Pokémon: I’m Really Not a Team Rocket Spy

With the move Crunch as a hereditary skill, Maki had a feeling that Charmander might have a decent talent for bite-based moves.

Maki attempted to guide Charmander in focusing its Fire-type energy into its teeth. However, Charmander seemed to struggle to grasp the concept, getting stuck at this bottleneck for a while.

Just as Maki was pondering the next steps to help Charmander break through, Charmander suddenly opened its mouth and pointed at its teeth, letting out a series of excited cries.

"Have you made some progress?" Maki asked.

Charmander nodded eagerly, keeping its mouth open as if inviting Maki to touch its teeth.

Swallowing nervously, Maki overcame the psychological shadow of being bitten before and cautiously poked Charmander's teeth with a finger.

Huh?

Maki immediately noticed the difference, his eyes lighting up.

"You've already managed to store Fire-type energy in your teeth?"

Typically, as a Fire-type Pokémon, Charmander's body temperature was naturally higher than that of most Pokémon. However, the heat radiating from its teeth now was noticeably higher, surpassing the normal range.

With Crunch as a foundation, this was a promising start, even though it still fell short of mastering Fire Fang.

Maki tried encouraging Charmander to add Fire-type energy to its Crunch attacks. If successful, the combined effects of Crunch's ability to reduce the opponent's Defense and Fire Fang's chance to cause flinching or burn would make a Serene Grace-like Charmander no longer just a dream.

However, Charmander hadn't fully mastered Fire Fang yet. Whenever Fire-type energy was added to Crunch, it clashed with the Dark-type energy, causing even the Crunch move itself to fail.

Maki realized he might have been rushing things. Redirecting his efforts, he focused on reinforcing Charmander's training for Fire Fang.

An hour passed quickly. Maki decided not to extend the rental time and instead took Charmander to a more open area in the park.

Physical training was just as important for Charmander as skill training. After all, while Charizard might lovingly be referred to by players as a "glass cannon," it wouldn't make much sense for it to activate Solar Power only to exhaust itself after a short while.

Not to mention, real life isn't a game. Maki's plan for Charmander's development was to make it a dual-attacker, destined to trade blows with fiery punches.

Training now was essential to avoid trouble later. As the saying goes, "It's better to mend the fold after the sheep are lost."

Dragging Charmander along, Maki ran laps around the park multiple times.

Whether this training benefited Charmander or not, Maki couldn't say for sure. However, he felt utterly drained—his legs felt like they didn't belong to him anymore, even with his decent physical condition.

Charmander, though tired and panting, seemed to hold up much better than Maki. It even stopped to wait for him after running ahead, its gaze seemingly saying:

"Come on, Trainer! That's all you've got?"

Refusing to lose face in front of Charmander, Maki forced himself to run a few more laps. Eventually, he came to a sobering realization: humans and Pokémon were just inherently different in stamina. Unless you're some kind of super protagonist, don't even think about competing.

"Tomorrow... we'll continue! I'll run alongside you again," Maki said, his words slurred from exhaustion, though he still mustered his energy to encourage Charmander.

As a Trainer, you had to lead by example. If you couldn't endure hardship alongside your Pokémon, how could you call yourself a proper Trainer?

"No worries, I can still walk…" Maki declined Charmander's offer of a helping paw and stumbled back to the Pokémon Center.

Once there, he treated Charmander to a hot bath—well, the comfort was mainly his. Charmander was still wary of water, reluctantly agreeing to Maki's conditions under the lure of Pokéblocks.

"If you can't even enjoy a proper bath, how will you ever become a Water Absorb Charizard?" Maki muttered while toweling Charmander off.

Charmander assumed its Trainer was spouting nonsense after losing his sanity from running too much. It resolved to stop him from overdoing it tomorrow.

After drying off Charmander, Maki let it roam around the room as usual. He then checked his communication device and noticed a special message.

The sender was Giovanni. Since Giovanni's messages were always encrypted, there was no need to worry about them being intercepted.

The message was simple: Arrive in Saffron City within a week. Sabrina will fill you in.

The brevity left Maki bewildered.

If I'm being sent there, at least tell me what's going on, he thought.

After the initial confusion, Maki felt a headache—not because of the potential mission but because of the mention of Sabrina.

Sabrina held a unique status within Team Rocket. While she couldn't yet rival the likes of Lt. Surge or Proton in pure strength, her potential placed her on par with them.

Given enough time, Sabrina could easily reach the level of an Elite Four member.

In terms of psychic talent, Sabrina was one of two people Maki considered unmatched, the other being Caitlin from the Unova region—a future Elite Four member.

To Maki, these two weren't human. They were Psychic Pokémon disguised as humans.

He had limited knowledge of Caitlin, mainly from the anime and games of his previous life. But Sabrina… he had known her personally since childhood.

Sabrina's father, the current Saffron City Gym Leader, had already handed over most of the Gym's responsibilities to her. It wouldn't be long before she officially claimed the title of Gym Leader, potentially becoming the youngest in Kanto's history.

While her strength was a boon for Team Rocket, her personality was a different story—a challenge even Giovanni seemed to struggle with.

"She was so adorable when she was little! What happened?" Maki lamented.

Having known Sabrina and Silver since childhood, Maki couldn't help but feel exasperated by her drastic changes.

If most girls change eighteenfold as they grow, Sabrina must have transformed seventy-two times.

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