302 and 303. Shroomish Forest

This is a very long chapter, two chapters packed into one. Enjoy.

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Shroomish Forest, this place was not really that big considering it was a forest, but it mostly belonged to a Shroomish Clan, so they it was named after their territory.

After leaving Crossgate Town and winning that citizenship there, meaning no more taxes for the foreseeable future, Ash and his party happily arrived here to prepare to set up their camp and take a good rest before continuing on their road again to Fortree City.

Max was quite excited to be here. The very first Pokémon that he had actually befriended when he began traveling with Ash and the others was a Shroomish, so he always has special feelings for Shroomish and its species.

"Big Bro, let's go find a Shroomish, shall we?" He still liked to look for Pokémon everywhere he went, which was a good quality for a strong Pokémon Trainer, but he wasn't even a Trainer yet. So Ash had to go with him.

"Max, please don't disturb Ash right now. He is currently training his Ralts in some new tricks!" Before Ash could refuse or even say anything to Max, May spoke out for him. She was also busy training her Torchic and her new Bulbasaur.

She really didn't want an alone time with her boyfriend to be ruined by her little brother.

"Why can't we go?" Max was disappointed, but he saw the look on his sisters eyes and then went to play with Brock's heart-breaking patterned Spinda.

"Ralts, this is an extension skill of the Teleport move that we know, but a much more advanced version of it. What you have to do is to change the positions of you and your companions, or your opponents if you master it enough." Ash decided to teach the Ally Switch skill to his future super queen, Gardevoir.

The most obvious application of this skill is in the double battles that is included and created by the official battle rules of the Hoenn Region Battle Association, better known as the Hoenn Pokémon League, the same one based in Ever Grande City.

The combined use of Teleport and Ally Switch allows Ash to freely command how to control the positions of his two Pokémon's, giving him more possibilities for the random battles.

Additionally, if Ralts could master it to its peak potential, she could even switch her or her partners position with the opponent's position.

For Ash in the future, if he uses this combo correctly, this will become a terrifying field control strategy that most can't even think about.

Of course Ash his party, who were enjoying their food in the peaceful moments at their base tents, didn't know that the Team Rocket Trio who had been following them had just fainted from hunger.

Because James was so persistent that he thought he could participated and win in the PokéRinger competition, they didn't make much to any money in Crossgate Town. Now they followed the group into this forest, and they had already run out of last bit of food that Ash had secretly given to the Trio.

To be more specific, it was stolen by a group of wild Taillows right after Ash left some more extra food to them.

They wouldn't be in their current position if not for that small mistake.

They were so hungry that they ate everything they saw that the nearby Shroomish Clan had gathered for some reason. This was a big mistake, a very big mistake. Their hatred for them for their now stolen food was irreconcilable.

A few of the older Shroomish's were so angry that they directly evolved on the spot and launched a hellish pursuit on the three Team Rocket member.

They promised to themselves that even if it was the last thing they will do, they will still beat the crap out of those who stole their hard earned food.

After completing their evolutions, Breloom has changed from its previous soft and cute image, and has also gained the secondary Fighting-type. Its said that their claws can be extended freely, and because of such an ability, they can use their claws to perform boxing skills such as the extremely face priority move Mach Punch.

The Rocket Trio were running around like their lives depended on it, which it really did for once. What they were least good at was dealing with was a brutal attack from stronger opponents, and not to mention the number of opponents was terrifyingly high along with their combined strength.

By this time, May and Ash had already left the camp and moved to a more spacious area for some extra one-to-one training, all they saw was the Rocket Trio crashing towards them.

"Boss Ash, help us, meow!" Meowth was the first to see Ash and quickly called out to him for his help.

"What is that? What did you three even do this time?" May's first reaction was to go next to Ash's side and look at the Brelooms that were obviously releasing unrestrained murderous intent at them.

"That's the evolved form of the Shroomish's we saw before, Breloom!" Ash quickly pulled May away from in front of them, showing he wasn't interested in rescue the Team Rocket Trio from whatever they brought to themselves.

