I wake up feeling slow, out of sorts and uncomfortable.

  Not my usual feeling after I successfully use REST.

  Must be that damn PARALYSIS.

  STATUS: PARALYSED...

  Yep still got that shit, just like in the game I can't just sleep it off without going to a Pokémon center (closest one I'm guessing a billion miles away), finding a berry to cure PARALYSIS (again probably not happening in a place dominated by ice and no greenery), finding a potion.... sigh. Or finding an ability to cure status conditions... ... ..

  Yep, well I'm fucked.

  I wrack my brain for in-game knowledge on how to fix my problem... and then.... I realize that I'm not from the game. Why do I have to follow the game to cure Paralysis? Can't I just.. I don't know, figure out how to fix myself using medical knowledge?

  Although the name says Paralysis I'm not literally paralysed as I can still move my body. I just have episodes where I'm unable to move due to some discomforting current inside my body.

  So.... to remove a current.... I can just use another current. So I just need to summon Carvanah to teach it .... with words ..... a complex move.... to reverse paralysis.... before the Carvanha decides to attack me for capturing it........ whilst I'm stunned.

  Yeah.... so fucked.

  I take out some weak Pokémon, with PHYSIC which fails more than half the time, to stock up on some food and then prepare.

  No time like the present, I bury myself underneath the sand a distance away from where I’m going to attempt to summon my first capture. Let’s just hope she doesn’t just get summoned next to me instead. I’ve got a plan but I need to buy enough time to implement it.

  I take a deep breath and then bring up the Pokémon status. I noticed yesterday that there is an option to CAST and an option to RECALL. I CAST and took off into the distance. A significant portion of my MP is drained away in this process. Oh that is not good!

  Glad I learnt this outside of real combat.

  Carvanah finishes her thunder fang but there is nothing for her to target so her teeth spark but there is no me to chomp into. She looks very confused, she knew she had won the battle but now….

  I check her over from a distance and notice her HP/MP and even her condition is exactly the same as when I caught her last. I’m guessing I put her into a type of stasis. Great as a life saving device but I wonder if there is a way to heal her whilst she is in my storage.

  It would also be a great way to keep edible Pokémon that I was going to keep fresh for long periods of time. Sadly that will never work as I’m not going to lose my 1/1 slot for food instead of this Carvanha.

  I mean come on guys, she's literally the 3rd Pokémon in this world that I have seen that diverges from the game world. Why would I give her up for food when there is so much of it in supply everywhere.

  I watch as the injured and confused Carvanah tries to discharge a pulse of Spark; however I’m far enough away this time to not get hit by any AOE damage. Now is the moment of truth, I know she’s too tired to just swim away without getting picked off by another predator and has close to no HP/MP.

  Let's hope this works.

  TRADE - Lvl 13 Seel wishes to negotiate/trade with you.

  She pauses, looks around suspiciously and then gives up overthinking. She can’t spot me and doesn’t really have any other options. She’s smart enough to realize her only chance is to hope that since I haven’t attacked her that I have some other plan instead.

  Lvl 16 Carvanha enters trade

  Seel: Wishes to trade food and shelter for companionship

  After reading the request Carvanha has an awkward look on her face, I think she believes companionship is the kind that results in Pokémon eggs. . . whoops

  Carvanha: Declines trade. Offers her survival and food for her not killing you.

  Well this seems familiar somehow, but this time I’m the one with the upper hand. She doesn’t know what I want and I hold all the cards.

  Seel: Declines trade Offers food and shelter and survival for protection against other Pokémon and following her orders if deemed reasonable and non-suicidal.

  Carvanha seems confused, she doesn’t really get what I’m trying to achieve. She just floats there injured and confused for a time. Then almost as if her body actually sparks her eyes shine with inner light of understanding.

  YESSS

  Carvanha: Rejects trade -

  WHAT THE FUCK, wait.. She’s doing something

  BOND - Carvanha LVL 16 offers to join party of Trainer SEEL: Offers up herself for food/protection/safety

  Ohhhh, I guess that’s how I was supposed to do it…ALERT - This is permanent, party members can not be traded or released, till death do you part.

  TRAINER SEEL: ACCEPTED party join request.

  Ooo so it’s not the same as capturing I guess. Seems more like a soul bond or something like that. I’m going to need to find out more about what this actually means. But for now let’s do some testing.

  I rise above the surface of the sand, ready for betrayal. I have my energy just underneath the surface ready to go. Carvanha does nothing when she sees me. She does have a kind of look of expectation though. We stare at each other for a while.

  *We’ll….. Aren’t you going to feed me*

  I stare at her longer in shock…. Did she just talk to me!!!!! With actual words! Oh this is amazing!

