Sometime later, Halley arrived at the Marey Gym and took Oddish out of its Pokéball.

"Odi?" Oddish wondered, looking up at the massive Asian architecture.

"Welcome to Marey Gym, Oddish! We're going to take some courses here to get stronger. Are you ready?"

"Odi!" Oddish nodded with a smile.

"So you'd like to sign up for a course in the Gym, correct?" Some minutes later, the man in the reception asked.

"Yeah."

"Understood. Your classroom number will be 7."

Halley reached the classroom on the second floor of the building and opened the door. Dozens of trainers were sitting at their table with their Pokémon, to either challenge the gym or train their skills. He found an empty seat among the occupied tables and sat there, with Oddish sitting on the table.

Some minutes later, the Gym Leader confidently entered the room and stood at the teacher's table. "Good afternoon, class. I'm Clash, the Gym Leader of this Marey Gym."

"Good afternoon!" The trainers replied, applauding.

"Yeah, thanks. So there must be a ton of new faces in our class today because the ten-year-olds this year received their Pokémon today! Alright, who's ten years old?"

The majority of the class raised their hand, including Halley.

"Mmm, that's a lot. Though, here's the catch. I won't be your coach today."

"Huh?"

"Come in!" Clash said to the person right outside the classroom. In response, Ash Ketchum nodded and gradually showed up in front of the class, the trainers' jaws dropped and their eyebrows rose in shock. The monarch stood at the teacher's table instead of Clash and said "Hi, everyone. I'm Ash Ketchum!"

"WHAAAAAAAAAAAT?!" Every trainer in the class screamed in surprise, their fingers pointing to the monarch, their jaws dropping as low as they could and their eyes widening to the maximum.

"O... Odi?!" Oddish was the exception while the other Pokémons in the class had no idea why their trainers were screaming.

"Ash Ketchum?!"

"The one who won the World Coronation Series last year?"

"Yup, the one!" "Pika!"

"Everyone, this is Ash Ketchum. He will be the one who will coach you today." Clash explained.

----------------------------------------

The time goes back to when Ash first visited the Marey Gym, trying to challenge it.

"MONARCH!!" Clash shouted out, as he sprinted to Ash in the lobby.

"WHAT THE-" "PIK-"

The Gym Leader went right in front of Ash in the blink of an eye and grabbed his hands.

"Holy moly, what brings you here?"

"Eh?" "Pika?"

"I didn't expect you to be here, man! You're here to challenge the Gym, right?"

"Yeah."

"Got it. Before you battle against me, you'd have to go through the Gym Test."

"What is it?"

"You're supposed to sign up for a day on the course if you were an ordinary trainer... But you're not. So how about this? Can you be the coach instead of me today?"

"A coach? I mean- I've never officially taught someone before though. Would it be okay?"

"You'd have more skill in battles than me, so why not? I believe you would be able to teach them well."

----------------------------------------

Halley looked at Oddish in front of him and noticed that Oddish was visibly surprised by Ash showing up. He knew Ash since he was a global celebrity for being the strongest trainer in the world, but it looked weird for a Pokémon who just met its trainer to know him. Especially when all the others didn't.

The monarch looked around the classroom and said "Woah, that's a lot. Alright then, guys. Do you have anything to ask me?"

Right after Ash finished his words, nearly everyone in the class raised their hands.

"Heh, this would take kinda long..." Ash answered the questions individually, eventually finishing all of them about an hour later. "So, no more questions? Can we start now?"

"Of course!"

"I want to learn so much from you!"

"Well then, guys. Let's go outside!" "Pikapi!"

The entire class went out to the sand beach on the island, doing some warm-ups before getting to the training.

"So... What are we gonna do?"

"Hmm... Oh, that would be good! Pikachu!" Pikachu jumped off its partner's shoulders and landed on the sand.

"Huh?"

"Rotom Phone, set a timer of three minutes!"

"Setting a three-minute timer."

"Uh, what are you trying to do?" One of the trainers asked.

"We're gonna play a simple game with simple rules."

"A simple game?"

"Yeah, basically, Pikachu will run away from your Pokémons for three minutes, and if any of your Pokémons lands an attack on it, you win!"

"That's... not that simple..."

"Also, two handicaps. Pikachu can't hurt your Pokémons in any way, and it can't use Quick Attack."

"Then... Maybe?"

"Our Pokémons can't move out of this beach for three minutes. Would you like to play it?"

"Hmm..."

"Yeah, why not?" Another trainer answered.