Seeing the cold attitude Ash had in his face, Jessie and James suddenly became even more anxious and scared, "Boss, we gave you the Feebas we caught, how could you not save us now?"

"Even if I gave my Feebas back to you, you won't be able to train her correctly or evolve into a Milotic." Ash smiled slightly, and now the Brelooms were already in front of him, ready to fight, "By the way, how did you provoke all these Brelooms?"

But the Rocket Trio had no time to answer Ash's question. The Brelooms began to pummel them all and knocked them away into a random corner of their forest.

Ash made sure to use his Aura and Psychic powers to help the Trio increase their defenses and survive this incident, this was his way to thank them for making him meet his new partner, Feebas.

Not satisfied with the weak Trio, they targeted all of their pent up frustration on Ash and May, getting ready to hit them with their new Mach Punch attacks one after another.

Unexpectedly, before Ralts could take action upon what she saw was a slow attack, Torchic, who had been beside May the whole time, actually blocked the two attacking Brelloms in front of May.

"Torchic, do you want to fight them?" May could more better feel Torchic's fired up fighting spirit. The younger Torchic that Ash had caught a while ago had already evolved into a Combusken, so May's Torchic felt that he also needed to work harder to not disappoint his Trainer, May.

"Alright then Torchic, use your Ember attack!" Torchic was a Fire-type Pokémon and should do well against the Grass-type Breloom.

However, Brelooms were very fast as it was their nature, and so they were able to avoid the Ember's attack range in a green blur. Then what looked to be their leader and the strongest Breloom amongst them punched Torchic, sending May's Torchic flying away.

"Torchic, are you okay?" May gritted her teeth. As expected, Torchic's power was still too small to deal with the physical and level superior Breloom. "Torchic, don't be afraid of their kind, now use Flame Charge!"

Torchic turned into a small fireball and dashed towards the Breloom, but the Brelooms all stood up together, staring at Torchic's incoming figure, and then got ready to punch Torchic down into the forest ground.

"Now's the time, Ralts!" Ash didn't need to say the exact order, Ralts already had multiple ways to deal with such opponents. His little girl was getting smarter and smarter as she grew, it made Ash have a legitimate tears in his eyes.

Ally Switch was quickly activated, Ralts and Torchic switched their places, now she stood in front of the Brelooms, and Torchic returned to May's side, feeling very depressed of his performance.

After learning Flame Charge, Torchic started to become a little more bellicose and became a lot more courageous, but it still wasn't enough for them.

Ash glanced at Torchic, 'Looks like the little guy should be evolving soon, maybe anytime now.'

Whether it was Ralts' Psychic-type attacks or her Fairy-type attacks, they are both very effective against the Fighting-type Breloom. However, all Ralts needed to use was a single, simple but powerful Psybeam to knock out all the Brelooms nearby and return to Ash's side.

Ash put her on his shoulder and gave her some of her favorite candies to show that she did well.

Ralts naturally loved this and gave Ash a kiss on the cheek to show her appreciation to him.

Ash will never reject such a thing from Ralts, who was like his daughter in a sense.

Ash then slowly walked towards the Brelooms who were all still very angry.

"Okay, okay, you don't need to be so angry with me. It wasn't us who messed with you guys, you guys already dealt with the culprits. Have this, this is special food for Grads-type Pokémon's such as yourselves. Share these with each other." Ash took out a few bags of the special Grass-type food and placed them next to the downed Brelooms. This is what Brock prepared for May's Bulbasaur.

Seeing so many delicious looking food in front of them, these Breloom finally calmed down from their anger, but they were not in a hurry to enjoy it right here. Instead, they held the food in their arms and walked in the direction they had originally come from.

Before leaving, the leading Breloom glanced at Ash and motioned for him to follow them.

"Ash?" May looked at her boyfriend worriedly, but she didn't expect it was her Torchic to follow the Brelooms first.

