Start Game 1.7
August 14th, 2022
Every day I kept up a regular routine with Mirko, together the two of us were learning basic martial arts, practicing stances, learning basic moves and techniques, and stretches.
Lots of sit-ups, squats and plenty of juice.
“How are you doing, Mirko?” I called out to the rabbit as she unleashed her moves, a Quick Attack into Drain Punch, into an ear-based Pound to knock an opponent off balance.
Mirko perked up. “Miro! Bwahaha.” She placed her hands on her hips, boasting about her progress. I had focused on her speed, agility, and power. She had fallen in love with taekwondo and muay thai and had adapted the various elbow techniques for her ears. A mix of both martial arts was adapted so she could use every possible part of her body as a weapon.
“Is there something you want to ask about?” I didn't understand her language but I could get the subtext a lot of the time. She generated a Drain Punch, and swirled it around, then pointed to herself.
“Oh, you're asking what kind of moves I think you should learn?” She nodded, and I took a moment to formulate my response.
Well…
“Well you're pretty close to learning Double Kick, which serves as an excellent base to developing Jump Kick.” Jump Kick was an incredibly powerful Fighting-type move, and would make Mirko into a real monster when it came to raw power. “Work Up is another good move, it increases your strength by strengthening your aura.” All pokémon moves work by channeling their aura, the vast well of metaphysical energy which fuels their abilities and maintains their existence.
“Wa?” Mirko asked unsure.
“Work Up is… a ritual that increases your strength. You remember the feeling of Drain Punch right, how it reinvigorated you with drained power?” Mirko nodded, and I felt we were getting somewhere. “Use that feeling of reinvigoration, reach for your energy and tell it to wake the fuck up, channel it into a movement that pumps you up, a stretch maybe? Boost your power.”
Mirko didn't take long to figure out a movement, she shifted her hips, and moved her weight from one foot to the other. It was a cocky flex, and a bright red light sparked from her skin, until it unfolded into a flare of red energy that reminded me of the kaio-ken. I wonder…
“Mirko. Use a Pound, as hard as you can on that boulder.” I pointed to the spherical stone, and she threw herself at the target with glee, an ear taking a bright white hue. Her ear whipped around with immense force, practically a blur to my eyes and shattering the eleven-inch diameter mass of earth with a single strike.
Mirko looked so very proud of herself, having broken a rock over four times her own mass. We had been training her strength through exercises and fighting certain pokémon that offered the best traits for her to grow from.
EVs and IVs of a sort existed in this world, though they were a lot more ambiguous than a basic numerical system. EVs were simply bundled into experience, the growth of a pokémon through battle and challenges of the body. It's a battle of aura against aura, element against an element, and forces of nature colliding. So fighting certain pokémon or performing certain exercises filled the bond between pokémon and human with the experiences of life. increasing their power.
That left something vaguely like individual values or in truth potential which was more… a form of internal cultivation of energies, by providing the right environment to unlock their full potential, improving their ‘stats’ as well as training speed, comprehension, move mastery, and the ease in breaking out of bottlenecks within an evolutionary stage.
It could sorta sometimes be passed down through blood, since their own energy provided an optimal cradle for their young. Precisely measuring potential was not an exact science, this wasn't some kind of hyper-precise gameplay system.
Strengthening their potential allowed for the activation of latent affinities and genetic aberrations. From what I remember this was responsible for many of the unique variants of pokémon.
Non-standard moves, like a pikachu that learns Surf or Fly or an Entei that learns Sacred Fire. The ‘Shiny’ characteristic, named for the bright shine of their blood, minor elemental affinities, or of course the Alpha Phenomena, also known as the Giant phenotype. The ultimate manifestation of this cultivation involves Type Royals, legendary creatures ten or more times larger than ordinary for their species.
However, the bond between trainer and pokémon was the best way to bring out that hidden potential, creating something greater than the sum of their parts. All those methods of creating the right environment had to be paired with the bond of friendship between humans and pokémon. Being a fucking selfless asshole had a good way of weakening a pokémon, reducing their potential. Up to a point.
