blenderwars Chapter 724 The Hired Managers of Team Rocket
Chapter 724 The Hired Managers of Team Rocket
The next morning, Li Shuwen was at the training camp on the outskirts of Zhenxin Town.
Three furtive figures emerged from the woods and headed toward Li Shuwen's camp.
The woman in the lead tried to straighten her back, attempting to project the aura of an elite trainer, but her pale face from hunger and her overly forceful strides betrayed her.
The man behind her maintained an elegant smile, but that smile looked like a hallucination caused by hunger.
Meow Meow is also disguised as a human, wearing a hat and sunglasses. Apart from being very short, there are no obvious flaws at first glance.
The "person" standing in the middle seemed to notice Li Shuwen's gaze, his body stiffened visibly for a moment, and then he straightened his chest as if to appear calm.
"Excuse me, are you Master Li Shuwen?"
Li Shuwen smiled and nodded. "It's me. Is there anything I can help you with?"
"I am Miyamoto, this is Sasaki, and this is Nyanko-sensei."
The three exchanged a glance, then knelt down with a thud, performing a full earth-kizuka (a traditional Tibetan Buddhist ritual).
"We've long admired your Midas touch, Master, and have come specifically to learn your secret techniques!"
Looking at the three clowns in front of him, Li Shuwen immediately recognized them as the Rockets trio, but he didn't expose them.
Making them stronger would also be a good whetstone for Li Meining and Xiao Zhi.
Li Shuwen smiled gently: "You must be tired from your long journey. Come, sit down at the camp."
The trio were secretly delighted and followed Li Shuwen into the camp, where they sat down on simple wooden benches.
"Gurgle—"
Almost simultaneously, the three bellies rumbled in unison.
Meow Meow blushed. "Well... we admire the master so much that we've spent all our travel money, so..."
"So I don't have money for food, meow." Kojiro blurted out, only to realize afterward—oh no, did that sentence just now reveal something?
He looked nervously at Li Shuwen, only to find that the master simply smiled and stood up: "Wait a moment."
A moment later, Li Shuwen returned with a plate of snacks.
What followed was like a ravenous tiger pouncing on its prey. The three of them, with six hands, simultaneously reached for the plate, grabbing pastries and stuffing them into their mouths, not even bothering to chew, swallowing them whole. Musashi grabbed two in each hand, one still in his mouth, his eyes already eyeing the next piece. Kojiro tried to maintain his composure, but his speed betrayed him—he was of noble birth, his snatching skills maxed out. Meowth simply buried his face in the plate; the mouth hole in his balaclava came in handy, though crumbs of pastry peeked out from under his chin.
Thirty seconds later, the plate was empty.
The three men leaned back in their chairs and simultaneously let out satisfied sighs.
"It's alive again, meow..."
"Is this what it feels like to be alive...?"
After they had recovered, Li Shuwen smiled and said, "Now, let me see your Pokémon."
Musashi and Kojiro exchanged a glance and simultaneously pulled out their Poké Balls.
"Come out, Arbok!"
"Hey, you lisp, come out here!"
"Double-shot gas, giant carnivore, let's be friends!"
Four Pokémon appeared in the camp, and Li Shuwen carefully examined them.
Arbok's scales were somewhat dull, Lickitung's tongue hung limply on the ground, Weezing floated listlessly in the air, and Victreebel's leaves had slightly yellowed edges.
Li Shuwen frowned slightly: "You can't even feed your Pokémon three meals a day, how can they possibly become stronger?"
Musashi was stunned, and asked blankly, "Do Pokémon need to eat three meals a day? Isn't it enough for them to stay in their Poké Balls and eat once a day, or even once every three days?"
Li Shuwen took a deep breath. He knew that Team Rocket's attitude towards Pokémon wasn't bad, but he didn't expect them to lack even this basic common sense.
"Miss Sasaki, let me ask you," Li Shuwen pointed at Arbok, "if you don't eat for three days, will you still have the strength to fight?"
"Of course not..."
"The same goes for Pokémon." Li Shuwen stood up, walked to Arbok, and gently stroked its scales. "The power of Pokémon largely comes from its food."
"Sufficient and balanced nutrition can greatly enhance their physical strength, endurance, and even the power of their skills."
He then pointed to the giant food plant: "Look at the edges of its leaves, they're slightly yellow, which is a sign of malnutrition."
"The smoke concentration of the dual-explosive gas is insufficient because the body lacks energy."
"The tongue of the big-tongued creature is its most important weapon, but look, it doesn't even have the strength to lift it up."
The four Pokémon all looked at their trainer, their eyes filled with grievance.
Musashi and Kojiro both felt a pang of conscience.
"Trainers can go hungry, but they must never let their Pokémon go hungry." Li Shuwen looked at them seriously. "This is the first ironclad rule for becoming an excellent trainer."
He took out several bags of Pokémon food from the tent: "I'll cover the cost of these four Pokémon's food for now. You can pay me back when you have the money."
"Remember, the most important thing when training Pokémon is being willing to spend money!"
Instead of wasting money on manufacturing unnecessary machines, we might as well feed them to Pokémon; maybe they could actually defeat Ash and Pikachu.
Kojiro nodded excitedly, "No problem, Master! We'll work in Pallet Town to pay off our debts!"
Li Shuwen almost couldn't help but laugh—he almost forgot that these three were the legendary "Kings of Migrant Workers".
Over the next week, the residents of Pallet Town witnessed the birth of a miracle.
At four in the morning, before the sun had even risen, the milkmen in Zhenxin Town had just delivered the milk to each household when they saw a figure already busy on the street.
"Mr. Miyamoto, are you here to help deliver the newspapers again today?" The milkman looked at Kojiro in surprise—this young man who called himself "Miyamoto" was skillfully rolling up the newspapers and accurately dropping them into each household's mailbox.
"Good morning!" Kojiro smiled and waved, his movements fluid and precise as he delivered the newspapers one by one. "I have three jobs to do today, so I need to hurry!"
Watching Kojiro's departing figure, the milkman shook his head and sighed, "This Mr. Miyamoto is so meticulous and conscientious in his work; he's much better than the previous newspaper deliveryman."
On the other side, Meow Meow gripped the knife with both paws, chopping vegetables at such speed that it created afterimages, the rhythm on the cutting board as even as a metronome. The potato shreds were cut to uniform thickness, the carrot cubes to the same size, and the onions were chopped with effortless grace—and she didn't shed a single tear the entire time.
"Your knife skills... have you practiced?" the boss couldn't help but ask.
"I used to help people chop vegetables all the time, meow," Meow replied casually, her hands still busy.
He certainly wouldn't say that he honed his skills by cooking for the Rockets for many years.
After all, the trio were often so poor that they could only afford the cheapest vegetables, and since their knife skills were poor, they could only eat vegetable scraps.
Musashi wielded the mop like a whirlwind, dragging it from the left to the right of the hall, from the doorway to the counter, leaving the floor so shiny that it reflected people's images.
When cleaning the windows, she hung on the window frame, swinging her arms so fast that the glass was wiped as if it didn't exist.
An elderly woman, seeing Musashi's movements, remarked, "This girl is really efficient, it's just... uh... her voice is a bit too loud."
At that moment, Musashi was yelling at a passerby who had accidentally stepped on the floor she had just mopped: "Are your eyes on the top of your head?! Can't you see I just mopped the floor?! Get out of here and walk on it again—no, I mean, wipe it clean!"