Today had been an incredibly fun day.
Sunny happily headed home with his little Litleo, humming a cheerful tune the entire way.
Even his footsteps seemed much lighter than usual.
However, while walking back, Sunny noticed a Spearow standing quietly on the ground.
It looked completely listless, its head hanging low, its entire body radiating dejection.
Anyone who saw it would instinctively spare it a second glance.
The Spearow also looked strangely familiar.
After thinking carefully, Sunny finally remembered where he had seen it before.
It was the same Spearow that had landed on top of Simba’s Egg some time ago.
After living with Pokémon for so long, he had gradually become capable of distinguishing individuals even among members of the same species.
To most people, every Spearow looked almost identical, but that was far from the truth.
Some were slightly taller, some thinner, some had longer feathers, while others had brighter, sharper eyes.
This Spearow was noticeably larger than the others of its kind.
Judging from its physique alone, it had obviously lived for quite a long time.
Every part of its body had fully matured, and by all rights it should have evolved into a Fearow already.
Moreover, Sunny had met most of the Spearow living in this forest at least once or twice before.
He had never seen this particular one, which meant it had most likely flown here from another forest.
Curious, little Simba trotted over and gently poked the Spearow with one tiny paw.
The Spearow did not react at all.
Spearow were famous for having terrible tempers.
Normally, touching one without permission would immediately earn an angry peck or a barrage of furious chirps.
Yet this one remained completely lifeless.
Its condition had to be serious.
Could it actually be depressed?
Having experienced difficult times himself in his previous life, Sunny could more or less understand how the Spearow felt.
Because of everything Entei had taught him, coupled with his own deep love for Pokémon, he genuinely wanted to help it.
This time, however, he decided to handle things himself instead of asking Entei.
He felt bad always relying on Entei for everything.
Besides, it was about time he gained more experience solving problems on his own.
It would also be a good opportunity to let Simba become more familiar with the forest.
Of course, before doing anything, he first had to find out what had happened.
Which meant…
It was finally time for the God’s Eye to do its job again.
Very quickly, the familiar information panel appeared before him.
Spearow (Unknown)
Gender: Female
Type: Normal / Flying
Level: 22
Ability: Keen Eye (Its accuracy cannot be lowered, and it ignores changes to the opponent’s evasion.)
Held Item: None
Moves: Omitted
Status: In despair after losing something extremely important.
As a result, it is unable to evolve.
Evaluation: A Pokémon just as infamous for its bad temper as Mankey.
Be careful when encountering flocks of them in the wild.
If it is only a single one, then pretend I never said that.
Sunny quickly understood the reason for its current state.
So it had lost something incredibly important.
That certainly would make anyone miserable.
Thinking back to the time when it had shown interest in Litleo’s egg, perhaps what it had lost was also something large and round?
He crouched down.
“Spearow, did you lose something?”
No response.
“Was it… a stone?”
The moment it heard the word “stone,” the Spearow instantly snapped out of its lifeless state.
Its eyes widened as it excitedly cried out.
“Speear! Yes! Yes! I lost a very important stone! Have you seen it?” You are reading on g.com, the official source.
Sunny shook his head.
“No… but I can help you look for it.”
The hope that had just appeared in the Spearow’s eyes immediately dimmed again.
“So you don’t know where it is…”
Its voice became filled with sadness.
“Spearoo… I’ve searched for so long, but I still can’t find it. Maybe… maybe I’ll never find it again…”
“Don’t worry.”
Sunny smiled encouragingly.
“If it’s something that important to you, then you definitely can’t give up. As long as we keep trying, we’ll find it eventually. Pull yourself together!”
His encouragement restored a little confidence to the Spearow, although it still looked absent-minded.
Wild Pokémon generally were not particularly aggressive.
As long as someone did not deliberately provoke them, they were usually quite reasonable.
At least, every wild Pokémon Sunny had encountered had been.
Even if he happened to meet one with a bad temper, the aura of a Legendary Pokémon lingering on him meant very few Pokémon dared attack him.
Because of that, Sunny was naturally quite fearless around unfamiliar Pokémon.
Helping this Spearow simply came from genuine kindness.
Seeing that it had calmed down somewhat, he began asking what had happened.
Although still depressed, the Spearow slowly explained.