"So you're telling us to play tag against your Pikachu, while we're all 'It'? Sounds fun!" Another added.

Sometime later, Ash and Pikachu were standing in the center of the circle of other trainers, who had their recently received Pokémon out. Putting his arm out for the countdown, he said: "Are you ready, guys?"

"Yeah, we're good!" One of the trainers said.

"Ready... Set... GO!" Just as Ash raised his arm after that, the timer started ticking, and Ash sprinted as fast as he could not get caught in the attacks.

"Scorbunny, Ember!"

"Mudkip, Bubble Beam!"

"Eevee, Quick Attack!"

And just as Ash got out of the crowd, the dozens of Pokémons mostly used their attacks against Pikachu. A Pokémon with brown and cream-colored fur and long pointy ears first charged swiftly with its body glowing silver, but Pikachu easily dodged it by jumping upwards. But then, while it was airborne, a beam of blue bubbles flew toward it.

"Pikachu, Iron Tail!" However, the electric rodent glowed its tail silver blue and deflected the bubbles away from it. The barrage of bubbles was followed by a small pebble set on fire.

"Use Electroweb for that!" Instead of using its tail, Pikachu created a small orb of electricity on it and tossed it to the fireball. The orb expanded into a small net of electricity and trapped the fire inside, extinguishing it as it fell.

"Oddish, Acid!" Halley commanded, and Oddish spat out a stream of poison to Pikachu.

"Iron Tail again!" Pikachu effortlessly blocked the poison with its glowing tail and deflected it.

"Odi..." Oddish groaned, who seemed to have expected it.

"It's no use... Using simple attacks over and over again won't work," Halley said. "Rotom, do Oddish have any other moves it can use?"

"Let's see... It can use Growth."

"Growth? Oddish, can you use Growth?"

"Odi!" Oddish took a deep breath while facing the sun. When Oddish finished breathing, an orange energy shot out from the ground around it and it was covered with a faint green aura.

"What does this do, Rotom?"

"It increases the Special Attack of the user. Oddish is specialized for Special moves, but... You only have to land an attack once."

"Hmm... Oddish, use Acid, but not at other Pokémons!"

Oddish shot out a stream of poison from its mouth, and the pressure of the liquid seemed to be a little stronger than before. The poison was also glowing slightly purple.

"Checkmate! If that's so!"

Sometime later, another orange energy shot out from the ground around Oddish. Its body was covered in a bright green aura at this point, which signified that it was much stronger than usual.

"So... Is this enough, Rotom?"

"Yeah, Oddish's special attack is now, like, stage six. It won't go any higher."

"Okay then..." Halley looked up to the sky and saw Pikachu fighting against the bird Pokémons. When one of them flew to the Mouse Pokémon, it just effortlessly weaved sideways to dodge it or even got on it to use it like a living platform.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

"We have to make sure Acid hits Pikachu. We'll need a flying Pokémon to take Oddish there now." Halley looked around him to see the trainers focusing on operating their Pokémons and noticed a girl looking up at the sky while clenching her fists. Halley knew that her bird Pokémon was somewhere up there, and she was trying to land a hit on Pikachu any time soon.

She had bright orange hair with a long ponytail, yellow eyes, a white T-shirt with a gray wing icon drawn on it under an orange jacket, a black skirt with a white stripe, black shoes, and white stockings. She was so focused on battling that, even when Halley approached her, she was continuously looking at the sky.

"Fletchling! Use Peck!" She suddenly shouted out. Just then, an orange and gray robin glowed its beak white and started to fly rapidly through the sky, nearly hitting Pikachu.

"Tha... That's so fast!" "Odi!" Halley and Oddish reacted, noticing her Pokémon's performance. Thinking that interrupting her would be a nuisance for her, he turned away to find another person to request. But just then,

"What?" The girl asked, her eyes still focused on the sky.

"Huh?"

"You just came to me. What brings you here?"

"Can you take my Oddish up there?"

"What? There are dozens of guys already doing that. What's the poi-" She looked down at Oddish for a moment and noticed its body overflowing with green energy.

"I mean, your Fletchling is fast. Like, really fast. So I thought it would be a-" Halley explained just after she asked.

"Ooh, la la. How did you do that?"

"Huh?"

"Fletchling, come back!" She shouted, clapping her hands. The orange robin heard her and flew to her in seconds. Halley's Rotom Phone popped out of his pocket and scanned the robin.

"Fletching: Tiny Robin Pokémon. Normal/Flying Type. A usually calm Pokémon that will increase its body temperature and alter hormone balance once it's in danger."

