New Rules

Chapters 1 &2

Summary - The rules for the league have become much stricter on trainers who have a year or more of experience. Everywhere trainers that have been in more than one league are receiving the same rule. This rule being they cannot capture any new Pokémon instead they must train and use the ones they already have. Each region has also added training areas all over the regions. Ash will be older and more mature in this fanfic.

Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon; however, this fanfiction was in my head for a while.

Ash had just been home for about three days when the new rule was set in place: To him, that sounded like a nice change of pace. What he did not know was that the reason for this was the dwindling populations of wild Pokémon due to over-capturing.

Trainers were capturing wild Pokémon faster than they could reproduce and keep up their numbers, which caused the remaining wild ones to go into hiding. Even the more fierce ones such as Houndour, Spearow, and Mankey hid when humans were about.

He missed his old Pokémon and wanted to catch up before the rule hit Ash had regained his Goodra, Squirtle, Primeape, Lapras, Butterfree, Greninja, and Pidgeot. The large brown and white bird returned because he had lost the leadership of the entire flock. Also, Primeape had missed Ash. This was something that surprised the 15-year-old raven-haired trainer greatly.

His small mouse starter wagged his lightning-shaped tail as Ash took a moment to think about what he would do for the teams. That was an idea. What if he did the same thing that he did in the battle frontier and used a mix of teams that seemed like a fair trade-off?

Now he needed to decide on his first team, so he did not have as many as Gary did, so that did not matter now. All that did matter now was making the ones he had stronger than before.

Besides, it would give him a chance to catch up as well as make it up to them. This could also relieve some of the boredom he had built up during his time at home.

The teen yawned. It was getting late; he would go to the lab tomorrow to start gathering his first team. Then he would head to the nearest training area that was in Pallet town.

One thing that bothered him, though, was what to do with his 29 other Tauros. He could not trade them. That was something he could decide later. Maybe he could also do something about all the extra empty Pokéballs that he gathered up.

Meanwhile, at Professor Oak's lab, those 29 bull-like Pokémon lowered their heads and charged through the fence. The herd of bulls whipped their three tails as they followed a very familiar scent into the night and away from the lab.

Ash woke up early the next morning, got dressed, and had a quick breakfast. Once he finished getting ready, he headed to Professor Oak's lab with Pikachu on his shoulder.

Meanwhile, at the lab, all the Pokémon were being fed. The Professor wiped the sweat off of his forehead as his short white hair started to get heavy with sweat. As the teen walked in, he could feel the heat emitting from inside.

A small greenish four-legged Pokémon with a bulb on his back ran up to him. "Bulbasaur," the grass-type greeted. Ash kneeled as the yellow mouse with brownish/black stripes jumped off. Suddenly, all of Ash's others rushed toward him.

He stood up. "I am guessing you all heard the news about a new rule." he began. They all nodded as they listened. "Good. I am planning on training all of you to make up for the years we missed," he informed.

Once they heard that, they waited for their trainer to say more. The raven-haired took a breath and began to speak once more. "Truth be told, I want to use this rule to catch up with you, and together we will be stronger than we were before," he declared.

"I am going to need all of you to split into teams for training," Ash informed. They all formed a circle to plan on who should team up with who.

Suddenly, one of them stomped over to Ash's side, a large green and brown Pokémon with a tree on his back. Followed by a large and heavier black and white one, along with two smaller ones, a blue turtle with a curly tail, along with a yellow and white one.

After that, a red tortoise with a coal-black shell that at the moment was emitting steam from the holes all over it. The last one was a dark bluish rock-like creature with red crystals.

"Alright, so Torretera, Squirtle, Scraggy, Torkoal, Snorlax, and Boldore." He then sat down to think.

"So that is one team for training, now who else?" Ash asked.

As if to answer his question, his yellow and brown starter stepped up and walked to the side.

The electric type was followed by a large monkey that had a red body with a white chest and flames on top of its head.

Then a yellow sauropod with leaves at the base of its neck and another leaf on top of her head. The grass type was followed by a small shark-like Pokémon.

Finally, after the small shark, a large light blue Pokémon with a long neck, a black shell, and flippers finished off the second team while the others tried to decide on the other teams.

"Then we have Pikachu, Infernape, Bayleef, Gible, and Lapras," he replied .