
Proton ignored the jab and flexed once, trying to unknot the stiffness. "I need a proper mount," he muttered. "Riding a Crobat isn't comfortable."
Enzo didn't comment, but he stored the detail. If they were going to operate as a unit, movement mattered. Comfort was part of speed. Speed was part of survival.
They started forward.
Cerulean wasn't small.
Water flowed through the city in controlled channels, cutting streets into clean, geometric lines. Bridges stitched districts together. The sound of moving water never fully disappeared beneath the noise of traffic and voices. Near the main avenues, taller buildings rose in layers, apartments stacked above shops and offices. Farther out, the streets narrowed into older blocks where the roofs dipped lower, and the alleys held tighter shadows.
People filled the sidewalks.
Not just trainers. Workers in uniforms. Vendors pushing carts. League staff moving with clipped purpose. Couples arguing about groceries. Kids running with Pokémon at their heels. A woman crossed the street while a Poliwhirl carried her bag like it had done it a thousand times. A fisherman leaned on a railing with a Poliwag bobbing beside him in the canal, both of them staring into the water as if they shared a private thought.
Pokémon weren't decorations here. They were part of the city's daily rhythm.
Ronnie slowed without meaning to, his mouth half open. Proton's eyes moved differently. He wasn't admiring anything. He was cataloging streets, sightlines, patrol routes, and exits.
Cerulean unfolded around them—canals, bridges, crowded streets—until one building pulled the eye.
It wasn't tall. It didn't need to be. It was wide, heavy, and built like it belonged there more than anything else did. Stone, glass, and a perimeter that looked designed to handle crowds.
Ronnie pointed. "What's that?"
Enzo didn't slow. "Cerulean's S-Rank Gym."
Ronnie's eyebrows shot up. "That's the gym? Then how many are there in this city?"
"Three Rank B gyms. One Rank A. And that one," Enzo said.
Proton glanced at it again, expression sharpening.
"Cerulean isn't a town," Enzo said. "It's a hub. The lower ranks filter people, the higher ranks control them."
He paused, then added more quietly, "They're all controlled by the same family. Daisy sits at the top."
The name carried weight even if Ronnie didn't know the politics.
An S-Rank gym meant the League cared.
It meant money, influence, and oversight.
Ronnie exhaled. "So this place is serious."
"All major cities are," Enzo said. "They just hide it differently."
They crossed a bridge, and the canal's sound rose briefly, clean and cold beneath them. On the far side, the crowd thickened. Vendors shouted about berries and fresh fish. A man in a repair apron argued with a customer over a cracked Poké Ball casing. Two trainers walked past with bruised faces, laughing like pain was normal.
Proton leaned closer. "So what's the plan here?"
Enzo didn't give him the full plan. Not yet. He gave him the part that mattered immediately.
"Every city in Kanto has a black market," he said.
Ronnie's interest snapped back. "Cerulean too?"
"Especially Cerulean."
Proton's tone stayed flat. "We have money for that?"
Enzo's expression didn't change. "We have Rocket Points."
Proton frowned. "But will that work? Do Rocket Points really mean anything here?"
Enzo's expression didn't change. "Who do you think controls the black market in Kanto?"
He watched the flow of the street for a moment and then angled them away from the polished districts. The buildings got smaller. The signs older. The people stopped looking up.
"Stay close," Enzo said. "Keep your heads down."
Ronnie pulled his hood up without being told. Proton did the same.
As they moved, Cerulean's clean rhythm faded. Pavement cracked in places that didn't get fixed. Patrols passed less often. Cameras still existed, but they watched with lazy disinterest. The city didn't become dramatic, it simply became worn.
Proton fell into step beside Enzo and asked the question he'd been holding.
"Was it here?" Proton murmured. "Where you were born?"
Enzo didn't slow. He turned down an alley without hesitation, as if the route lived in his muscles.
"Home, sweet home," he said.
Ronnie looked around, quieter than usual. The poor district wasn't a horror scene. It was just hard. People leaned against walls and talked low. A cart sold cheap noodles. A kid ran past, tired. A Machop stood beside a delivery crate, patient and bored while two men argued.
Life was still life. It just costs more here.
Enzo guided them through side streets and shortcuts that avoided open intersections. He knew which corners had eyes and which corners had teeth. He knew where curiosity turned into trouble.
Then he stopped in front of a shop that looked like it shouldn't survive on honest business.
A lamp store.
Dusty shades filled the window. Old glass fixtures hung behind them. The sign above the door flickered like it couldn't decide whether it wanted to be noticed.
Ronnie frowned. "This is it?"
Enzo pushed the door open. A bell rang, too cheerful for the neighborhood.
Inside, the shop was dim. Rows of lamps stood in silence, bulbs dead. A man behind the counter looked up with tired eyes that had seen too many "customers" to pretend surprise.
Enzo didn't speak. He walked to the back as if he was browsing.
Proton and Ronnie followed, faces half-hidden, moving like security without needing to act.
At the rear, behind a curtain of hanging cords and boxed fixtures, Enzo reached for one particular lamp.