"Can you give this Oddish a ride, Fletchling?" The girl asked, showing her Pokémon Halley's Oddish. Fletchling nodded and spread its wings for the weed Pokémon to get on, and flew up at swift speed just as Oddish got on it.

At the same time in the sky, Pikachu was still surviving against the army of bird Pokémons, and Ash proudly looked at it from below.

'Now that's Pikachu. About fifteen seconds to go.' Then, he looked at the newbie trainers commanding their Pokémons. 'They're also attacking in a more varied way now, too.' At that moment, Fletchling flew right past Pikachu again and dove down. 'Also, that Fletchling, is its ability Gale Wings?'

It was then Fletching rose to Pikachu again while spinning. The rodent easily dodged it by moving sideways, but it was then that it realized Oddish was sitting on the robin.

"Pi...ka?"

"Now, Oddish! Use Acid!" Oddish spat out a steam of purple acid to Pikachu at point-blank range, intensely glowing bright purple and with intense pressure. Pikachu would've been able to dodge it if it was a simple Acid, but the problem was Oddish was charging its energy all along to garner strength for this move.

From far away, it looked like a bright purple ray spinning through the sky. Some Pokémons even got caught up in the attack and fell to the beach, but that was the case with Pikachu too.

"Pi?!" Pikachu gasped, as the empowered stream of Acid hit its face directly. The electric rodent tripped over and fell to the ground, and the timer had five seconds left at that moment.

"Woah, for real?" Ash reacted, noticing Pikachu fall to the sand. "Alright, that's enough! Someone landed a hit on Pikachu!"

"What?"

"Somebody managed to do that?"

"Pika!" Pikachu answered, wiping its face off the acid.

"Yeah, congrats, guys!" Ash added, raising his thumb to the trainers.

'Pikachu... It must have been quite a strong attack, but it's wiping his face as if it's harmless. Just how strong is it?' Halley thought.

"So, hmm... Oh, hey!" Ash called, referring to the Fletchling's trainer.

"Huh?" The girl stepped back in surprise as Ash ran to her in excitement.

"Your Fletchling was so fast back then! Is its ability Gale Wings?"

"Yeah?"

"I knew it. I used to have a Fletchling back in Kalos, but its ability was Flame Body. I wanted to see a Fletchling with that ability so much! So, are you the one who finished my Pikachu?"

"Pika?" Pikachu interrupted, raising its arm. "Pika..." It pointed at its face stained in purple, which was quite irrelevant to a bird Pokémon.

"Oh, I see. Then, who-"

"This guy right here." The girl turned to Halley and Oddish.

"Oh."

"So you're the one!" Ash exclaimed, running to him this time. "What's your name?"

"Ha, Halley?"

"Hey, guys! We have the MVP of the raid right here!" Ash announced, drawing everyone's attention.

"Eh? Huh? Uh..." While Halley nervously stammered, the trainers one by one gathered around him, filled with impression.

"Now, Halley. Can you tell us your impression of this?"

"Uh, I have two things to say, one is that I didn't win this alone." Halley turned to the girl with Fletchling. "She helped me a lot on this."

"Yeah, kinda. I took his Oddish there, even though it was him that landed the finishing hit."

"Doesn't matter. What's your name, by the way?"

"Solare."

"Alright, Solare. Oddish wouldn't have been able to hit Pikachu if it wasn't your Fletchling, right? You're the MVP, too!" "Pika, Pika!"

"Well, thanks, I guess."

"So, Halley. What is the other thing you'd like to say?"

"It's that..." Halley apologized to the trainers, saying, "I accidentally hurt some of your Pokémons. Sorry, everyone!"

"It's okay, man. What's wrong with it?" A trainer replied. "We all won, after all."

"Yeah, why are you apologizing? You carried all of us back then!"

"Thanks... I saw some of your Pokémons get hurt in the process, so I felt a little sorry for them."

Ash gently looked at him from behind, quite interested in the rookie trainer. Then, when he looked at the Rotom Phone again, the lesson time was already over.

"Oh, where did the time go? It's time we say goodbye now." "Pi..." Ash said.

"Wait, what?"

"Aww, already?"

"Yeah... Sorry. It was fun playing with you, though. See you all again sometime-"

"Nah, guys. You gotta see the climax!" All of a sudden, Clash suddenly jumped into the area, slamming the sand as if a boulder fell from the sky.

"Huh?"

"Wait, wait, right! I almost forgot that!" "Pikapi!" Ash and Pikachu gasped, realizing that it was not over yet.

