Rope and Whitley headed south along Celadon City, they still weren't on the normal roads that the Alliance had set aside, but given Rope's strength it wasn't that big of a deal.
Danger in any area was relative, and for truly new trainers, even taking the regulated roads that the Alliance regularly cleared was dangerous.
Not to mention taking the wild roads like Rope.
"Do you know the Gym Leader of Fuchsia City?"
Whitley suddenly seemed to remember something, then asked towards Rope who was fetching water by the creek in front of him and preparing to cook.
Rope did not stop his work, and then said, "I know him, but I don't really know him well."
He then lifted the pot out of the stream and threw the Magikarp, which had foolishly gotten into the pot, back into the stream.
The Magikarp jumped out of the water with a splashy leap, stared at Rope with dead fish eyes, then dropped back into the water, wagged its tail gently, and disappeared into the distance.
Rope secretly sighed a sentence this thing is covered with bones, no meat, otherwise today high and low whole meal of fish soup for everyone to taste fresh.
Although it's cruel to eat Pokémon... sometimes the human desire for food is just too much.
Back in the day, Farfetch'd was also a common Pokémon, and then it became a rare species... Slowpoke's tail can be regenerated, otherwise it would probably have become a rare Pokémon by now.
But now Slowpoke's tail has also become a normal curry ingredient.
...It's cruel, but it's true that the relationship between humans and Pokémon hasn't been good for very long. Humans have always had a deep-seated malice towards things they can't control. Before the invention of the Pokéball, humans had never been able to subjugate Pokémon in the true sense of the word.
Whenever they had the chance, Pokémon would escape and even kill their controllers.
This is the reason why Pokémon were called 'monsters' back then.
Desiring to take the monster's power for themselves, but fearing the monster's betrayal, mankind was thus entangled with the Pokémon for thousands of years in such a torn situation. It was only after Professor Westwood invented the modern Pokéball that Pokémon came to be known as Pokémon instead of monster.
So it wasn't even that long ago that the term Pokémon was born.
Of course, the history of Pokéball can be traced back further. For example, in the Chengdu region, handmade Pokéballs were made from the fruit of the round mandarin, which were produced in small quantities, but were quite effective.
Wooden Pokéballs were also made in the Sinnoh region in ancient times, and if you go back even further, the seal of the super-ancient Pokémon could be called a Pokéball in a sense.
The wisdom of the ancients is not to be underestimated, but naturally the modern man is not far behind, and the variety and effectiveness of today's Pokéballs is also very important.
Whitley ate the last bit of curry in the bowl, accidentally burped and blushed, then looked at Rope's face which didn't have the slightest reaction and breathed a sigh of relief, and then asked, "So, Rope. what's the point of you popularizing my knowledge about Pokéball?"
This time it was Whitley who was confused, she couldn't even figure out how the conversation between her and Rope had jumped to Pokéball. That said, she had originally wanted to ask him why he didn't know Koga very well. After all, with Rope's ability to make friends, it was hard to think of anyone else he wasn't friends with.
"It's nothing really, it's just that I was thinking about how I've been really rushed on this trip, there's a lot of big things going on, but I really just haven't done much on my own. I didn't walk the famous Diglett's Tunnel, I didn't go into Cerulean Cave, I didn't climb Mt. Moon, I didn't go to the unmanned Power Plant... when I think about it, I've had a pretty tasteless trip."
Rope said as he too finished the last of the later curry on his plate.
Whitley looked at the four Pokémon around Rope, and then at Rope himself, and said, somewhat helplessly, "Are you misunderstanding something about tastelessness? Burning down the Viridian City Mayor's home, engaging in armed combat and physical combat with a large number of Legendary Pokémon...where does that fit in with tastelessness?"
The four Pokémon around Rope also looked at Rope in unison before nodding together.
[Whitley's right!] ×4
Seriously, they felt like Rope's journey should never come to anything interesting. They've seen a lot of big scenes already, and now they just want to have an honest-to-goodness baby cup.
"Off topic again, you guys, what the hell do you mean by telling me Pokéball?"