It didn't light up.
It clicked.
A panel in the wall shifted with a soft mechanical sound, revealing a narrow passage.
Ronnie's eyes widened.
Enzo stepped through first.
The air changed immediately. Warmer. Drier. Packed with bodies and secrets. They descended a short set of steps, and the noise rose to meet them: low voices, coins, vendors calling, laughter that sounded more like relief than joy.
At the bottom, the black market was already there, fully visible, fully alive.
It wasn't hidden by being small. It was hidden by being tolerated.
A main corridor ran forward with branches splitting into narrower alleys. Lighting came from bare bulbs dangling on wires. The air smelled of sweat, fried food, chemical potions, metal, and damp stone. People moved with purpose, not curiosity.
Vendors didn't shout. They spoke softly, as if volume could invite the wrong kind of attention.
On one side, jars sat in neat rows behind glass. Bone fragments. Scales. dried tissue. A sign read: ENHANCEMENT MATERIALS. Another line promised better evolution outcomes, higher "potential," stronger results. A man in gloves explained to a customer how certain parts could be mixed into feed to "push" growth.
Enzo didn't stop. He'd seen that lie before.
Further down, laughter spilled from behind a curtain. A gambling den. Not friendly. The kind that felt like a trap with tables. Cards slapped against wood. Coins clinked. Someone cheered too loudly and immediately went quiet when a heavier voice answered.
Nearby, loan sharks stood without stalls. Clean hands. sharp smiles. They offered quick cash to trainers who wanted entry fees, licenses, and second chances. They made sure those trainers paid back twice, or paid back in other ways.
Other alleys were marked only by a change in smell and the presence of men who didn't look at faces, only at pockets. Services that didn't need signs.
And there were Pokémon.
Not as companions, but as inventory. Cages. Foam cases full of Poké Balls. Photos. Crude labels: "Unregistered." "No questions." "Caught last week." Some vendors swore their stock was legal. Others didn't bother lying. A few had the blank look of people who had stopped caring what anyone called them.
Ronnie's shoulders tightened beneath his hoodie. Proton kept checking their flanks.
Enzo moved through it all without changing his expression.
The black market had one rule, and everyone followed it.
Here, you could buy anything.
And better than that, you could buy silence.
Enzo didn't look at the prices meant for Pokédollars. He watched the smaller numbers scribbled beside them.
RP.
Rocket Points didn't just work here. They carried weight. Team Rocket wasn't an organization down here, it was the ruler. And nobody wanted to disrespect the ruler.
Ronnie leaned in. "Is this where you're buying the Pokémon?"
"Not now, first we check the eggs," Enzo said.
He kept walking past potions, stones, black-market TMs, fake League badges, and counterfeit IDs. None of it mattered.
He wanted eggs.
The egg stall sat behind a heavy plastic curtain, like a butcher's freezer. A simple sign hung above it.
BREEDER STOCK
EGGS AVAILABLE
NO RETURNS
Inside, the temperature jumped. Warm on purpose. Heat lamps hung from the ceiling. The air smelled faintly of straw and antiseptic. Crates and padded shelves lined the walls, each holding rows of eggs.
Some eggs were tagged with clear League-style cards—photos of the species the shell supposedly held, breeder signatures, even batch numbers. Others had rough stickers slapped onto them with handwritten labels: RED, YELLOW, GREEN, sorted into separate crates like cheap merchandise.
The "GREEN" section was overpriced on purpose. Not a bargain—bait for desperate trainers who wanted to believe they were buying destiny. And even then, most of what was being sold openly was YELLOW and RED. The common stuff. The safe stuff. The kind of eggs that kept breeders in business without giving anyone a real advantage.
Anything above Green wasn't here.
BLUE "the royal stock" didn't sit on a shelf under heat lamps. They went to private auctions. Closed rooms. Numbers that only rich sponsors and League-backed families could afford.
But there was always one corner that never looked organized.
A section marked UNTESTED.
No photos. No species. No promises. Just a messy pile of random eggs, discounted because nobody could guarantee what would hatch—or whether it would be worth anything at all.
That was where Enzo went.
Enzo didn't need guesses.
He had the System.
He went straight to the center, where the eggs were piled in a messy, random mass. The discounted pile. The pile nobody wanted to waste time identifying.
A sign listed the price: 1,000 Pokédollars each.
Under it, someone had written the translation: ~900 RP.
Proton and Ronnie positioned themselves behind him without being asked. They didn't browse. They didn't touch anything. They watched the entrance and the corners.
Enzo reached into the pile.
The System flared in his vision as his fingers brushed shell after shell.
POTENTIAL: RED
POTENTIAL: YELLOW
POTENTIAL: RED
POTENTIAL: YELLOW
Common. Weak. mediocre.
He kept going. Patient. methodical. He treated it like work because it was work.
Minutes passed. Hundreds of eggs.
Then the blue text changed.
POTENTIAL: GREEN
SPECIES: Alolan Rattata
Enzo's hand paused for half a heartbeat.