"It's okay, these Brelooms are quite interesting. I want to see what they have to offer."

Ash gave her a little kiss on the forehead, and the two of them didn't have the time to go back and explain to Brock and Max, so they jus went along and followed the Brelooms to a valley deeper into the forest.

They could see a mountain of fruits on one of the sides here. Ash hugged his Togetic from the air and smiled, "It seems that this should be these Breloom's main lairz Only the strongest Breloom is qualified to allocate all of these resources for themselves, or the main ones."

As soon as he finished speaking, an astonishing number of Shroomishs and Brelooms came out of the valley and its many caves, and the three Brelooms standing at the highest point of the valley made Ash's eyes light up in acknowledgment.

They are looking condescending and their momentum was very amazing, for being this young and being in the wild. Although visual inspection and height does not always represent a Pokémon's powers, it is certain that its size is at least 1.5 meters and a very solid builds, especially the one in the center, which was taller than the two around it by a little more.

It was precisely because of the existence of these theee Brelooms and their large army that this forest, which originally had no name or significance to the area, became the territory of them and was called the Shroomish Forest.

Now, as the Shroomishs have evolved one after another after training or just living life, the number of Brelooms in this forest has increased tremendously, and they have already achieved the unshakable status of being the absolute rulers of this forest .

All of the Brelooms holding the food given by Ash slowly came forward and placed the food in front of the Breloom King, the tallest one in the middle.

It opened the bag and tasted it, and of course it liked the taste of the food. Its eyes lit up, and it jumped in front of Ash and stretched out its paws.

Is this really how one should be asking for food, by force?

Ash's eyes lit up and was very amused and took out a Poké Ball, "If you want more, how about joining me to a dance!"

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303. Breloom

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When King Breloom came infront of him, Ash saw clearly the true size of this guy.

Breloom was a Pokémon that looked like the kangaroo he remembers from his past life, with sharp red claws and a powerful green body. The mushroom on its head is shaped like a hat, which is quite cute, making them look less intimidating to most people.

This was not the first time that Ash has challenged the leader of an Pokémon group to catch them.

It was simply that they have more innate potential and are easier for him to bond with.

His new Sharpedo, Houndoom, Scizor, Swellow, Taurus, Slowking, Absol, Flygon, Grovyle, Heracross and Hitmonlee were all the strongest members of their group before they were caught by him, and his now returned Pidgeot had also reached the peak of power in the Kanto Regions Viridian Forest.

But after being caught by Ash, their previous goals were slowly being completed and changed to a new harder goal.

His Pokémon's new dreams were all to help their Trainer, Ash, become the future Pokémon Master!

The compatibility between Shroomish itself and Ash was unimaginably low, but after completing their evolution, Breloom, which has the new added Fighting-type, has a very decent compatibility with Ash.

So far, the most Pokémon's of a single type that Ash had were all of his Water-type Pokémon's, but he had no other Grass-type Pokémon's except for his Royal Starter Pokémon's and his still baby Celebi.

This leader of this large Breloom clan was obviously not something he wanted to miss catching.

So Ash started the battle to catch the leader directly. The two tall Brelooms behind the leader Breloom were just about to take action when they were stopped by the leader himself.

All he did was lower his head a little and motioned his right hand up.

He rises to the challenge from Ash.

At the same time, Torchic actually jumped down from May's hand, stood in front of the Brelooms that had just accepted the challenge, and he himself got ready to challenge the same one that he had just lost to.

"Torchic!" May was about to stop him, but when she saw Torchic's back, she looked at Ash and suddenly understood something, "Okay, Torchic, let's fight side by side!"

For a time, all the Brelooms retreated to the outer edges of the makeshift battlefield, leaving a large open space for Ash and May and the two Brelooms to fight.

Ash's fighting spirit was also burning high, "May, you have to fight on our own this time! I can't help you anymore, everything has to depend on yourself and the trust you put in your Pokémon's!"

