Pokémon: Master of the Rain Team

Chapter 649 - 649 – The Spawn Camper

"Child, you're from the past. We can't tell you about the future," Towa said, refusing to answer Reiji's questions. "That would change history. Go back as soon as you can. Celebi should be waiting for you at Lake of Life."The truth was, history had already changed. From the moment Reiji crossed into this time, the Pokémon world's original timeline no longer existed for him. A new branch had split off, one that belonged to Reiji.

"Forget it." Reiji shook his head. He already knew plenty about the Pokémon world's future. What he wanted to know was his own future, and what happened to the people he knew.

If they did not want to tell him, he would not force it. He stood up and left the tree house.

"Sorry for bothering you. I'll head back as soon as I can."

"Rai!"

Diana chased after him, unable to hold back the urge to spoil something.

"Rai, you're really strong in the future. You cleared Champion Road and became the Orange Archipelago Champion—"

"Thanks."

Reiji saw Towa hurrying out after her and stopped listening before Diana got scolded.

Still, that one sentence already told him a lot. Champion Road meant challenging the Elite Four and the Champion. And he became the Champion of the Orange Archipelago?

Spoiler people really did exist in every world.

Past Reiji and future Reiji were the same person. He knew himself too well. If he had known his past self had come to the future, he probably would have spoiled things too. Honestly, Reiji kind of wanted to see what face his future self would make.

He released Pidgeot and flew toward Lake of Life. Even if Towa and the others refused to talk, he had another way to learn about the future.

One phone call.

As long as his future self had not changed numbers.

Back at Lake of Life, Reiji released Poliwrath and Scyther. Scyther was badly hurt again, so he began treating it first.

Poor Scyther really could not catch a break. It kept getting braver with every fight, and its opponents kept getting stronger too. Reiji was starting to worry about its mental state.

He also placed Pelipper in the lake to recover. It was not injured, so its unconsciousness was probably a side effect of the time jump.

Gengar had no such problem. It had stayed awake the entire time. Elite Four-tier strength really did give it more room to handle things.

Then there was Celebi inside the Heal Ball. Reiji did not plan to wake it up yet. At least not before he spoke to his future self.

If he failed to return, or got killed the moment he went back, he at least wanted to know how it happened so he could avoid it.

This world had its own Celebi too, the Celebi of this time. In practice, Celebi was very hard to kill. If something happened to one Celebi in one point in time, Celebi from other times could cross over and save it.

After putting Celebi's ball away, Reiji switched off his phone first. The last thing he wanted was 2 identical SIM cards with the same number existing in the same world. Then he took out his satellite phone and called his future self.

To his surprise, the call did not go straight to a shutdown message. It rang.

Good. Future him had not changed numbers.

After a while, someone answered. A cold woman's voice came through.

"Who are you looking for?"

"Huh? A woman?" Reiji thought. Doesn't matter. The call connected.

He lowered his voice into a hoarse rasp and said, "I'm looking for your boss. Put him on."

"Our boss is busy. How do you have his private number? Who are you?"

"Just give him the phone. Tell him someone from back home is calling."

Reiji nearly rolled his eyes. What was wrong with this woman? It was not even her phone, so why was she wasting time? This was a Champion's private number. How was that not important?

"Someone from back home?"

At the Orange League headquarters on Pummelo Island, Matori stood in front of the desk and passed the phone to the man behind it, looking confused.

"Matori, whose call is it?" The man behind the desk frowned at the phone she was offering him, clearly annoyed. What was this crazy woman trying to do now?

"Rai, he says he's from back home. Do you want to take it?" Matori had no idea what that was supposed to mean. Someone from the same village?

Wasn't Reiji an orphan? Then anyone "from back home" would be another orphan from the same place. Of course. Now that he had made it big, every poor old connection wanted to crawl out and claim kinship.

Shameless.

If Giovanni had not ordered her to monitor this man by working as his secretary, she would never have come here to play assistant. And now she even had to warm his bed at night.

So annoying.

"From back home?" The man Matori called Rai paused, then took the phone.

The only people who could use that phrase with him were other transmigrators from his previous life.

Maybe he had changed the Pokémon world's plot too much by becoming Champion of the Orange Archipelago. Maybe some later transmigrator noticed him, realized he was an outsider too, and came to test the waters.

No idea where the guy got his private number, but he was probably trying to latch onto him.

That was what he assumed of people like that.

He brought the phone to his ear and asked, "Who is this?"

"Boss, my shredded pork in garlic sauce has gotten pretty good lately. Want me to bring some over?"

Future Reiji went still.

That dish didn't exist in this world. Whoever was on the other end wasn't just making small talk. He was testing him.

Future Reiji tested him back. "What, are you calling to borrow money?"

On the other end, Reiji almost grinned.

That was the right answer.

It really was him.

"Haha, you caught me. I just got here, and I'm a little short on cash. Think you could lend your poor little brother—"

"Lend you shit. Your cooking's terrible. Get lost. I'm broke."

"Oh, broke, are you? Then eat shit. No wonder you still can't catch anything when you fish."

Future Reiji understood immediately. Someone was listening, so the only safe way to talk was to turn the whole call into a fight.

"You bastard, who are you calling bad at fishing?" future Reiji snapped. "I've landed bighead carp before. Say that to my face tomorrow, two-fifty sharp, and I'll beat it into your head, you useless idiot."

Then he slammed the phone down and turned to Matori.

"That bastard called me useless at fishing. Find out who he is."

"Already done." Matori tapped through her tablet and pulled up the signal. "Satellite phone. The signal came from near Olivine City in Johto."

"Fine. I got it. Leave me alone for a bit."

The moment future Reiji heard Johto, most of the anger drained out of him. Too far away to chase right now.

