NOVEL WEB Chapter 12: Poketube
The Poketube, an equivalent of Youtube in this parallel world.
Dante watched many lessons here when reviewing for his Trainer examination. He especially liked watching 'Let's ask Mr. Zhongli!' and 'Wildlife tips from Forest Ranger Tighnari'.
Mr. Zhongli is a retired Pokemon Champion of China and was rumored to have signed a contract with the Legendary Pokemons. He has lived since the start of the war between Pokemons and Humans, and even now still looks like a man in his late twenties to early thirties.
During the war, he rose to become one of the strongest Pokemon Trainer in the whole world.
His Poketube account has millions of followers, with his videos receiving views of no less than ten million. His videos are usually him talking about the events of the war, followed by answering ten questions from the audience.
Mr. Tighnari, on the other hand, is an International Forest Ranger. He usually travels around the world exploring various Pokemon species and ensuring the protection of Pokemon habitats.
His videos show him exploring the wild, giving practical tips and information regarding Pokemon habits, edible and non-edible food in the wild, how to spot whether you are encroaching a dangerous Pokemon's territory, and etc.
Both content creators provide Dante additional information aside from the ones in the books.
Browsing the videos from his search, one of them caught his eyes.
The video was posted just yesterday, with the title 'My Pokemon Trainer Journey Part 2: Taking the Pokemon Trainer Examination'.
The reason it caught Dante's eyes was because he recognized the girl on the thumbnail as the top scorer during the written part of the examination.
Dante opened the video and started watching.
The video wasn't long, only about 5 minutes. It basically shows a clip of her studying, her entering the Pokemon branch to take the test, and finally a picture of her Trainer ID. There was also a voiceover about what she felt and her aspirations at that moment.
The video had 7 likes and 1 comment congratulating her. Dante also liked the video, congratulated her in the comments, and then proceeded to browse other videos.
Meanwhile, in a condominium, a girl with green hair and wearing a sports bra and workout leggings with a towel hanging on her shoulders, was sitting in front of a table and eating breakfast.
From the sweat on her face and still labored breathing, one could tell that she had just finished a workout. The girl was planning to have a light meal before taking a bath.
Her name was Kuki Shinobu, a girl of Japanese descent, currently living in the Philippines to pursue a Pokemon Trainer career.
Due to some conflicts with her family, she decided to travel to another country to continue her study.
"Ahh, it's been a month since I ran away from home. Although the money I saved up should at least last for a year according to my calculations, I still need to find other ways to earn money. I'm lucky Shelly has little appetite."
Saying that, Shinobu smiled and patted the Shelmet that was eating beside her. It let out a *Shelll* before continuing to eat from its food bowl.
Shelmet is a bug type Pokemon that looks like a bivalve or a snail. It has a gray shell that resembles a knight's visor, with a coiling spiral of its shell further back. The shell has protrusions on the underside, which it apparently uses as legs. Its inner body is pink with a long, puckered mouth, and green markings below its eyes.
Shinobu got Shelmet from the wild four months ago. It was one of the reasons why she got into a conflict with her family.
After eating, Shinobu took out her phone to browse the news for a while. In the headlines, there reads "SHOCK! TEENAGE STAR ACTRESS FURINA DE FONTAINE QUITTING FROM SHOWBIZ?!".
Seeing this, Shinobu raised an eyebrow. While she was not a diehard fan of Furina, she also watched some of her works.
Furina can be said to be an internationally famous actress since childhood after starring in the movie 'Holly Potter and the Wishing Stone'. Her quitting from the showbiz industry can be said to cause worldwide shock from her fans around the globe.
Clicking on the news and skimming it for a while, Shinobu was a little surprised.
It turns out that Furina is just temporarily leaving her acting career in order to focus more on her upcoming university studies. In the interview, Furina shared about her dream of becoming a Pokemon Coordinator ever since she was a child.
Pokemon Coordinators, like Trainers, also train Pokemons to battle. However, instead of focusing on the fighting aspect, their main focus is how to make the battle more visually appealing.
Shinobu continued to browse for the news. She smiled at being notified of her Poketube video being liked, and also liked the congratulation message addressed to her.
Becoming a content creator was one of the methods Shinobu thought of to earn enough money for her Trainer career in the early stages.
As long as she shows enough potential, people will come to support her journey with Shelly. It was also a disguised way of assuring her family that she was fine and healthy living alone in another country.
Turning off the phone and stretching her slender body, she walked towards the bathroom.
"Let's go Shelly! It's bath time!"
*Shelmettt*
Shelmet hopped off the sofa and followed behind Shinobu.
—
In the Zulueta household
Dante finished washing the plates for breakfast and began to head into his room. Sitting on his bed, he began contemplating.
After watching some Poketube videos, he summarized the things most needed by newly emerging trainers.
The first and most important is the starter Pokemon.
As a new trainer, most have no experience when it comes to taking care and training a Pokemon. They will inevitably make mistakes, such as improper training, improper commanding, and sometimes even neglecting the Pokemon's needs.
In addition, trainers can only have one Pokemon before they beat their first Pokemon Gym.
Therefore, the ideal starter Pokemon are those friendly to humans, easy to take care of, have a high potential, and can reach that potential fast enough.
The Pokemon Alliance official website has a section which talks about the best Pokemon candidates to choose from as a starter. Dante saw many of the official starter Pokemon from the games such as Bulbasaur, Charmander, Totodile, Chimchar, Mudkip, etc.
Of course, there were also others such as Eevee, Abra, Flabebe, Vanillite, Darumaka, and many more.
Dante already decided Pikachu to be his starter Pokemon, and searched the Pokenet to see other's discussion regarding Pikachu as a starter.
The general consensus was that, unless you have enough money to buy a Thunderstone, it is best to choose other Pokemon as a starter. Dante was a little puzzled as to why there was no mention of the Light Ball, so he continued searching.
He was surprised by the result of his search.
According to various studies, the Light Ball acts as an outlet that allows Pikachu to release double the energy from its body. However, due to the inherently weak body of Pikachu, this only allows them to exert 4-5 moves at maximum potential before fainting from overexertion.
A study mentioned about a trainer training his Pikachu to get used to the Light Ball. It allowed Pikachu to use 20 moves after training for 3 years. However, due to Pikachu's low racial limit, its Light Ball boosted moves can at most match Pokemons in the mid-high tier in terms of Attack and Special Attack.
In the end, the study concluded that the use of Light Ball on Pikachu is very inefficient in terms of time investment and is not recommended.