  *Are your retarded? Are you going to answer me or what? I’m right here!*

  Her fangs spark with electricity

  “Oh sorry about that, first time I've been able to communicate with a Pokémon properly before. I’ve got food that I've stashed in the sand beneath me and I can find us shelter in a moment. Do you have any abilities that will help restore your HP quickly?”

  *No, nothing like that however since you asked that question I’m guessing you do, however it doesn’t look like it can fix conditions. I remember getting some good shocks onto you even though I couldn’t see you. No clue how you escaped at the last moment and healed back up to full so quickly*

  “Oh sorry trade secret, but I might be able to figure out how to teach you some new skills and moves to help you heal. And if you are willing since we are kind of dependent on each other I can try to teach you how to remove status conditions, specifically PARALYSIS for now since you know. I’m kind of PARALYSED and it only seems to be getting worse over time.”

  *Fine, keep your secrets, very human-like behavior for a Pokémon. Maybe that’s how you got trainer status?*

  She stares at me from the side of her eye as she asks me that question

  I chuckle audibly, “Nice try, again that’s a trade secret.”

  She huffs *Whatever* and then heads towards the pile of sand I came out from and proceeds to pull out some food.

  “Can I give you a name or do you already have one? It’s hard to just think of you as Miss Carvanha”

  *No name, call me what you want, don’t care* she responds as she stuffs her face with low leveled meat that I collected earlier. She doesn’t seem picky in either name or food which is good.*

  Once you heal up a little and are feeling better we are going to try to teach you a move to remove Paralysis. And also see how we work together in both hunting and communicating during a Pokémon battle.

  I proceed to watch as the little fish continues to eat far more food than her size suggests, she continues until NOTHING is left.

  Burpppp *I guess this will have to do, low leveled food is not the best for helping with healing though, I’m assuming you can’t do much to fix that with your PARALYZED status.*

  I nod along. I quickly check her status. And notice that her health has significantly JUMPED up. 160/220 HP from 10/2220 is an amazing improvement in such a short time. She obviously knows something about quickly healing too but it does not seem to be a type of Pokémon move.

  “Okay so I'm going to try to teach you a new move. I want you to focus on your electricity and the power within yourself and then bring the sparks to the surface of your skin. Similar to your move Nuzzle but just use the raw energy and not the move itself.”

  *Sure, that’s easy enough.* Crackles of electricity spark around her.

  INSPIRATION “Okay i’m also going to name you Sparky. Now I want you to try to release a very small amount of power away from your body whilst still keeping most of it inside you.”

  Sparky does so and I can see an almost visible electric net slowly expand away from the scales of her. “Very good now I want you to continue doing this. Imagine all that electricity sucking up energy from around you.” I’m going to take a risk and I swim up to the field around her and put a fin up against it.

  ZAP - I take a whopping 100 electric damage and am smashed away into the sand below. I struggle to catch my breath as pain courses through my body. I think I made things… much worse.

  Why you say, well to be simple my PARALYSIS now seems to be working on my body even out of combat now almost constantly. I just sit there doing NOTHING and hurting.

  STATUS: PARALYSIS - FULL

  *DING - Pokémon Sparky - Carvanha has learned tailored move - ELECTRIC FENCE - Set up a field of electricity around you, anything that touches this field will receive all the energy from the fence as Electric damage* USES - 50 MP

  *DING - exp awarded to TRAINER LEVEL for teaching a unique move to your Pokémon.*

  Trainer LVL 1>3 Items awarded - 1x Potion, 5 x Pokéball - error error error, award removed, incompatible with host.

  Options - 1. Trainers may pick another item of equal value to receive OR 2. Trainers may use the reward to slowly work towards unlocking new features.

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Oh that sounds epic. But I know I need to fix my PARALYSIS ASAP and my best chance seems to be an item instead of teaching a move which has a high probability of just killing me outright.

  Option 1 Selected

  I browse the store paying little attention to the items I can’t afford. Of those that I can though it’s mostly berries, heal potions and … some more berries. And then I see it, Paralyze Heal.

  I select the Paralyze heal and after summoning the item from thin air the surprised Sparky looks at me as the item falls into my open slack jawed mouth and then proceeds to dissolve.

  To say it tasted like medicine, let's just say that I'd happily take medicine in my old life hundreds of times before I have to even have this one even once more. Revooooolting.

  STATUS: Normal.

  Hurray, So glad I knew exactly what I was doing there.

  *cough, cough*

  So with this I have 2 operational Pokémon. Sparky seems pretty happy with learning a new move for free. *I thought you were teaching me how to remove Paralysis.*

  “Hahaha, Nahhh I could totally do that all along.”