“Mirko. I have an idea that we can work on, you learned Work Up pretty quick, and I want to see how far we can customize it.” I slammed my fist into my palm, and she looked equally excited.
I was excited to see what I could pull off, even if it involved hard work and experimentation.
Heh.
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I examined myself in the reflective pond, doing my best to see how much progress had been made in a matter of weeks. My skin had gotten way softer, and my body had a sweeter scent, my facial and body hair had stopped growing as fast, so it was easier to shave.
Which was frankly absurdly convenient, not having to shave my legs was very much a boon with how thick it came in. My black hair had grown curlier and longer, and my chest was rather consistently sore now, which made sense. My medication worked wonders, and the feeling of relief was almost like a high that wouldn’t go away.
Twenty five days wasn’t enough for incredibly intense changes, but it was enough for visible progress and a remarkable improvement in mood. It also offered a good distraction from when I would take off onto my journey across the vast region of Tohoku. And I do mean vast.
Some four hundred and twenty thousand square kilometers of territory, a vast and untapped land, far more rural than its counterpart in my world, housing millions of humans and hundreds of millions of pokémon, and many hundreds of billions including the microbugs that form the baseline of every ecosystem on the planet.
As a rookie trainer, if I had been a trainer with a Youngster license I would have had to wait until the circuit began, however I should be able to leave in several weeks since travel between settlements often takes days to weeks. Between the first gym it was a journey of two weeks, along with several settlements where I could battle trainers and gain strength and knowledge.
I leaned away from the pond, eyes glancing down to the minor fish pokémon and aquatic bugs. I breathed in and out as I was surrounded by nature, taking deep and regular gulps of fresh air, crisp and sharp in a way I had never really known existed.
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Though that said more about me than it did about my own world.
I took in as much information as I could, letting my mind wander in every direction. I had read several papers on what I was researching personally, with my own body, with my own mind and spirit.
Most scientists of this world believed in the concept of aura, of what was whispered in a hundred secret tongues as Infinity Energy, of the energy inherent in all living things and beyond, of the vital force. Even if only the last decade or so had yielded the ability to directly observe the fundamental, physical form of aura.
Aura was the source of the unique abilities of pokémon, stemming from a single source, it was the energy of Evolution, it was what allowed pokémon to appear from out of nowhere, New Species springing into existence.
Aura was the fundamental, binding energy of the universe, a seething foam of energy which was the source of all matter, all energy, the building block of creation. All energy was allegedly a different expression of this aural building block. What did that mean for my world?
It reminded me of quantum vacuum energy, but more… metaphysical, more ephemeral than our own understanding of physics, of reality. But that was what others knew of aura, not what I had come to understand personally, only a flicker of thought towards such a… fairytale concept.
Aura was an important concept in the study of pocket monsters, it was how the symbiosis between human and monster had been forged since near the very beginning. It was likely the bond itself was aura-based in nature, connections fueling their growth and our own.
So I was running research on myself, on seeing how best to reach out to that strange and alien power, to that fundamental source of vitality and might. This was going to be more personal, more a field of parapsychology than one of hard sciences like physics and chemistry.
There was a connection between Mirko and me, she had chosen me in a very unorthodox way and I had elected to allow it despite it involving attacking me. There was also the fact I could pick up impressions of what she wanted to tell me despite the fact I'm literally on the spectrum and attempting to read an alien life form.
But above all it was my burning curiosity to explore and understand that was behind my quest to learn about aura. A fundamental aspect of creation at my fingertips, and it was something I wanted access to.
I close my eyes, letting my senses spread out to the area around me, letting my mind wander, thoughts racing as I overanalyzed every aspect of the world around me.
I thought back to the rush of battle and training, how Mirko unleashed her power into reality without hesitation, how something rippled along her body when she used moves, as we went along the journey of move mastery. Reducing the power of moves to reduce the needed time to use a second move, increasing power at the cost of stamina.
I remember fun brainstorming sessions with Mirko, drilling maneuvers and strategies for as many situations as possible, and trying to figure out what works and doesn't work through trial and error. Figuring out how to take care of her fur had been a hard task, and was more of a social task. She could do a lot of it herself, and liked brushes and gentle shampoo. I kept those memories close, and breathed.