Whitley was also helpless, chatting with Rope really had to have good enough patience ah, after all, this guy talked to you and got lost in thought or ran off topic while talking.
Although Rope can still bring back the topic by circling around, but the delay in the middle of the time is really not a half a star. After getting acquainted with Rope, Whitley also got used to interrupting this guy's long-winded discussion, although it was all dry knowledge, but most of the time, it was better to listen to the topic.
"Ahem~, do you know where all the bad Pokéballs are sent?"
Rope coughed lightly, then asked.
"I don't know, destroyed?"
Whitley shook his head, then gave his guess.
Rope bristled and shook his head, saying, "How can that be. Knowing that all the Pokéballs are now produced by those big companies, how could they possibly give up that much profit. The ones that are completely unusable are definitely destroyed, but the more Pokéballs are all just poor quality and have a far lower chance of capture than normal Pokéballs."
"So?" Whitley asked as he picked up a Pecha Berry from his plate and nibbled on it.
"So they negotiated a very special zone with the League. It's called the Hunting Zone, also known as the Safari Zone."
Rope also picked up a Pecha Berry from his plate and took a nibble.
"The second name is good, the first is maliciously heavy!" Whitley couldn't help but frown.
The name Safari Zone was fairly normal, while the name Hunting Zone was blatantly calling Pokémon prey, which could be quite disconcerting.
Rope spread his hands and said helplessly, "That's why they changed the name. However, even after changing their name, their essence has not changed. That place is the place where artificial enclosures are made and then Pokémon are released in large numbers to eventually allow trainers to enter to take them in, but they have to take money. Of course, there are other requirements."
"Like the use of a Pokéball with the park's special qualities?"
Whitley finally guessed the antecedents of Rope's words and then said.
"That's clever! That's Safari Ball." Rope smiled and stroked Whitley's head.
Whitley gave Rope a big blank stare and then opened his hand.
Rope laughed, "The poor quality Pokéballs from the big companies became the specialized Pokéballs for these places. the catch rate is extremely high, and fighting is not allowed inside the Safari Zone, and trainers are only allowed to defend themselves with their Pokémon. On the contrary, the Pokémon in there are each fed to be so strong that normal fighting and normal Pokéballs are not always collected, and the Pokéballs are of inferior quality."
Whitley nodded, then caught the question in Rope's words quite acutely.
Whitley frowned and took another nibble of peach, "But the Safari Zone isn't small, is it? How is it going to be possible to control the trainers' behavior with precision in such a situation?"
"That's right, that's the biggest problem, you can't follow the trainers all the time, but you can't take away their Pokémon either, after all, the Pokémon in there are also capable of killing people. If something really goes wrong for Safari Zone and the big companies behind it are also liable, so they searched all the Pokéballs from the trainers."
Rope nodded, then replied, slamming the kernel of the tree fruit in his hand down into the depths of the forest not far away.
"Thunk!" Rope's berry seed seemed to have hit something, and as expected, a Caterpie soon came crawling out of the forest in a furious manner, with a packed bulge on its forehead as if it had come to seek revenge.
Rope, Whitley, and a crowd of Pokémon looked at the Caterpie in disbelief.
Caterpie winced, then scurried back into the forest with an air of aggression, like his enemy was in the forest.
Rope and Whitley were dumbfounded...
After a long moment, Whitley snapped back to his senses, then said, "That's not a bad idea... but Safari Ball can also increase the probability of recovery after wounding a Pokémon, right? Does the park still have to examine the captured Pokémon's body?"
"Not much," Rope shook his head, and then said, "Don't forget that various injuries could have been blamed on other wild Pokémon. many times you have to believe it even if you don't believe it, after all, if the Safari Zone wants to make money then it can't afford to jeopardize its reputation. If they accept Pokémon but don't allow them to be brought outside, this is not smashing their own signboards..."