  *Right…. And that’s why you chose to do it only after you were fully PARALYSED?... Could you at least try to make your lies a little more believable?*

  “Are you seriously complaining that you learnt a new move from all of this?”

  *No you are the boss I guess. Got any more cool tricks to teach me*

  “Yeah I’ve got plenty up my sleeve”

  *What’s a sleeve?*

  “Nevermind…”

  So with new knowledge about Trainer levels I decided to try to both teach Sparky some new moves and also see if I can use her in successful battles to gain more experience as well.

  We encounter a lvl 14 Tynamo. Little electric eels. And as much as I’d like to take on something electric that can stun me and then kill me. I think I’ve done that enough for this week at the very least.

  Instead of attacking I ask Sparky to try to hide out of sight with myself and observe them with her energy.

  *DING - Pokémon SPARKY has learnt AMBUSH*

  *DING - Pokémon SPARKY has learnt FOCUS ENERGY*

  Pokémon SPARKY has gained enough EXP to level, however, trainer's level is too low. Excess EXP has been sent to the weakest Pokémon SEEL.

  WHAT…. Yes, EXP SHARE. I’ll take that insult any day of the week!

  We continue to look for a more practical target. At this point, we encounter not just one juicy morsel but TWO of my favorite food EVER - YES correct SHELLDERS. One lvl 20 the other 22 but with mediocre stats (200hp and 220 hp respectively)

  “Okay here’s the plan Sparky, we are going to AMBUSH those SHELLDERS and then … eat them. Try not to use electric attacks as you might hit me in the crossfire. Although, if you get close enough use ELECTRIC FANG or that ELECTRIC FENCE skill okay? Finally try not to swim in front of my line of sight as my attacks are invisible and I need to see my target to hit them.”

  *sure thing boss. 3….2…..1… Goooo*

  SPARKY rockets out from the sand, very much noticeable and our surprise is gone. However it doesn’t matter. She smashes into the Shellder trying to dig away and crunches into it with electricity. I on the other hand get off a nice shot of PHYSIC which CRITICAL hits as the SHELLDER’s are both focusing on the threat of SPARKY more than the hole from where she came. Ooo this synergizes really well. She continues to maul the hapless lvl 22 Shellder who eventually stops struggling. The other terrified shellder attempts to escape away, however I continue to hit it with invisible charges of PHYSIC.

  I know the next hit will end it. I prepare for the meal but watch as the tasty scallop gets a determined look on its face and then starts glowing. Not an evolution.. .. She continues to get brighter and brighter.

  Ahhh shitttt. SPARKY take coverrrrr!!!!!

  Sparky dives beneath the sand and moments later a loud BOOM resounds. Bits and pieces of shrapnel shell fire all around the area and torn flesh floats about.

  Now that is what I'd call a SELF-DESTRUCT. Pretty sure there is no coming back from exploded body parts. Seems like a one time move.

  I’m lucky that SPARKY is willing to share her portion since mine is smithereens.

  *Thanks, I don’t think I would have coped very well with pieces of shell sticking out from my body*

  DING - Party exp awarded. All exp sent to SEEL. Seel Lvl 13>14

  Trainer exp awarded for successful team battle/instructions given Lvl 3>5

  Trainer gained 5 x Potions 1 x great ball - error error error, award removed, incompatible with host.

  Yeah I’ll take option 2 today. Let's see if we can unlock anything. .. … and… nothing. Meh, oh well.

  I’m really happy with today, good food, levels gained, moves learned, a new interface, a new roulette and “friend” who isn’t hostile, cured Paralysis and best of all a partner who shares her SCALLOPS and food.

  In my old world, let's just say trying to take my partner's sushi would likely result in murder via suffocation in my sleep.

  So with that, I find an empty cave nearby and settle down with Sparky for some quality sleep.

  REST

  STATUS

  TRAINER SEEL: LVL 5

  Slots: 2/2

  AVAILABLE MOVES: CAST 100MP, RECALL 100MP, CAPTURE 0 MP requires spare Pokémon slot and Pokémon to be injured enough to capture

  Items: 6 x Potions

  Caught Pokémon: 2

  Bonded Pokémon: 2

  [CARVANHA - BLACK ZONE VARIANT - LVL 16]

  Carvanha's strongly developed jaws and its sharply pointed fangs pack the destructive power to rip out boat hulls. Many boats have been attacked and sunk by this Pokémon.

  [WATER/ELECTRIC]

  HP 150/220 MP 50/220

  STATUS

  [SEEL - LVL 14]

  [PSYCHIC/???]

  [HP 200/280 MP 200/280]

  STATUS: Normal