Pokemon Heroes: Sinnoh Saga [Book 1]

Chapter 56: Pastoria City, City of Marshes

"Pastoria City was easily not my favourite stop on my travels through the Sinnoh Region. It was always wet, always cold, always muddy. If it wasn't raining, it always looked it was about to, or had just stopped. This was to be expected of course. Pastoria City sat right in the South-East corner of Sinnoh, right next to Route 212. Whatever parts of Route 212 weren't drowned in rainwater, were choked in a muddy, boggy, swamp. Thick mud, deep water, peat bogs, and a lot of humidity were commonplace in the area. Pastoria City had managed to combat the heat with the gentle sea breeze that blew from the south by the rocky beach. And they had contained the swamp into a massive conservation area known as the Great Marsh. It was Sinnoh's version of the Safari Zone—a very limited, swampy Safari Zone. But that's another story for another chapter..."

Sam, Alyssandra, Jeremy, Pikachu and Niya exited the Gym, Sam's excitement clear on his face. He hadn't even won the badge yet. He had just put his name down to battle Crasher Wake when he returned from a recent trip to Snowpoint.

He would be the first person to take on Crasher Wake for the Fen Badge this week.

In the meantime, Sam had two days to train and brush up on his skill before he took down the Gym Leader.

Sam knew he'd probably be using his Luxray. Being an Electric Pokémon gave Luxray a massive advantage against Water Type Pokémon like Wake would use. Sam also got a good look at the arena, and saw it was a massive swimming pool with places for land-based Pokémon to stand and fight.

Sam had a feeling Wake's Pokémon would be utilizing the water and land in order to both confuse his opponent's, and also keep Wake's Pokémon in their element where they could move to their fullest extent.

If things got muddy, Sam could swap to Empoleon to bring the fight right to Wake in the water. Empoleon's slick, steel body could cut through water and ice like a hot knife cut through butter.

Other than that, though, Garchomp was not a good pick. He was Dragon/Ground...he could swim through land but not water. Any Water Pokémon with an Ice Type move would do double the damage against Garchomp, as if the water wasn't bad enough.

Cranidos might be able to utilize her Ice Beam in a way to level the playing field—literally...but that was also risky. Too risk for Sam's liking.

The other option was using Staravia, but he wouldn't be able to dive into the water after his opponent's like Empoleon or hit them from after like Luxray.

Sam would think of something, of this he was sure.

Either way he was going to deal with Crasher Wake and win that Fen Badge.

Nothing was stopping him—not since defeating Maylene brought back his confidence as a Trainer.

The group walked cobbled street towards a bubble tea shop.

It was warm, the middle of summer, and even with the ocean breeze; the humidity of the marshes kept wafting into the city.

Pastoria City had a quaint, small town charm to it. The buildings were massive like in Veilstone or Hearthome or Jubilife. The architecture was old, refined, but well maintained. The buildings were made in the old, wattle-and-daub style siding between post and beam and painted white and black respectively.

The group sat down at the table, as Pikachu sprawled himself out in Niya's lap, basking in the sun. She spoke his name happily as Niya rubbed his belly and the group ordered—even Pikachu got himself a small cup of bubble tea.

Jeremy dabbed at his forehead with a cloth. "This heat is ridiculous," he sighed, "I miss Twinleaf in the summer. It was hot, but you could always trust a nice breeze from Lake Verity. And when that failed you could always go swimming to cool off."