The day spent training past relatively uneventfully. Hobbes wouldn't have been considered a 'high level' yet if he were in a game, and even if he were, mimikyus didn't exactly have a huge move-pool. Larger than dittos, of course, but much smaller than the average pokemon.

This world didn't have 'levels', of course, but I still thought they were a helpful way of approximating a pokemon's power. Hobbes still mostly relied on his 'early game' moves, and while he was stronger than most other starters of kids just setting out on their journeys, he wasn't stronger than most third-stage evolution pokemon. If I had to guesstimate, I'd put his power at around level twenty-five or so.

We spent the day drilling through Hobbes' moves: shadow sneak, astonish, scratch, double team, and baby-doll eyes. It only took a few repetitions of each before Hobbes was able to use them just as well as he had been prior to his fusion, which I considered a good sign. I didn't bother with practicing mimic -- while it was a powerful move in certain situations that we'd spent hours upon hours training to master, the move was rendered somewhat redundant with his new ability to transform. And besides, mimic required an opponent to train; I didn't feel it was necessary to terrorize the local ditto-fusion population any further when it wasn't necessary.

The only move that might have been weaker after his fusion was baby-doll eyes. It was difficult to tell without an opponent and because it did no direct damage anyway, but the aura of pink that surrounded him when using the move seemed slightly weaker from what I remembered a few days prior. I wondered if that was a sign that he'd lost his fairy typing in the fusion, but decided to withhold judgment until we made it to a pokecenter where he could be scanned.

If it was, I didn't think it would be a huge loss. The only other fairy-type moves he could naturally learn -- from my game-world knowledge, at least -- were charm and play rough, and neither of those would come for quite a few 'levels.' I planned to lean more into his new ability to transform over training his own moves, anyway.

Even though we spent the whole day in the fields outside of Merraga, the training was a nostalgic reminder of our time stuck at home as a youngster. We'd only started our journey a few days ago, but the familiar routine of testing and measuring the power of moves brought about a pang of homesickness in the unfamiliar environment. I had no intention of indulging that desire -- I was on my journey, and was dedicated to fully embracing the adventure -- but I resolved to call home as soon as I got back to someplace with service.

We ended up staying in the fields for the night, finding a small copse of trees for me to set up my hammock. After how uncomfortable my previous night's sleep had been, I considered going back to Merraga, but ultimately discarded it. Every town was required to provide at least some form of cheap temporary housing for trainers on their journey. Typically, this was in a motel-style building attached to the pokecenter, but since Merraga was so out-of-the-way of normal trainers' routes, they only had a small closet-like space attached to the local clinic for trainers to use. And if the oil and gas lamps Cayden saw lighting up the town as he walked through were anything to go on, he doubted the room even had electricity or a place to charge his phone.

One of the few positives about going back to a flip phone after having smartphones in his previous life was their extended battery life. His phone could last for a full week before it needed a charge, and even longer if he was out of service and not using it regularly -- he didn't have to worry about his battery running out anytime soon.

We woke -- once again -- at dawn, thankfully fully rested after settling down as the sun set the previous evening. And after eating a quick breakfast, we set out for the mine.

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"Di..."

"Oh, come on, don't be a baby," I said as I pulled my flashlight out of my backpack. It only took an hour of walking until we stood at the base of one of the low mountains, and thirty minutes after that, we located our first mine shaft.

It was horizontal into the side of the mountain, with two sets of tracks leading into it. A large metal door blocked off the entrance, secured with a massive padlock. But the door was clearly a late addition to the mineshaft, barely wedged into place and hardly proper security; gaps surrounded the edges of the metal where a cold breeze blew from the dark, as wide as a foot in some places.

Plenty wide enough for me to squeeze through.

"Kyu, dimikyu," Hobbes cautioned, but I knew he was just as curious and excited to explore as I was. He looked with me into the dark as I pointed my flashlight into the largest gap at the edge of the door. There wasn't much to see -- just an empty, round tunnel, extending further than the light from my weak flashlight was able to shine.

"We'll be careful. We'll just explore for a few hours. If we don't find anything cool, we'll turn back. And if we find anything too cool for us to handle..." I gave Hobbes a savage smile. "...we'll run."

Hobbes just sighed, playing the part of a disappointed mother, shaking his head and letting out a resigned "di".

Truthfully, I wasn't nearly as confident as I was projecting. Caves were considered one of the most dangerous environments for trainers to explore, and for good reason. It was impossible to get any signal for wireless devices further than a few feet into the cave, which meant it was impossible to call for help if something went wrong. And even more than caves on Earth, cave-ins in the pokemon world were always a possibility. Shifting rocks from tunneling onix or golem could leave even a cautious trainer trapped or lost, doomed if they didn't have a pokemon with teleport or dig. The recently developed and crazily expensive 'escape rope' items could simulate a teleport out of a cave, but I didn't have near enough money to afford one. Besides, they had an extremely limited range and could only teleport a trainer to a nearby location with a 'receiver' -- one of the main reasons so many caves had pokemon centers just outside of them.

And all those didn't even include the most dangerous reason many trainers avoided caves: the small but always possible chance of stumbling into the forgotten home of a powerful pokemon and provoking its ire.

But despite all these dangers, I was determined to explore the mine. And for all Hobbes' worries, I didn't think this would be a repeat of the Lavender Tower misadventure. I had good reasons for why I didn't think this was a bad idea.

For all the similarities, this wasn't a natural cave -- it was an old, abandoned mine. On Earth, that would have increased the danger, as mines were typically less stable than caves. But here, it made it safer. There weren't likely to be many species of pokemon that called the area beneath the mountain home before the mining operation began, or else they never would have been able to start mining in the first place. And with the door blocking off the entrance, I doubted many pokemon would have been able to move into the vacated place in the meantime. I was sure that some pokemon lived down there, but it was much more likely to be smaller and less powerful pokemon that claimed the abandoned habitat, rather than one of the uber-territorial forces of nature that could kill me with barely a glance.

And at the end of the day, the mine was cool. The caves beneath Kanto were some of the least explored places in the region. They were nothing like the standardized routes most trainers starting on their journeys stuck to, carefully monitored by rangers and with exhaustive lists available on the net of possible pokemon encounters. Every time someone set foot into a cave, they were setting foot into the unknown, with the possibility of finding rare pokemon, magical rocks, and riches beyond imagination.

Most legendaries in the games called caves their homes, after all.

This mine wouldn't be that. I had no illusions of stumbling upon the home of mewtwo, capturing him with one of my two remaining pokeballs, and then sweeping the Elite Four. This was just an old, abandoned mine. More than likely, I'd find nothing more than some forgotten tools and a zubat or two.

But the feeling was the same. That feeling of excitement and adventure, of setting foot where no man had gone before -- it was intoxicating. And if I wasn't willing to chase that feeling when it was offered in a relatively safe environment, could I even call myself a real pokemon trainer?

So with Hobbes leading the way, I squeezed through the gap next to the door, stepping into the dark of the mine.