Breeder Headquarters, Building No.
1, Second Floor, Room 303—
This was where Wally and Joy would take their examination.
By now, the two had already spent another night resting at the hotel, and their spirits had recovered fairly well.
Professor Birch had also arranged a lavish meal for them in advance.
Wally had benefited from his generosity and, since leaving the orphanage, this was the first time he had eaten so well.
The examination was scheduled to begin at eight o’clock in the morning.
With half an hour still remaining, examinees were already beginning to arrive one after another.
Most of those taking the Junior Pokémon Breeder examination were teenagers.
Of course, that wasn’t an absolute rule.
If one visited a few other examination rooms, they might even see people well into adulthood coming to take the examination.
This wasn’t because those people had poor comprehension.
Rather, they had simply begun studying the relevant knowledge at different times.
Wally had a considerable advantage.
He possessed a mature mind, and he had also been exposed to Breeder knowledge since childhood, giving him an early start.
However, these dry and complicated subjects were genuinely difficult for children to master in their entirety given their limited ability to think and comprehend.
That was also why adults generally found it easier to grasp certain concepts than children did.
Wally’s circumstances were difficult to replicate.
Even Joy, who had been fortunate enough to receive instruction from renowned teachers and came from a good background, was only now taking the examination at the same age as Wally.
“203—”
Wally looked up at the room number.
He and Joy entered with their examination information in hand.
Only examinees were allowed inside, so after Professor Birch escorted them downstairs, he returned to wait on his own.
Naturally, he had absolute confidence that Wally and Joy would pass the examination.
The only thing worth anticipating was how their scores would rank among the other examinees taking the examination at the same time.
By then, quite a few people were already seated in the classroom—slightly more than ten.
After calmly looking around, Wally and Joy found their assigned seats and sat down.
As time passed, more and more examinees entered the room.
By the final ten minutes before the examination began, virtually every seat had been occupied.
At the front of the classroom, a woman who looked to be in her early twenties was writing the examination period on the blackboard:
8:00–9:30
She was the proctor assigned to this examination room.
“My name is Nurse Joy.
I will be your proctor.”
Wally was somewhat surprised.
He hadn’t expected the proctor to be a member of the Joy family as well, just like Joy.
However, the Joy family was widely distributed, so there was no guarantee that the two were actually related.
During the remaining ten minutes, Nurse Joy quieted the classroom and carefully explained the examination rules to everyone.
The regulations were fairly ordinary, and most of those present knew at least some of them.
Moreover, since this was only the Junior Pokémon Breeder examination, both the difficulty and the examination process were relatively straightforward.
This was the first part of the examination: the written test.
As soon as the examination began, the papers were distributed.
Wally picked up his paper and glanced through it.
He immediately felt that the questions were somewhat elementary.
None of this could stump him.
There were three pages of questions divided into three sections: multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank, and written analysis.
The examination was worth a total of 100 points.
The multiple-choice section was worth 30 points and contained ten questions.
The fill-in-the-blank section was also worth 30 points and contained ten questions.
As for the written-analysis section, there were only two questions, each worth 20 points.
For the first stage of the examination, a score of 60 or higher was required to proceed to the next stage.
Anyone scoring below 60 would be considered to have failed the examination.
“Just the basics.”
After carefully scanning the paper once more, Wally began answering.
The first question, for example, concerned Poochyena.
It tested the Pokémon’s temperament and was practically a free point.
There were four choices:
A: Stubborn
B: Short-tempered
C: Keen
D: Timid
Without hesitation, Wally put down his answer and selected A.
All four choices had some basis, but A was the most appropriate in this context.
Poochyena often bared its fangs and fiercely intimidated its opponents.
At the same time, when it was struck back, it could tuck its tail between its legs and flee.
Furthermore, it possessed an exceptionally keen sense of smell.
Without an in-depth understanding of the species, an examinee could easily be confused by the very first question.
In truth, Poochyena’s most prominent temperament was its stubbornness.
Whenever it saw something moving, it would immediately bite at it.
It would continue chasing its prey until the prey was exhausted, and it would stubbornly pursue opponents that tried to escape.
In other words, once it locked onto a target, it would chase it until the target was completely exhausted.
Compared with its other traits, this characteristic was particularly pronounced.
To answer the first question correctly, one needed not only a comprehensive understanding of Poochyena, but also the ability to distinguish its primary temperament from its other characteristics.
The second question was accompanied by an illustration:
Question 2: What is Gyarados’s secondary Type?
A: Water
B: Dragon
C: Dark
D: Flying
…
…
Extremely quickly, without the slightest pause, Wally finished the multiple-choice section.
At the same time, Nurse Joy, who was supervising the examination, was looking around the room.
After seeing the information for Wally and Joy, she was quite surprised.
Ten-year-old examinees—and one of them was apparently even from her own family.
What remarkable children.
She therefore decided to pay special attention to these two young examinees when the examination results were released.
Meanwhile, Wally immediately turned his attention to the fill-in-the-blank section.
If the multiple-choice questions could theoretically be guessed correctly, the fill-in-the-blank questions placed a much greater demand on the examinee’s actual knowledge.
Question 1: Beldum primarily relies on (——) to control its movement.
At first glance, this might seem like an extremely simple question.
Someone might even happily write down “Take Down” or “psychic power”, congratulating themselves for knowing the answer.
But in reality, such superficial answers were often imprecise or simply wrong.
Beldum’s body is magnetized, and it uses magnetism to move, communicate, and control its attacks.
It was said to have a connection with Magnemite, but Beldum’s magnetic force was primarily associated with its Psychic-type capabilities rather than its Steel-type ones.
Beldum was extremely limited in battle.
Without using move-tutoring techniques, it could only use Take Down.
Perhaps some people had encountered a rare Beldum and carefully observed the way it battled.
It wasn’t difficult to notice that it seemed to use only Take Down.
Naturally, such people might confidently fill in “Take Down” as their answer.
Another approach was to start from Beldum’s Types: Steel and Psychic.
Steel was difficult to use as an explanation, whereas Psychic would naturally lead one to think that its psychic abilities were the fundamental means by which it controlled its own movement.
Therefore, very few people could correctly answer “magnetism.”
These questions were specifically designed to weed out examinees who were merely trying to muddle their way through the examination.
After writing down the two characters for “magnetism,” Wally continued answering.
One question, then another, then a third…
All the knowledge he had accumulated over the years was now fully reflected in the examination.
Wally answered quickly and with ease.