Pokemon: I refuse to be a supporting character!

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Trapinch was no match for Purugly.

Even when underground—a terrain favoring Ground-type Pokémon—it stood no chance.

Among the ten moves Purugly had mastered were:

- The opponent-disabling Hypnosis,

- The fire-countering Water Pulse,

- The defensive Protect,

- The powerful Hyper Beam,

- And... Dig.

There's a saying: "Dragons give birth to dragons, phoenixes to phoenixes, and rats to hole-diggers."

But how many people have seen a cat digging holes? A big, fat cat, at that.

Li Xiang had the "privilege" of witnessing it many times—watching a fifty-kilogram tiger-like feline casually toss aside dirt, burrow into the ground like a snake, and emerge from a hole it had dug somewhere else.

And so—

Thud!

With a muffled sound, a gray-and-white shadow leapt out of the ground, holding an orange Trapinch in its jaws. Disgusted, it spat the ant onto the ground, then pinned its head firmly under a paw.

Who else could this be but Purugly?

Behind her, from the hole she had crashed through, several trembling Trapinch crawled out slowly, heads hung low, not daring to meet her gaze.

What horrors had Purugly unleashed underground?

Clinging to Tropius's wing, Li Xiang couldn't help but feel curious.

But he would never get an answer.

Soon enough, the Trapinch that had been recklessly altering the terrain in a public space and creating hazardous traps were taken away by caretakers for a stern lecture. Their punishment? Likely a week of unpaid labor.

Meanwhile, Purugly, who had promptly discovered and apprehended the offenders, climbed higher in the rankings for the conservation base's annual Best Pokémon Employee Award.

If she actually won, Mrs. Yin's year-end bonus might double.

As for Li Xiang, who had also played a role in the discovery? He got a couple of compliments from Mrs. Yin and the reward of playing on Steelix's head, enjoying the thrill of riding the giant Pokémon.

But he was satisfied.

Seeing Steelix in anime and encountering one in real life were two entirely different experiences.

Standing under its bulldozer-like head, being stared down by its massive eyes, Li Xiang felt both excitement and nervousness.

When humans face creatures much larger and stronger than themselves, it's natural to feel fear.

In fact, if Steelix were evaluated by the physical laws of Li Xiang's previous life, this massive steel creature would weigh at least 50 tons—probably even more.

It was only natural to feel intimidated.

Yet if that were the case, Steelix's sheer weight alone would allow it to crush countless Pokémon.

A small, lightweight Pokémon like Pikachu, weighing just a few kilograms, would likely be obliterated by a single Tackle, reduced to nothing but a puddle of blood.

Thankfully, Steelix's body wasn't bound by real-world physics. Its actual weight was a mere 600 kilograms—a figure often mocked as evidence that its designer must have failed physics class.

.....

Learning moves wasn't something that could be rushed.

Unlike how Rowlet in the anime casually spat a couple of stones and instantly mastered Seed Bomb, Litten required more time.

It would take at least a month for Litten to successfully learn the move, which was why Li Xiang wasn't pressuring it.

He adopted a gradual approach, having Litten focus on learning Fake Out while continuing to test whether defeating Pokémon at the conservation base could earn him candy.

The answer remained the same: no.

The rules became clearer—he had to battle Pokémon with Trainers and win decisively, without any shortcuts, to receive candy.

Thus, Li Xiang began searching for novice Trainers at his level.

Lin Feng was unavailable.

Who knew what he was busy with? He hadn't replied to any messages on [WeChat].

Li Xiang hadn't had the chance to visit Lin Feng's family shop recently, so he gave up on milking that particular "sheep."

Unfortunately, Li Xiang didn't have many friends in this world. Aside from Lin Feng, he could count his [WeChat] friends on one hand.

Not much opportunity to "shear wool," as he liked to put it.

The senior students at the dojo? Out of his league.

If they went easy on him, the victory wouldn't meet the conditions for candy.

Public parks? A possibility, but Litten needed to train its moves. The Pokémon raised by the base's caretakers were generally above Level 30, making them too strong for Litten.

Plus, the caretakers didn't have the time to battle with him every day.

After much deliberation, the park seemed like the only option. Mornings and evenings were busy with people exercising, while afternoons were relatively quiet.

If Li Xiang got lucky, he might find some fellow novice Trainers there to battle.

Or so he thought.

Reality, as always, had other plans.

.....

Were there peers at the park?

Yes.

Were they willing to battle? At first, yes.

But midway through the battle, when one realized their Pokémon was at a disadvantage, they'd stop abruptly, recall their Pokémon, and walk away without a word—lacking even the most basic sense of sportsmanship.

Unfinished battles earned Li Xiang no candy.

This experience drove home the fact that sore losers existed in this world, just as much as they did in his previous one.

Especially kids who didn't understand the spirit of competition.

Park battles relied entirely on mutual respect. If the other party walked away, Li Xiang could only morally condemn them without any real recourse.

If they forfeited properly, that would be one thing.

But stopping halfway? What was that supposed to mean? Don't they feel ashamed?

