“So, this the shop?” Heath said to himself. He looked around and saw that everyone was focused on a multitude of things that somehow made Heath feel back at home in New York. Heath shook those thoughts from his head, quickly focusing on the shop in front of him. Heath had found a couple of shops that he wanted to try visiting today but he was also expecting some news on when Norman would be arriving at Oldale so he would be able to do his job efficiently and maybe get in some luck with the soon to be Normal type gym leader.

‘I should stop procrastinating and go in already ugh’ Heath thought as he quickly opened the door and heard a chime from the doorbell set up above.

He looked ahead and saw a man at the counter who looked bored noted by the interval of yawns and next to him was a Cute Purloin that seemed to be sleeping in its bed. The clerk eyes slowly drifted towards Heath scanning him up and down but soon he lost interest signaling by closing his eyes. The clerk seemed to be pretending like there was no guest as his store, which Heath found weird.

Awkwardly, Heath walked up to counter where the guy was feigning sleep and tried to get his attention by whispering

“Excuse me, Sir?” Heath shyly asked.

The clerk slowly peeked up his head which was previously buried beneath his arms and looked up to see Heath.

“Huhhh” The shopkeeper groaned in annoyance and looked at him in a lazy and spiteful way.

“Kid, what do you want? Can’t you see I’m sleeping?” The clerk barked while rubbing his eyes

“This is the Pokémon Shop where you sell pokémon right?” Heath asked. The man gave him another look seemingly trying to find something.

“If I say no will you leave the store?” The man asked with a lazy smile.

“Maybe?” Heath sarcastically joked

“No”

Heath sighed

‘At this rate, I’m going to get a headache’ Heath thought before continuing with his questions.

“Well, what do you sell then?”

“Lis-”

“Erwin”

Heath heard the door behind him open with a guy who was wearing a navy-blue dress shirt with long gray slacks. He had his blazer hanging off down his back being held with his left hand with his other in his pocket.

‘What the hell is this situation? I just wanted to see some pokémon’ Heath sighed quickly taking note of the man looking straight at him. Viewing everything with his eyes as they sharply captured everything in their way. This sharpness seemed possible with his onyx-colored eyes which contrasted completely with his ash blonde hair.

“You know better than to treat customers like that.” The man yelled.

The man entered the store and when he looked at Heath again, Heath felt a calming and kind atmosphere that reminded him of Vanessa back in Little Root but that was immediately spoiled when he looked at the drowsy man Erwin.

“Arthur, I’m tired. The kid was asking me some of the most nonsensical questions and making fun of my intelligence. How is it my fault if I respond in kind” Erwin groaned as he lied.

“Yeah, right you lazy asshole. He probably felt like he was interrupting you just by breathing. I’ve read the reviews recently and fuck sake’s stop behaving like a bored kid.” Arthur spat. He held his head down in frustration causing his blonde hair previously slicked to the back of his head to fall forward. He was soon calm and took another glance at Heath and smiled.

“Sorry kid he’s just extremely lazy, what’s your name?” Arthur said slicking his hair back.

“Heath, nice to meet you. You must be new around here in Oldale town if you came to this shop.” He outreached his hand while Piplup who was previously sleeping was now stirring awake and looked at the handsome man in front of him confused but not caring enough Piplup just fell back to sleep.

‘Typical’ Heath commented on the sleeping bird

“Yeah, I am. I came to Oldale so that when my friend arrives in town we can head back home. I sort of promised them I would stay in town till they arrived but it might take longer than expected” Heath said as he carefully omitted some of the facts.

“Oh, that’s cool. I hope they come soon but, in the meantime, do you wanna go to the back of the shop? That’s mostly where the good pokémon are, since I’m guessing you don’t want to see our outdated catalog?” Arthur directed.

Heath shook his head

“I didn’t get one.” Heath scratched his head in shyness.

‘Do they both work here?’

