Hitting my Stride

With the Water Badge in my grasp, it was time to travel back to the Steamy City Motostoke for my third: the Fire Badge. Apparently, this particular gymleader is known as a bit of a "rookie-stomper" who serves to weed out trainers who can't cut it in their gym challenge. With my pokemon team starting to reliably hit its stride, I look forward to testing the abilities of Cheeto, Señor Zorro, Chirpy, Stuffy, and the rest.

The big meeting with the chairman over lunch turned out to be much ado about nothing. Nothong new was revealed. No characters were introduced. It was basically a diversion that was meant to remind the player character that eventually the plot was going to happen and not to forget about the mysteries behing Galar, Dynamax, and the Legendaries. I had said earlier that this game doesn't jerk you around and I guess I spoke too soon. In this particular game's defense, there is less fucking around than in previous titles (I will never forgive you gen 5), but episodes like this, few as they are, make me a bit crazy.

Onward to Galar Mineshaft No. 2.

I was able to snag a few more pokemon along the way: Cutiefly, Sneasel, Noibat, and the pokemon that looks like an apple, Applin. I...have no words for it.

Here, I was able to defeat Bede again. After I defeated his four pokemon (he carried the Psychic Galar Ponyta from the reveal several months ago), he seemed to be much more gracious than last time.

He was still a dick, but he is definitely getting more used to the fact that I'm just plain better than him.

In the exchange, Snorkel evolved! I had already seen and battled Drednaw before, but I was still very happy to see him rank up like this!