There are two months until my 15th birthday. Two months until I get to travel to my heart’s content. And boy do I have plans for then.

Currently, I’m training Drako with some of the charmeleon in the Charicific Valley. There are five charmeleon including Drako and they’re all engaged in an all out brawl.

Due to Drako’s size, he stands out, and is being teamed up against by two charmeleon while the other two duke it out. One of the charmeleon gets in close to slash at him while the other prepares a dragon breath.

Although Drako could probably bull through and win, that’s not what I’ve been teaching him. He snorts a small amount of smoke before getting serious and releasing a humongous smokescreen. While under the cover of the smoke, he slips around the melee charmeleon and knocks them out with two well placed slashes that are almost dragon claws, courtesy of Elise's tuition. Although Drako is big for a charmeleon, I still wanted to teach him proper tactics. One thing we trained was being able to hear his opponent while in a smokescreen.

The ranged charmeleon doesn’t know what’s happening in the smoke but lets out a dragon breath anyways. After a few seconds the smoke begins to clear, showing a prone Drako charging up his own dragon breath. He jumps up and fires the much larger dragon breath at the ranged charmeleon, knocking it out.

After dealing with his two opponents, Drako turns to the last remaining charmeleon. The charmeleon lets out a small flamethrower, sending out a challenge to Drako. Drako accepts and they both begin charging their flamethrowers.

Releasing at the same time, both flamethrowers look about even, buffeting against each other in the middle of the pokemon. But slowly, the opponent’s flamethrower starts to shrink while Drako keeps up a steady stream. Eventually, the opponent is worn down and Drako puts a little oomph into his flamethrower to explode it forward. Due to its previous injuries, the charmeleon is defeated.

Drako raises his maw and roars at the heavens.

While Drako relishes in his victory, I quickly heal the downed pokemon. As I go from charmeleon to charmeleon, I can’t help but think that Drako is a beast. I mean, that last charmeleon was 3 years old, and Drako is only 2.

I know that blood bonded pokemon grow more quickly and more powerful than their non-bonded counterparts…but still, Drako was only winded slightly from that fight. I’d say he has around 60% of his energy left and he was undamaged.

I shook my head. I can’t start getting complacent. I’ve barely faced any other bonded pokemon. Also, Drako’s size could hinder his flying as a charizard. So far, on the ground he is faster than the other charmeleon. Hopefully, he becomes adept at flying. If not, he still has a stronger attack than typical pokemon of the charmander line.

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Speaking of Drako’s evolution, it should be imminent now. He’s started showing signs this past week. I hope he evolves before I set off for my journey, getting around with a flying mount would be way easier.

I start walking back to the main compound with Drako walking beside me. As we approach my house, I see Obediah at a training area with his charmeleon, Estoria. Being the daughter of Elise, my Grampa’s charizard, Estoria is a prime example of a charmeleon. Although, she was newly evolved around a month ago.

Estoria is practicing her ember to develop it into flamethrower. As we pass by, suddenly Drako stops and stares at Estoria. I just facepalm as I basically see hearts flying out of his eyes.

“Hey, how’s it going Orick?” Obediah greets me as Estoria takes a break.

“Not bad, just got done training with some of the charmeleon in the valley. How’s Estoria’s progress?”

“She’s doing really well! She should have flamethrower down in less than a week!”

As we’re talking, Drako walks up to Estoria and tries engaging her in conversation but she just huffs out a small flame and looks away. Although Drako always tries to flirt with Estoria, she never reciprocates and tries to ignore him when she can. I think that she’s jealous of Drako’s progress, even though he is older than her. Sometimes when I’m practicing with Drako, I can see her sneaking glances at him.

“Well, we should get going, my mom has dinner ready.” I say. “C’mon Drako.”

Drako lowers his head in sadness as he catches up to me.

“Hey, don’t worry about Estoria. I think she secretly likes you.” I whisper to him, causing him to perk up.

“Mom, we’re home.” I say as I enter my house.

“Come in the kitchen, dinner’s ready.” She calls from the dining room.

We quickly enter and start scarfing down Mom’s heavenly cooking, while she looks at us fondly exasperated at the rate we’re eating.

“Slow down, it's not going anywhere.” She says with a laugh.

“Well, we only have two months to enjoy your cooking.” I say with a smile. But mom slightly frowns at that and takes a moment to recompose herself.

“I’m sure you’ll manage. And if you’re really craving it, you can come home.” She says wistfully.

I mentally slap my head. Why did I have to lower the mood like that? I know that Mom has had some troubles during her journey, and seeing how she no longer has any pokemon, I can guess somewhat what happened to her. If you lose all of your bonded pokemon, it’s almost impossible to form a bond again.

As well, your first six bonds would always be the deepest. While you can only have six bonded pokemon at a time, if one was lost you could replace the bond. Many trainers never made it to a full six bonds, quitting after two or three.

Mom never liked talking about her past, though I knew she was a trainer who started with a charmander. She would always try to focus on me while I was growing up. Now that I’m about to leave, I’m worried about how she’ll cope with me gone.

In my past life, my parents weren’t horrible. But they never really cared for me like Mom. They just neglected me unless there was trouble with my grades or school. With the love and care that Mom’s showed me in this life, I consider her to be my real parent.

After finishing my meal, I got up and did the dishes. When I was done, Mom was still sitting at the table, staring into space.

I came up to her and gave her a big hug. “I love you, Mom. I’ll make sure to come back home as much as I can.”

“No, no. You should enjoy your journey…they could be some of the best years of your life.”

“I will be enjoying my journey. Besides, with Drako here I should be able to fly around quite fast.” I say.

“Chaaar!” Drako says as he sidles up to Mom on the other side. Drako really bonded with Mom over the years…mostly due to her exemplary cooking and the treats she made him.

“Oh, just make sure to always get home safe.” She says with tears beading down her cheek.

“I promise!” “CHAaar!”