"Ready to battle, monarch?" Clash asked, standing up.

"Of course, Clash!" "Pika, Pika!"

"Are you ready for some epic clashing, everyone?" Clash asked again, this time to the trainers.

"Heck yeah!" They exclaimed back, exhilarated for being able to see the strongest trainer in the world battle only a few meters away.

Sometime later, Ash and Clash stood in an arena drawn on the sand, surrounded by the trainers including Halley and Solare. The latter was standing on the edge of the arena between the two players, as the referee for the battle.

"Each trainer can use only one Pokémon, and Zetta-Zone is allowed." She explained the rules.

"Wait... What's allowed, again?" Ash asked, his eyebrows raised at the exotic word he had never heard of before.

"Zetta-Zone."

"Zetta-Zone? What's that?" "Pika?"

"Uh..."

"Oh, you haven't heard of it, monarch?" Clash added, showing him a square gray metal device with black highlights. There was a gray square gem installed in the center of it, which had a yin-yang drawn inside it.

"Yeah, I've never seen it before."

"I'll explain it as we battle. Shall we start now?"

"Okay then. I choose you, Pikachu!" Pikachu jumped off Ash's shoulders and landed on the arena, prepared to attack.

"Strike like a lightning, Pawmot!" Clash tossed his Pokéball to the battleground too, which opened to create a blue plasma and make an orange and tan bipedal rodent Pokémon come out of it. It looked similar to Pikachu except it was much larger, having yellow cheek sacs and pads on its forepaws. Halley's Rotom Phone flew out of its owner's pocket again and scanned the Pokémon.

"Pawmot: Hands-On Pokémon. Electric/Fighting Type. A Pokémon that is usually slow, but has surprising potential speed that will reveal itself during battles."

"Pawmot, huh? An Electric Type for an Electric Type? That's my favorite kind of battle." Ash said.

"Me too. Now, Pawmot. Use Arm Thrust!"

"Pikachu, use Iron Tail!"

Pikachu darted out while glowing its tail silver blue, jumping and spinning as it rapidly flew to Pawmot. Pawmot meanwhile, glowed its fists white and parried Iron Tail with them. Dozens of clashing noises came out from the arena from Pikachu's tail and Pawmot's fist colliding.

'Pawmot's an Electric/Fighting Type. It would be resistant to all of my Pikachu's attacks. This would be hard.'

At that moment, Clash tossed his device to the sky, which hovered midair and started spinning. The gray gem in it glowed brighter as it spun.

"Wha...?"

"The real battle begins now! Zetta-Statis!" The device enveloped and released a strong light covering the area, but the next moment, Ash realized it was not a simple light. Some seconds later when it got less bright, Ash and Pikachu found themselves standing on a tall skinny mountain, with a real stone arena placed on it. It was a forest of stone pillars as tall as skyscrapers, with the thick fog covering the ground. Clash and Pawmot were on the other side of the arena, and Solare was between them as a referee.

"Wh... Where am I? Where's everyone else?" "Pi...ka?" Ash and Pikachu gasped, looking around the exotic place.

"Inside a Zetta-Zone! You can't see others here because this is a separate space from our world."

"Woah... That's so cool! So what does it do?"

"You'll see. Pawmot, use Close Combat!"

"Pikachu, close in with Quick Attack!"

Pikachu glowed its body white and charged at Pawmot with immense speed, while Pawmot also darted out to it without thinking about defense. The former easily dodged the latter's flurry of attacks and decided to waste its opponent's power. After Pikachu evaded Pawmot's attacks for a while, Ash shouted out "Now, Iron Tail!"

Just then, his partner glowed its tail blue and slammed it onto the Hands-On Pokémon, expecting it to deal considerable damage to it. However, Pawmot easily grabbed it and tossed Pikachu away.

"Are you okay, Pikachu?" Ash asked Pikachu.

"Pika!"

"But... Its defense should have weakened after Close Combat!"

"Nah, not really," Clash said. "It should have outside here."

"Does that mean...?"

"My Zetta-Zone is Zetta-Statis. It can nullify any stat changes of the Pokémons inside it."

"Stat changes... Wait, so that means!"

"Which means, I won't have to worry about defense while using Close Combat!"

"That's crazy..."

"Now, monarch. What's your plan? Pawmot, Close Combat!"

"Pikachu, use Iron Tail then Electroweb to those pillars over there!" Ash commanded, pointing to two skinny mountains near him. As Pawmot's fist clashed with Pikachu's tail, the latter used the recoil to fling itself out of the arena. Then, it generated a yellow orb on its tail to throw it between two stone pillars in the distance, which expanded into a net of yellow electricity and attached itself between them. Pikachu coiled up its body to fall onto the net, which caused it to stretch away.

