Pokémon Detective: Cynthia Forces Me to Adopt a Pokémon

Chapter 246 Gathering Firewood - The Eye of the Grass Seedling Turtle

"Frozen Beam."

Without a second thought, Adek gave his partner the order.

The perfect teamwork between the champion and his partner was on full display once again. Without needing any further explanation, frost instantly spewed from the two enormous mouths of Double Ice, leaving two parallel ice slides in the spiraling wetlands.

"Alright! Let's go!"

Awareness and courage don't spring from the mind; they emerge from the soles of one's feet. The Unified Champion, abandoning his previous unwavering composure, waved his robe and leaped onto the ice.

The silt and ice completely filled the rugged steps, so moving over them was not limited by the "wetland terrain" slowing down the movement.

Wearing thick-soled sandals, Adek, like a less-than-professional ice skater, glided down the slope with a loud, scraping sound as his soles rubbed together.

Seeing the champion's reaction, the two small figures guarding the bottom of the three-story staircase also made a move—

The Grass-type Tortoise vigorously shook the leaves on its head, releasing Grass-type energy. Its daily training paid off; despite the distance, the vines in the wetlands grew successfully, silently forming several small, round grass knots on the slide. If Adek continued sliding down like this, it would inevitably trip over these treacherous grass rings.

However, even though the champion saw the grass trap, his speed in the gliding attack did not decrease at all.

Upon seeing the "tie the grass," Adek stomped hard on the ice and leaped into the air on the spiral staircase with its extreme elevation difference.

At the same time, Bogarman unleashed his fully charged "Water Cannon" attack.

Unlike the skills used under the detective's orders, this time Bogarman's water-type moves were both precise and powerful, heading straight for the Ardek Champion's face with tremendous force.

However, the resistance of the two beginner Pokémon still seemed too crude and clumsy in the face of the Unova champion.

"Go, Knight Snail!"

The moment Alder jumped, a red and white Poké Ball had already been launched. As if its trajectory had been precisely calculated, the Poké Ball flew into the air and met Piplup's "Hydro Pump" move head-on.

The Poké Ball containing the Pokémon popped open, and a giant Bug-type Pokémon appeared in front of its trainer, using its sturdy body to block the damage from the opponent's attack.

This Pokémon is covered in hard armor, and its huge red horns show the knight's bravery. It swings its two long spears with great momentum, determined to defeat the enemy in front of it—it is another Bug-type Pokémon from Alder, Escavalier.

Piplup's all-out attack couldn't shake the Pokémon at all; "Water Cannon" merely wet Escavalier's body, as if it had only given the Pokémon a bath.

"Well done."

The champion gave a shout of praise, and as he leaped into the air, he used the momentum to grab his partner's shoulders in front of him, then braced himself with both hands and exerted force. With agility that didn't seem like that of an elderly person, he performed a vaulting motion, using the drop in the stairwell to flip over and land on the Knight Snail's body.

The snail, carrying too much weight, crashed onto the ice, shattering the ice into pieces.

However, this Pokémon was not confined to the wetland terrain.

The Knight Devil isn't a true snail; beneath its shell isn't a soft, slimy body, but rather a biting Pokémon originally called Slug. This incredibly tough snail armor actually comes from another equally amazing Bug-type Pokémon—the one that can evolve into the Agile Bug, the Slug.

Therefore, although the Knight Snail lost its ability to move quickly after evolution, it still retains the potential for rapid movement in certain structures of its armor—for example, a sharp, crescent-shaped horn grows on the part of the Knight Snail that contacts the ground.

At this moment, the sharp point pierced into the ice, like a sharpened ice blade.

The melting point of ice decreases as pressure increases. Under the blade, the solid ice melts into liquid water, forming a water film that wraps around the part of the Knight Snail that is in contact with the ground, acting just like lubricant.

As Adek rode the Knight Snail, he glided across the ice as if surfing, even increasing his speed further. Ignoring the grass knots cut and crushed by the ice blades, he sped relentlessly toward the third floor of the dark Tower of Heaven.

On the fourth floor, the little Chimchar's performance left a deep impression on Aldek. Due to a slight hesitation at the beginning, the incredibly weak little Chimchar managed to move the power inside the tower that was thousands or even tens of thousands of times stronger than itself, causing the old craftsman and the red-faced dragon to fight a bitter battle and even pay the price of casualties.

Having learned from past mistakes, such errors will absolutely not be repeated in this battle!