"Yes, I know that!" May's heart sank but she was determined to prove her worth to Ash.

Then the two of them launched an attack at the same time.

"Torchic, use Flame Charge!"

"Torkoal, use Flamethrower!"

Ash chose to play it safe and use his Fire-type Torkoal to deal with the Breloom leader to avoid losing in an turn of events.

Sure enough, this Breloom's fighting will was also terrifyingly high, making sense that why he was the leader despite still being so young compared to the others. Facing Torkoal's incoming blazing fire, he was not afraid as own would expect, just like what Ash told his Hitmonlee when he was still a Tyrouge at the lake, the Fighting-type itself is the attribute born from pure skills and powers of its wielder.

This Breloom actually allowed the blazing pillar of Flamethrower to come closer, and then his figure disappeared at the last moment.

Ash's eyes lit up and he thought, 'Now that's what I would call a Mach Punch! It's so fast!'

The figure of Breloom avoided the Flamethrower, and in an instant it was in front of Torkoal, and raised his hand to punch Torkoal hard on its hard shell.

"Iron Defense!"

Torkoal stopped the flames and retracted his whole body into his hard carapace, created by hardened magma rocks. His Physical Defense power was now greatly improved.

Breloom punched Torkoal without having to adjust his position more than the necessary amount, a perfect example of how to do things.

"Torkoal's defense is already something I have worked hard to develop, using Iron Defense will only make it more impenetrable!" Ash grinned and suddenly burst into a new idea, "Smokescreen!

In addition to the flames it was brim with, Torkoal is also particularly good at using smoke based skills. Whenever he was moved, by anything, he will spit up large amounts of smoke to show how happy he was. Recently, he has learned to control the concentration of the smokes from Thyplosion, and it can now even dissipate the smoke with his common, which saves a lot of trouble for everyone.

This time, Ash directly asked Torkoal to use two smoke skills at once.

Needless to say, Smokescreen can heavily obscure the vision of an opponent; and the other smoke skill, Smog, is a Poison-type attack, which not only causes Poison-type damage, but it can also poison the opponent more than ant other Poison-type attacks can, although nowhere near the level of what Toxic can do.

Mixed in with Smokescreen, it was easily able to be spread and the effect was also astounding.

At this moment, the Breloom was in front of Torkoal again, and he was immediately swallowed up by the combined poisonous smoke.

Ash saw a huge seed among the red particles on the bamboo hat-shaped mushroom above its head. It was the physical Grasss-type attack Seed Bomb, and now it smashed towards Torkoal.

With a bang, the smoke was blown away by the power of the explosion. That was the power it have if used by a good welder.

"Interesting!" Seeing Breloom's movements, Ash became more and more satisfied with him.

What's even more interesting is that this Breloom's body was now purple, which means it had obviously been poisoned, but not only does it not appear to be in any sort of pain, but instead he actually became more and more energetic as times passed on.

This reminded Ash of a very rare ability that the Shroomish and Breloom line can have, Poison Heal.

After falling into the poisoned status condition, not only will your physical health not be damaged, but instead it will also continue to recover from the ongoing poisoning effects.

And this rare ability has a matching carrying item. When the Toxic Orb is carried, the Pokémon that holds it will fall into a poisoned status conditionduring the battle. This item can also be exchanged in from the System that Ash has.

Once the Poison Healing ability Breloom carries the Toxic Orb, it will continue to recover from any physical injuries that it receives while battling or training. If combined with the Leech Seed and Giga Drain skills that many Grass-type Pokémon's can use, Breloom will gain a terrifyingly high endurance, and just outlast the opponent without even attacking. After the special training that Ash's can give him, it can very well beat all six members of the opposition side without taking a single damage or even needing to use attacks in them.

"Okay, I see what you got! I like you, and I want it!" Ash's eyes now had a hint of blue, "Torkoal, Flamethrower!"

The raging fire headed towards Breloom with Ash's fighting spirit increasing the power, but the same happened to Breloom who was in the poisoned status condition. It actually slapped the pillar of fire hard with his palm.