Whitley pondered for a while, and then nodded her head, it was indeed this kind of reasoning, but to be honest, if it wasn't for Rope who had been purposely mentioning this today, she really wouldn't have been able to think of so many problems. After all, the Safari Zone hadn't existed for a short time, and she, an outsider, had heard quite a few rumors about it.
Most of them were related to Dratini.
The rumor that there was a Dratini in a certain location in the Safari Zone, and the legend of the Dratini... now that she thought about it, it was probably just propaganda... Dratini was just as rare a Pokémon as the Deino and Zorua of the Unova region! That can't just be said to exist.
"But... that's not what I'm most worried about..."
Rope spoke with a worried expression.
"What?" Whitley asked, looking at Rope's slightly worried face in confusion.
"What really worries me is the kind of people who only enter the Safari Zone for the sake of doing harm... Compared to this kind of harm filled with malice, it's still a better thing to take in against a battle instead."
Rope's words caused Whitley to shiver, to be honest, growing up in a family where everyone around him loved Pokémon, and the contact with n afterward had accepted the idea that humans and Pokémon were equal, and even that Pokémon were superior to humans. Now although the thinking has been normalized quite a bit, but it is still difficult to imagine that someone would deliberately hurt Pokémon.
You know, many people, not to mention deliberately, even if there is no doubt that the harm to Pokémon will be self-blame. But her understanding and knowledge of human nature made it impossible for her to doubt Rope's words.
Or rather, Rope's words were the truth, and there was nothing to refute them.
A lot of things are hard to accept, but that's the reality.
It wasn't just Whitley, but Rope too. After all, he knew that the Alliance's intention of setting up the Safari Zone was actually to protect the Kangaskhan and give the endangered Kangaskhan enough space to survive.
But according to his understanding, the increase in the number of Kangaskhan in the past two years is too small, and it is not a normal increase at all. Later, he heard about the Pokémon from Safari Zone invading Safari Zone, which made Rope think that Safari Zone seems to be a place for some people to vent their desires... and coupled with the legend of Dratini, it is normal for trainers who can't find him to be depressed and angry. It is indeed possible that there will be some extreme actions in the future... It can only be said that greed is insatiable.
"On our way to Fuchsia City this time, we'll pass by the Safari Zone in the Kanto region, I'm going to go in and take a look, scout around a bit, and if something really goes terribly wrong, I'll report it to the Alliance and outlaw the Safari Zone and reclassify it as a wild reserve."
Rope's face hardened.
"It's going to offend a lot of people, isn't it?"
Whitley didn't have to think particularly hard to figure out how much Safari Zone would benefit the League and the big corporations. Whether it was employment for residents, training of trainers, or tons of money, it was something that was hard to turn down.
It's no surprise that Safari Zone's Pokémon ratio would be the price to pay to get several of these things.
"Offending people is a given, except I think it's worth it to be offended."
Instead of continuing to make a face like he was some sort of impassioned hero, Rope gave a smile like he didn't care at all.
Whitley was just about to open her mouth to speak, but a flash of light came to her mind and something suddenly occurred to her, "Safari Zone opened in Fuchsia City, does the Gym Leader in Fuchsia City know about these situations?"
She looked at Rope, but Rope didn't say anything, just shook his head.
"I wouldn't dare jump to conclusions. After all, Koga and I do have a personal vendetta going on, and I can't rely on my own subjective speculation to convict Koga, it wouldn't be fair, and if he was involved, or knew about it but didn't care, we'll both have to get the appropriate evidence."
Whitley, however, feels that Rope has been a little too rational, and to be honest, by the time the news reached Rope's ears in Pallet Town, halfway across Kanto from Fuchsia City, it was not even known how many handfuls of news it was. Accuracy aside, there was no telling how long the time gap was. But I'm sure it wasn't a small amount.
So would the near and dear Fuchsia Gym be unaware of the situation?
It was all still speculation, but Whitley could already feel a fire burning at the back of her mind.
She got up violently, then said, "Go! Let's set off to Safari Zone right now.I'm going to find out the truth!"
With that, she marched towards the south with her two legs.
Rope smiled and looked at Whitley's back with a pleased gaze.