He watched Matori leave, but his face stayed dark.

Team Rocket had been monitoring the call. Matori had traced it without even waiting for his order. That alone told him how little freedom he actually had.

Still, the important part had gone through.

Now it depended on whether his past self caught it.

The shredded pork in garlic sauce had confirmed the caller came from the same world as him. The Pokémon world had inherited plenty from Japan, but Sichuan food like that definitely wasn't part of it.

The money line was his own test. The shameless answer, then the fishing insult, made it obvious this was not just some other transmigrator sniffing around.

It was him.

His past self.

And once Matori said the signal came from near Olivine City, there was no doubt left. Celebi's forest was in that area. Lake of Life was farther north. Put all of that together, and the answer was obvious.

He had gone through the same time jump once. The timeline had branched the moment he crossed over, but in his case, he had still ended up captured by Team Rocket.

Embarrassing, honestly.

This future was a mess.

He left the office in a foul mood. Whatever Matori reported later, he would deal with it when she came back.

Giovanni had sent her to watch him, but that had not exactly worked out the way Giovanni intended.

By the time he was done with Matori, she was asleep from exhaustion, and he was barely holding on himself.

He forced himself to stay awake long enough to pass the real message to Gengar. Through Gengar's telepathy, he explained everything, then told it to find a way to deliver the note.

Fortunately, Team Rocket did not watch him as tightly as they had in the beginning. Sending out a small slip of paper should still be possible.

Past me, the future is on you.

After that thought, he pulled Matori close and finally fell asleep.

Not bad.

Giovanni thought he had sent a leash. Instead, he had handed her straight to him.

Only after he was fully asleep did Matori open her eyes. She moved his arm off her and watched him for a moment. When she saw nothing strange, she closed her eyes again.

She had listened to that earlier phone call more than once and still could not make sense of it.

Some dish. Borrowing money. Little brother. Fishing. Tomorrow. Two-fifty. Useless idiot.

Reiji said strange things all the time, and half of them sounded like insults. She did not take it seriously.

The caller had claimed to be from "back home," but that only made it sound more like some poor relative crawling out of nowhere now that Reiji had made it big.

People were always like that. Once someone climbed high enough, every forgotten nobody suddenly wanted a connection.

She hated that.

There was no need to bother the Boss with something this small. Some broke relative trying to latch onto Reiji would only put him in a bad mood.

…

At Lake of Life, Reiji nearly jumped the moment he heard the hidden time.

Tomorrow. Two-fifty.

Future him had buried it right in the middle of the rant.

He switched on his old phone at once.

Luckily, Arborville had a communication tower. His old keypad phone still had 2 bars of signal.

Now he just had to wait.

He could have turned the phone on later, but he left it on anyway. Missing the call would be stupid, and future him's situation sounded bad. Even as Champion, he clearly had people watching him.

He had to be careful just making a phone call, then smashed the phone afterward. Maybe he was afraid of being overheard. Maybe he was afraid of exposing something.

Whether that anger had been real or an act, the call tonight would make it clear.

Time dragged on.

Reiji waited deep in the forest.

Poliwrath and Pelipper soaked in the lake all morning and recovered. Scyther could move again, barely, but it still needed more treatment.

During that time, Gengar finally explained that Celebi had healed Poliwrath and the others. If Celebi treated Scyther too, it should recover quickly.

Reiji decided to wait. He wanted the message from his future self first. After that, he could ask Celebi to heal Scyther. For Celebi, it should be easy.

So he waited.

Afternoon passed.

Night fell.

The phone stayed silent.

He kept waiting. Midnight came and went. Then 2 a.m. came and went. Still nothing.

Not time yet. No need to panic.

He did not release his Pokémon today. This was the future, and if any of them wandered off into this huge old forest, finding them again would be a nightmare. Better to let them eat and stay inside their Poké Balls.

At 2:49 a.m., Reiji stared at the phone, nerves tight.

Everything depended on 2:50.

The last minute crawled by. He kept glancing between the second hand on his watch and the dark phone screen.

The second hand passed 12.

The phone lit up.

It vibrated and rang.

Buzz. Ring. Buzz. Ring.

Reiji picked up on the second ring.

He said nothing.

Neither did the person on the other end.

Then a sigh came through the line, followed by a voice.

"Slowking speaking. I'll be repeating Rai's message. Don't ask questions. I can't answer them. I wasn't there back then. Listen carefully. I hope this gives you a different future."

"I'll begin."

"Stay alive. Stay quiet. Don't get cocky."

"Team Rocket is much worse than you think. They have plenty of lesser Legendary Pokémon like Darkrai and Zapdos. Giovanni alone has 2 Champion-tier Legendary Pokémon."

"It starts the day you go back. Giovanni comes in person and waits for you there. I'm forced to join Team Rocket. You can guess what happens after that."

"How you break out of this is up to you. I didn't escape. I missed my chance. Gengar should be able to open a way out, but back then, I didn't have the nerve to gamble on it. By the time I realized it, it was already too late."

Reiji listened in silence, then started roasting his future self in his head.

Really?

A riddle guy and a spoiler guy?

Of course it was him.

So when he went back, Giovanni would be waiting in person.

That was insane.

A max-level boss camping the starter zone just to crush a newbie. Giovanni had no shame at all. If Reiji had never come to the future, he would have walked right into the same ending.

But future him had time-traveled too. So why hadn't anything changed?

Had Giovanni camped the return point?

Maybe Giovanni had gone through time before and already knew Celebi would send him back to the same place.

That old bastard was rotten to the core.

Bullying a newbie with a max-level boss was bad enough.

Camping the spawn point too?

Absolutely shameless.

[End of chapter]

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