This was also a Fighting-type skill, Force Palm.

Force Palm had a chance to leave the opponent with the paralysis status condition.

The force of that palm actually shattered the fire pillar into two separate ways, and Ash only became more and more excited by seeing this performance. The physical of this Breloom had already caught up with one of his of his weaker Pokémon's from the Johto Region. There was even a chance that he could fight against his Shiny Noctowl when not using his physical Flying-type or Normal-type attacks, which doesn't say much, but he was definitely more physically powerful than his current Torkoal.

Although he would still lose to his Swellow in a fight because of his MASSIVE weakness to Flying-type attacks, not to mention their Bonds Evolutions, no doubt about it.

Ash and Torkoal did not move seeing this. Breloom slashed the flames with his other palm again and rushed towards Torkoal.

It jumped high and its red claws were now shining with a terrifying white light.

It is clearly one of the strongest move of the Fighting-types.

Dynamic Punch!

Even Torkoal's Iron Defense may not be able to withstand this terrifying power, so measures must be taken, "Torkoal, use ERUPTION!"

The best defense is often also called the strongest attack.

Torkoal didn't panic by seeing this, Ash had thought him, but it be afraid of danger but instead to embrace it.

Thinking of this, his carapace was releasing a terrifyingly high heat.

Terrifying heat poured into the valley floor, and just when Breloom was about to hit Torkoal with a punch, the ground around them suddenly exploded into hot magma.

Boom!

Boom!

Boom!

This was the signature skill of Ash's Typhlosion and also the one who taught Torkoal how to better it from all of his previous experiences in using it, and now Torkoal had used it to its fullest power, well for his current body. At that moment, the entire valley seemed to be shaking, and the far away Shroomishs and Brelooms were even shivering and sweating in the high heat.

Togetic quickly used a Safeguard to block most of the heat from the attack for Ash and May.

Pikachu just lightly jumped off and used a light Iron Tail to reflect a large piece of stone back to where it came from and landed back on Ash's shoulder, next to Ralts.

Ralts and Togetic happily cheered on for their big brother figure, which really made him blush with embarrassment, but he happily took it with great strides.

Ash and May just chuckled seeing this.

"BRE!"

The sound of what sounded like train whistle came from the flames, and a figure jumped out. Breloom was burned all over, and Torkoal, who was in the fire, also seemed to be injured all over. Both sides were hurt, very hurt.

Breloom looked at Torkoal and Ash, his eyes shining with the light of full acceptance, the Breloom leader recognized Ash's and his Torkoals power.

"Then let's go!" Ash then threw his more advanced Poké Ball and put his new Breloom inside to rest.

Ash had his Poké Balls specifically made to be much better than the standard Poké Ball when it comes to healing his Pokémon's.

His Pokémon's health was one of the most important thing for him, so he didn't need to think twice before using his money for it.

Plus, it didn't help that he was very rich now, so he didn't need to worry about such things.

Breloom: 190/255

On the other side, Torchic was beaten black and blue by the Breloom he had lost to before, but he suddenly roared and released a dazzling light from all over his body.

"Torchic?!" May exclaimed, but the scene in front of her was very familiar to her. Her Torchic was finally evolving into its next stage!

The evolved Combusken also received the new Fighting-type, and the skills it can now use are very familiar to May from seeing Ash train his own Combusken all those times, they are Double Kick and Sky Uppercut.

"Congratulations, Combusken, now use Double Kick!"

Combusken and Breloom, who had also just completed his own evolution not long ago because of the Rocket Trio, looked at each other and immediately felt respect for each other. They gave up their special attack skills and only used their new Fighting-type skills to fight until they both fell to the ground in double knockout.

"Awesome, Combusken, you are now so powerful! Now maybe we can finally beat Ash's Combusken!" After coming his evolution, Combusken suddenly became May's current strongest Pokémon, even more so than her Beautifly, whom she had personally trained for longer.