He lifted the egg. It wasn't large. It wasn't marked. It didn't look special at all.
That was why it was special.
Enzo turned slightly and placed it into Ronnie's arms like he was handing him something ordinary.
"Hold that," Enzo said.
Ronnie blinked. "What is it?"
"An egg," Enzo replied, flat.
Ronnie started to argue, then stopped when Enzo's eyes flicked toward him. He hugged it carefully to his chest, suddenly afraid of breathing too hard.
Enzo went back to the pile.
More focused now.
RED. YELLOW. YELLOW. RED.
He worked until the heat clung to him and his hood felt heavier. The room preserved egg quality. It also preserved discomfort.
If anything, that first GREEN hit made him colder. Sharper. Like the System had just proven the market's "luck" was irrelevant as long as he kept digging.
The heat lamps buzzed softly overhead. The air stayed thick and warm to protect the shells, but it also made time feel heavier. Egg after egg passed through Enzo's hands, the System flickering verdicts in clean blue text.
POTENTIAL: RED.
POTENTIAL: YELLOW.
POTENTIAL: YELLOW.
Most of it was trash. Predictable. Exactly what you'd expect from a random pile sold to people who didn't know better.
Then—
POTENTIAL: GREEN
SPECIES: Alolan Rattata
Enzo's hand paused.
For a second, he just stared at the text, as if he didn't trust it.
Two.
His bad luck… had finally broken.
He lifted the egg, checked it again as the System confirmed the result, then placed it carefully with the first one. Ronnie adjusted his grip, eyes wide, like he was afraid the shells could hear him.
Enzo kept going.
More shells. More flickers.
Then—
POTENTIAL: GREEN
SPECIES: Pidgey
Enzo's fingers tightened slightly around the shell before he set it aside. Common species, yes but valuable.
He worked deeper into the pile.
And then the System flashed something that made his eyes sharpen.
POTENTIAL: LIGHT YELLOW
SPECIES: Charmander
Enzo froze.
A Charmander egg had no business being here.
The shell looked like any other, unmarked, untested, tossed into the random section like a mistake. But the name alone changed its value completely.
Not because it was strong.
Because it was a royal Starter.
Royal starters weren't sold to the public. Not in shops, not in markets, not even in most legal breeder circles. They were League-controlled assets—distributed through official channels, given to chosen candidates, protected by rules and reputation.
Even a bad one was worth money.
A lot of money.
Enzo slipped it into his growing collection without emotion on his face, but inside he noted the implications. Someone had smuggled it. Someone had lost it. Or someone was selling it without realizing what it was.
Either way, it wasn't leaving this tent without him.
He kept searching.
This part wasn't luck anymore. It was a grind. A numbers game, and Enzo had the only advantage that mattered: certainty.
Egg after egg, the System filtered the noise.
After what felt like hours and what had to be thousands of shells, he finished his sweep with a final count that satisfied him.
Nineteen.
Not nineteen random eggs.
Nineteen eggs with Green or Light Green potential.
When he was satisfied with what he had chosen, he moved to the counter.
A clerk stood behind a register with a bored face and eager eyes. Not an egg seller, really. A seller of everything around the eggs.
The clerk glanced at Ronnie's arms and then at Enzo. "Do you have incubators?" he asked, too casually.
"One," Enzo said.
The clerk's mouth twitched. A greedy smile tried to form, confident he'd found someone to squeeze.
Enzo watched that smile for one second.
Then he pulled out his badge.
Not a League card.
A Team Rocket insignia.
Squad Leader.
The smile vanished immediately. The clerk straightened, eyes sharp with recognition. "Sir," he said quickly. "Of course."
Enzo didn't react.
"If you need incubators, we can offer a discount," the clerk added fast. "Good stock. Reliable."
"Eighteen," Enzo said.
The clerk blinked, startled by the number, then nodded hard. "Yes, sir. Eighteen."
He tapped the numbers into the register with sudden care.
18 incubators — 1,500 RP each.
Then he looked up again, cautious now. "And the eggs?"
"Nineteen," Enzo said.
The clerk stared at him for half a second, then started calculating, fingers moving faster.
19 eggs — 900 RP each.
He turned the screen toward Enzo.
TOTAL: 44,100 RP.
Enzo glanced at it once. "Okay."
The clerk swallowed and nodded quickly, ringing it through without another word.
Then Enzo added, "Deliver them."
"Where?" the clerk asked.
Enzo gave the name of a hotel.
Not just any hotel.
A hotel tied to Team Rocket.
The clerk's throat bobbed. "Of course," he said quickly. "We'll deliver immediately."
Then he rushed to add, "No delivery fee. You've been an excellent customer."
Enzo paid and turned away.
They left the egg stall and moved through the market corridor without lingering.
He gave the only answer Proton was getting today.
"It's not finished," Enzo said.
Proton's mouth tightened as if he wanted to push harder, but Enzo's tone made it clear the conversation was closed.
Then the System flickered in the corner of Enzo's vision.
REWARDS LOADING… 71%