"Now, Quick Attack!" The mouse Pokémon glowed its body white as it spun on the net, and launched itself back to the arena when the net unstretched, at a speed so fast that it was uncapturable to the naked eye. Before Clash could even command, Pawmot got directly hit by the attack on its stomach, at a force so powerful that it immediately fainted in place.

At that moment, the background faded to white again and shattered to reveal the beach where the course pupils were watching their battle. Even though Ash didn't see them while in the Zetta-Zone, they seemed quite satisfied with watching the strongest trainer battle in the flesh.

"Pawmot is unable to fight, Ash Ketchum is the winner!" Solare announced, pointing her arm to Ash and Pikachu. The spectators applauded, congratulating and respecting the winner.

"I knew you would do it!"

"You were so awesome inside there, Ash!"

"Thanks... Though, can you guys see inside a Zetta-Zone? I couldn't see you while inside..." "Pika..." Ash asked, scratching his head with Pikachu.

"Congrats, monarch. This is your first Gym victory here." Clash added, applauding. Then, he answered, "And yeah, while you can't see things outside from inside, it works for vice versa."

"Oh, well... Curiosity solved! How do I get that Zetta-Zone, though?"

"Follow me!"

"Thanks for watching my battle, guys. You can go now! Hope we meet again!" "Pika-Pika!" Ash and Pikachu said as they followed Clash into the Gym.

As time passed, the trainers on the beach left one by one, to spend time with their Pokémon, venture around the town to get stronger, or challenge the Gym. Halley was also about to leave, but he struggled trying to find a decent place to visit with his new Pokémon.

"Hmm... Where should we go next?" He wondered while sitting on the beach with his Pokémon. Just then, Oddish's stomach grumbled, from using up a lot of energy in its battle against Pikachu.

"Odi..."

"Oh... We haven't eaten dinner yet, right? Alright then, let's go to the marketplace!" Halley decided, standing up.

"Odi?"

"Marey Marketplace is a marketplace in this town, and it's got everything you can think of! You deserve it, Oddish. You landed a hit on the strongest Pokémon in the world!"

"Odi??" Oddish also stood up, its face full of excitement.

"Yup, let's have some fun there! Now, let's go!" Halley drained Oddish into its Pokéball.

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Meanwhile, Clash led Ash and Pikachu into his office, which was a brown wooden room with an old-styled interior and pieces of furniture. There was a cabinet on one side that nearly covered the wall, with hundreds of small drawers on it.

"Wait a minute, so you wouldn't have the badge case as of now..." Clash said, searching the cabinet. Some seconds later, he took out an octagonal case and a yin-yang-shaped badge. He put the latter inside a notch in the former and handed it to Ash. "Here you go, this is your badge case."

Unlike rectangular badge cases in other rectangular regions, the badge case in the Terra region was octagonal, with eight small badge notches surrounding a large octagonal hole in the middle.

"What's this hole in the center for?" Ash asked.

"It's for the reward you would receive after winning in a Terra League! Since you can participate in it after getting eight badges, good luck."

"Mmm... Wait, and what about the Zetta-Zone?"

"Oh, right! I almost forgot..." Clash searched the cabinet again, to take out the metal device he had during his battle, and a space blue square gem with a brighter blue Saturn drawn on it. He inserted the gem into the device and handed it to Ash.

"This Zetta-Zone is called Zetta-Magic. It would be a great one for you, so try it out when you have time!"

"Okay then, see you later!" "Pika-Pika!" Ash and Pikachu said, leaving the office.

"See ya, thanks for working as a coach here!"

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In the meantime, Team Rocket was waiting for the bacteriophage to drain all the energy it could contain. Meowth had the laptop on his lap, and there was software running on it that displayed "90%" on the laptop screen. Jessie meanwhile, looked down at the marketplace, starting to be crowded with people as the sun set. "Guys."

"Yeah?" James replied.

"It wouldn't hurt to go down there for a minute, right?"

"Huh?"

"But, we have to protect this-"

"FOR HOW LONG?!" Jessie shouted in annoyance. "We've stayed an entire day here, guys! I'm getting tired of this..."

James and Meowth were already hugging each other and shivering, but the former said with a trembling voice. "Then... Come back as fast as you can, we might leave any time soon."

"Time for some shopping!" Jessie shouted out, running down the hill with excitement.

To Be Continued