Apparently not.

When they realized they'd lose badly, they opted to quit entirely.

Faced with such behavior, Li Xiang could only chalk it up to bad luck. Afterward, he found a few others to battle.

These ones fought to the end, but when Li Xiang asked for a rematch, every single one refused. Anyone watching might have thought he cheated during the battles.

And just like that, Li Xiang's wool-shearing plan fell apart.

...

And so, another week went by.

He scraped together everything he could, trying every possible way to gather candies.

Finally, he managed to collect all the colors: six in total—yellow, red, blue, purple, green, and indigo.

Among them, Li Xiang was certain of the following: yellow represented HP, purple stood for Special Attack, blue for Speed, and red for Attack.

As for the remaining two colors, indigo and green, he couldn't quite recall which was for Defense and which for Special Defense.

Now, the red and purple candies had reached five pieces each, blue had seven, and the other colors were scarce.

Li Xiang debated whether to feed one type to Litten first to see the effects.

He had tried eating one himself, but it had no effect at all—it was just an ordinary sweet. However, deciding which one to feed was a topic worthy of further study.

Speed was out of the question—he needed to save it for testing future rules.

The candies for Attack and Special Attack were relatively abundant, so their effects would be more noticeable.

Therefore, he had to choose between Attack and Special Attack.

Incineroar, this Pokémon, could build on either Attack or Special Attack. Its 80 Special Attack stat wasn't exactly high but wasn't low either.

However, based on his knowledge from his previous life, he decided to feed only Attack candies to Litten and save the Special Attack ones for the next Pokémon. This way, the entire team would benefit more.

After all, having one stat that stood out provided more visible benefits than spreading everything evenly.

From what he had observed, no matter how many Pokémon he trained, he could only earn one candy per day through training alone. Most of the candies came from battles.

Currently, every candy in his jar had been earned by Litten alone, so by rights, they should all go to Litten.

Thus, he decided to take a simpler approach.

—Candy Trading.

He would save the Special Attack candies for now, as their impact on damage output was more evident in the early stages and would be of greater help to a Pokémon.

As for the rest, they would all be fed to Litten.

Later, when teammates leveled up or earned candies through victories, those could be exchanged for Attack candies or other types.

Li Xiang planned to create individual jars for each Pokémon, along with a shared jar for candies earned during daily training.

Individual jars could be used for personal candy exchanges, while the shared jar would be distributed based on group consensus.

With this plan in place, he began preparing for post-consumption tests.

Regarding the candies, he believed the fewer people knew about them, the better.

Unlike some abstract "stat points," these candies were tangible items. If he wasn't careful, others could easily discover them.

Therefore, even Miss Yin and Purugly were kept in the dark.

As for Litten… Li Xiang wanted to explain everything to it, but unfortunately, it couldn't understand such complexities.

So, he had no choice but to keep the secret to himself.

.....

One afternoon.

In the office.

Li Xiang reviewed the data and photos from a professional device test conducted yesterday, which detailed Litten's strength metrics.

Without drawing attention, he mixed four red candies into Litten's lunch.

Given Litten's sensitive tongue, it was impossible for it not to notice the sudden sweet taste in its food, but since it was Li Xiang who added them, Litten didn't mind.

In fact, it saw through him.

To Litten, the taste was pretty good.

Even if it tasted awful, it would have swallowed it without a second thought, because it trusted that Li Xiang wouldn't harm it.

Li Xiang, on the other hand, only felt relieved once he saw Litten successfully eat the candies. He wondered how long it would take for the effects to show.

Would they be instantaneous, like something out of a fantasy novel, where power surged through the body and resulted in a breakthrough?

Nothing of the sort happened.

Litten merely smacked its lips as though it felt nothing, licked its paws, and washed its face. After finishing that, it ran up to Li Xiang, rubbed against his leg, and meowed for catnip.

Of course, Li Xiang obliged—it was such a small request. How could he deny it? He even brought out the ultra-expensive catnip that Su Yiliu had bought for him.

It was said to be of the highest quality—so potent that an average cat couldn't stop once it started.

The only downside was that it came loose and unprocessed, but for a small kitten like Litten, the loose format was perfect.

Just as the little one lunged forward, batting at Li Xiang's hand and preparing to indulge in the catnip to its heart's content…

Li Xiang suddenly let out a loud yelp and pulled his hand back at lightning speed.

Litten's ears flattened into an obedient "airplane" shape, and it crouched down, nervously watching him, completely unsure of what had happened.

The two other cats and Florges also turned their attention toward them.

Even Miss Yin, who had been reviewing documents, looked up in surprise. She immediately got up, walking briskly toward Li Xiang.

"What's wrong?"

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Happy New Year guys! I hope this new year brings all of you much closer to your dreams.

Also, I'd like to announce that you can now read (up to 35+ (previously 25) advance chapters of [Pokemon: The Legendary Trainer] and up to 25+ chapters of [Pokemon: I refuse to be a supporting character!) exclusively on my Patreon!