With the strength of the Unova Champion and his partner, as long as they can overcome this insignificant distance between themselves and their opponent, they can immediately subdue the two starter Pokémon left behind by Detective Hugo with swift and decisive action, leaving no chance for the opponent to set a trap.

Unfortunately, in this distorted and chaotic competition, there was no shortage of unexpected changes and surprises.

.

"Oh no! Stop immediately! Everyone stand by!"

Adek's shocked voice suddenly echoed throughout the entire corridor.

Upon hearing its master's command, the Knight Snail immediately plunged its javelins into the mud beside the snow track, abruptly halting its full-speed sprint.

"Double Ice, use the 'Sleep' move. There's still a tough battle ahead, let's recover our stamina first."

Another command was issued, and although Double Ice hesitated for a moment, it still carried out the order.

Despite subconsciously sensing something was wrong, both Pokémon obeyed Alder's commands without hesitation, out of trust in their trainer.

However, the trainer who issued the command ended up in a bad situation.

Whether due to old age and senility or not, Adek seemed completely unprepared for the consequences of his command, and lost his balance the moment the Knight Snail slowed down, falling forward like a cannonball due to inertia.

Although he managed to grab the Knight Snail's armored crown at the last moment, avoiding injury, half of his body still sank into the mud.

Even in this sorry state, Aldak still gave orders to his partner while still in the mud.

The sound emanated clearly and unmistakably from where the champion was located.

"Knight Snail, prepare for attack, use 'Metal Blast'..."

"Hey! That's enough!"

Adek interrupted himself, the command and rebuke merging together in an instant.

"Stop imitating my voice! Knight Snail, Double Extra Ice, listen up! I didn't give any orders at all! Someone is impersonating me with a similar voice!"

At this moment, Double Ice has fallen into a "sleep" state to recover its stamina and cannot be woken up by the trainer's calls; while Snail Knight is in a state of confusion and bewilderment.

Unconditional trust can also be a curse, a curse that binds the champion's main Pokémon like chains—this is the original meaning of Hugo's so-called "bonds".

Alder frowned deeply: Even if it was an impersonation, the opponent's voice was far too similar to his own; no wonder his Pokémon couldn't tell the difference. But why did the fake command voice happen to be right where he was?

Just then, the champion suddenly remembered something. He looked around and saw a broken clump of grass in the wet ground at his feet. So he bent down and pulled up the clump of wild grass that had grown from the Grass Turtle's "Grass Knot" move.

Twisting and untying the tangled knotted grass rope, a wireless speaker the size of a die slipped out.

It was the same kind that Detective Hugo had used in both the fifth and fourth floors.

The dice in my palm suddenly began to vibrate—

"Ahem, here is a pre-prepared recording. If Mr. Adek hears this audio, it means that you have seen through this obvious trick, right? Congratulations."

Hugo's nonchalant tone of explanation flowed from between Adek's fingers. The speaker was quite small, but the recording it played was deafeningly loud, making it extremely noisy.

"Although I've learned a little bit about vocal cord simulation, it's really too difficult to perfectly imitate another person's voice and intonation. So, when preparing for this battle, I chose another way to confuse the audience."

The detective in the recording explained.

"As the champion of the Unova region, Mr. Alder naturally has a large number of videos of him commanding his Pokémon in battles. By cutting out and extracting the commands from those videos and putting them into a remotely controlled wireless speaker, we can achieve the effect we see right now."

"Of course, since I'm not on the battlefield right now, I can't possibly pinpoint the exact time to play the recording. So, for the sake of rationality, I entrusted all these audio recordings to a Pokémon that was present at the scene. And now that Mr. Alder has seen through Grass Knot's true secret, there's no need to keep the Pokémon's identity a secret any longer."

Alder looked up and his gaze locked onto a Pokémon at the bottom of the spiral staircase.

In the darkness, the grass turtle revealed a cryptic, shy smile, its black pupils gleaming.

According to the recording, the wireless speaker is now entirely controlled by this Grass-type starter Pokémon. In other words, it is Turtwig himself who is playing the recording left by Detective Hugo, revealing the identity of the mastermind to Alder.

What arrogance and self-confidence!

The tender green leaves overhead swayed from side to side, causing all the plants in the wetland to wiggle slightly as if they had their own independent consciousness.

"Attack freely! Ignore my next commands!"

"Do not act for now! Listen carefully to my actual orders!"

As if demonstrating contradictory meanings, two completely opposite commands were issued simultaneously from Adek's mouth.