In and out.
Out and in.
Every breath of fresh air, every beam of sunlight warming my skin, the grass tickling my legs, and the sound of so many pokémon around me. There was something, a well of awareness I couldn't quite reach out and touch, both within and without.
But I knew it was there, a subtle breaking of reality, a gentle massaging of physical law. I wasn't sure why I was so sensitive to the physics-altering effects of moves, but it was convenient when it came to studying them.
I smiled.
There was so much still to learn.
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August 21st, 2022.
I floated in the series of spaces between spaces, where time no longer flows one way but all ways, the yawning abyss between possibilities, the primordial chaos which marked the Outside of reality, the bleeding channels of the endless universal wavefunction.
I didn’t remember how I got here, but I did know I had been anchored to something, had enough rope so I wouldn’t get pulled from existence all together. But I did see things in the In Between, vaguely familiar in some respects and horrifically horrifying and unfamiliar in others.
I saw networks of red crystal, forming vast valleys of real and virtual space, the hub of the wheel of creatures so vast they outmassed star systems, following an endless cycle, cleaving to instincts a billion years old, the memories of a world a billion years dead.
I passed those by, and crashed into a mysterious realm of portals, a quiet wood between the worlds, countless iterations of the same concept, the same trope across infinite planes. A white void, a gutter space between panels that I was kicked out of in an instant, then an odd gap junction with a fancy book, then…
Black, blacker, blackest / And cold beyond all frozen things
There were more places my mind vaguely recalled, an endless expanse of swirling, silvery clouds broken only by pools of color, random junk, and the colossal corpses of long dead gods.
A nothing-space inhabited only by planeswalkers and eldritch titans that devour entire realities. A barren plane of red soil, the birthplace of entities I couldn’t begin to describe, gods, demons or both?
Then a furthest ring, an infinite space which divides all sessions, completely unnavigable and unfathomable, untouched by the time of any universe in existence.
The second to last series of spaces was a bizarre dimension filled with a black-green oily substance, with gravitational anomalies and swarms of floating cubes providing a perception of infinite worlds.
I could feel something in those spaces, watching, waiting, and hungry. But I was protected by the barrier of the between spaces, my distant connection to those worlds strengthened by… a greater existence.
I finally fell into a realm painted with stars and holes into other realities, clinging onto crystalline meteoroids, a shadow covered the stars and then—
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I startled awake, a scream strangled in my own throat as a feeling of impending doom and dread seized my heart with no intention of letting go.
The broken memories stuck in my head, playing over and over and over and over and over and—
The room buzzed like static, and I covered my ears, curling up into a ball as it screamed in my ear like the chiming horror of breaking reality as… as…
A comforting presence swept over me in a flash of white light, as Mirko materialized out of the strange essence of aura minimized within her ball.
She let out a comforting muttering sound, thumping her foot on the bed in a regular and even pattern. She breathed in and out and I followed her lead as her presence provided much needed safety.
It took me a few minutes to center myself in the unfamiliar darkness of my room, and I dropped my face into my hands, feeling sweat trail down my cheeks.
Mirko’s paws very carefully prodded at me, as if asking for permission. I nodded and she hopped onto me, not settling into an affectionate cuddle so much as an acknowledgement of her presence, almost awkward but sweet that she made the attempt despite her natural distance as a buneary.
She made a soft purring sound, gently grinding her teeth, and offering her head. I very carefully placed a hand on it, letting my hands glide through her soft fur. I pet her forehead, giving her little scritches and gentle strokes along her head. Mirko slackened, and I very deliberately let her see that I was going behind her ears.
The gentle massage continued, and I pressed my lips together as I became mesmerized by the texture and feeling of Mirko’s fur. She relaxed, and so did I…
My eyes felt heavy. “Thank… you for calming me down.”
She nodded with a gentle almost smile, and my eyes began to slide close.
Tomorrow… hopefully… be a better day.
Zzzz…
I lost unconsciousness, falling into far more pleasant dreams.