“It was about the same size as me… It had reddish patterns… It wasn’t perfectly round… It was really heavy…”
“My mother gave it to me.”
“It stayed warm all the time.”
“When the weather was cold, lying on top of it felt wonderful…”
“I really love collecting all kinds of stones.”
“I’ve picked up lots of them.”
“But that stone was my favorite.”
“Then… more than two weeks ago… it disappeared.”
“I searched everywhere…”
“I still couldn’t find it…”
Sunny blinked.
Wait a minute.
That description did not sound anything like a Pokémon Egg.
So why had the Spearow landed on Litleo’s egg that day?
He had even thought it wanted to do something to it.
Apparently, the poor thing had simply searched for so long that it had become desperate.
Anything remotely round with some reddish markings immediately caught its attention.
Sunny quickly organized the information in his head before saying,
“Can you take us to where you originally kept it?”
The place was not far away.
It was still inside the same forest, just an area Sunny had rarely visited before.
No wonder he had never encountered this Spearow previously.
Soon, they arrived.
On the ground lay a shallow depression.
It was obvious that a large object had rested there for quite some time.
There were no signs that anything had been dragged away.
The surrounding grass, however, was rather messy.
Still, that was perfectly normal.
This area did not belong to any particular Pokémon, so many different Pokémon regularly passed through.
After making a simple inspection, Sunny reached a conclusion.
The culprit was probably a fairly large land-dwelling Pokémon.
That stone obviously was not light.
Small Pokémon such as Furret could never have carried it.
At best, they could only drag it.
As for whether another Flying-type Pokémon had flown away carrying it…
That seemed rather unrealistic.
A bird flying through the sky while carrying a massive stone would have been impossible to miss.
Surely another Pokémon would have noticed.
Therefore… Find the original chapter at g.com.
The answer was fairly obvious.
A large terrestrial Pokémon had most likely picked it up.
Though…
Could it really be called stealing?
The stone had simply been lying in the middle of the road.
Who would have known it belonged to someone else?
Sunny could not help asking,
“You’re… actually this careless?”
“You just left something that important right in the middle of the road?”
Normally, wouldn’t someone hide something precious somewhere safe?
The Spearow fell silent.
“…”
What could it even say?
It had merely taken the stone out to let it bask in the sunlight.
Then it had gotten hungry and flown off to find food.
When it returned…
The stone was gone.
Perhaps it had indeed been careless.
But still…
Should another Pokémon really pick up such a huge stone lying by the roadside?
Besides, it should still have carried the Spearow’s scent.
Seeing its guilty expression, Sunny sighed helplessly.
“You really are even more carefree than I am.”
“If your stone was especially beautiful, then of course another Pokémon might have wanted to take it.”
Just as he was about to continue speaking, he noticed little Litleo busily sniffing around the pit.
The cub’s nose moved constantly as if it were trying to distinguish the lingering scents and identify the Pokémon that had taken the stone.
Sunny blinked in surprise.
Could it actually smell something?
Litleo was not a canine Pokémon.
Its sense of smell should not have been anything extraordinary.
Still…
Even if it could not compare to canine-like Pokémon, it was undoubtedly far superior to the noses of both Sunny and the Spearow.
After sniffing for quite a while, Litleo suddenly looked delighted.
“Sunny! There are several Pokémon scents here that are especially strong! They might belong to the Pokémon that took the stone!”
Sunny was pleasantly surprised by the discovery.
At the same time, however, he suspected Litleo had misunderstood.
After all…
Two whole weeks had passed.
The original scent should have long since disappeared.
What Litleo was probably smelling were simply Pokémon that had rested here more recently.
Even so, he did not want to discourage his partner.
Instead, he smiled brightly.
“That’s amazing! Now we finally have a lead! Simba, you’re incredible!”
Hearing his Trainer’s praise, Litleo happily spun around in place.
Being complimented by his Trainer made him unbelievably happy.
Unfortunately, he had no idea that he had most likely followed the wrong trail.
The Spearow also became excited.
“Does that mean… we’re really going to find my stone?”
Sunny smiled.
He certainly could not let the hopes of these two Pokémon be crushed.
The next step was obvious.
Rather than blindly following an unreliable scent, they should ask the Pokémon living nearby whether any of them had seen anything unusual.
That was the truly correct place to begin the search.
(End of Chapter)