Arthur glared once more at the happily sleeping man and then sighed. He went up to the drowsing shopkeeper and reach his hands around the desks seemingly trying to find something. He then pulled out a couple of things.

“Here” Arthur carefully gave him a paper magazine while he dangled keys in hand.

“Good thing I know where things are” Arthur chuckled.

“So... you work here?”

“Nah I just own the building. Erwin here is the operator and owner of his shop though I’m surprised that It’s still running but it’s probably from his clan’s support.”

“Clan?” Heath mumbled in confusion. He heard of Guilds, and orgs but clans aren’t something he wasn’t aware of.

“Yeah, that sleeping bastard’s full name is Erwin Squire” Arthur tried to allude to something expecting something but Heath was just more confused.

‘Squire? Is that someway a connection of Squirtle? Realistically it could relate towards Piplup’s royal line as well’ Heath thought trying to figure out the heritage.

“You don’t know. I see… well most of the clans aren’t focused on the public perception most of the time but they do have an absurd amount of influence within the Union” Arthur admitted.

“Can you tell me about them, you seem to know a lot?” Heath asked politely as they both strolled through the gates full of the cutest, coolest and most unique pokémon from a multitude of regions. There were even Pokémon from the Galar region, even some Pokémon he didn’t know existed were there.

‘How, is that? I guess there would be a lot of-’

“So Clans were basically once upon a time a group of knights that serviced some of the region's heroes back in the day. They were especially in the Kalos, Kanto, Unova, and Galar regions, saving the world from terrors of the True Legendaries. Decades later after the Golden age the knights split due to some mysterious reason from Sinnoh’s influence.”

“Centuries later the Knights had settled down and some vanquished from the face of the earth, some resided in other regions while the rest had become icons like most of the grass type gym leaders being from the Demeter’s Scythe Guild which is a proxy for the one of the clans.”

‘Ugh, more research is needed’

“So yeah, that’s the basic of clans from a historical standpoint.” Arthur smiled.

“What guild is Erwin apart of though?”

“Freya’s blessing supposedly but honestly I think he barely has their support. The last two of the big four are Hephaestus’s Hammer and Osiris.” Arthur stopped and looked at a baby pokémon that was crying wildly. Heath quickly made his way over and saw that it was a crying shiny Shinx.

‘It’s cool that they aren’t that rare especially when the Pokémon is so cute’

‘Shinx’ Heath thought as he used his skill

Shinx

Age: 2

Gender: F

Rank: Copper (Lv. 1)

Potential: Diamond

Moves: Spark, Charge, Tackle, Growl

Ability: Rivalry

‘Diamond, what the fuck?’ Heath’s eyes widen in seeing the cub look at them with smiling tears to contrast the sad tears that it was shedding before they came. It mewled clawing at the gate towards Arthur who smiled at the action and softly picked up the black and blue tiger.

“What a cutie, right? She a beaut, just like her dad” Arthur cuddled with the tiger while Heath looked at the gate and saw the price at 2.5 million Pokédollars. Heath’s eyes bulged out of their sockets which cause the Shinx to be concerned while Arthur chuckled.

“Not the first person to react like that when seeing the price.”

“Why so expensive?” Heath muttered.

“Well, this little cutie has an expansive history for only being 2 years old. For one, she has the potential of diamond which I don’t know if you’re aware but that’s really hard to get from a Pokémon’s birth. Their parents have to have the rank of Diamond and at that point, trainers find it really difficult to let their pokémon rest for that long. For safety of the pokémon and the trainer it’ll take a couple of months for things to go back to normal. And at that point, the eggs talent is usually undoubted.” Arthur explained.

‘I guess pokémon do need to be put out of commission when they get pregnant. Even a ditto…ditto’s is in this world wow. I feel bad for them.’ Heath shuddered at the thought.

“Also, this Shinx is the child of one of the strongest gym leaders of the Sinnoh region.” Arthur nuzzled the Shinx and Heath noticed that Arthur’s hair was slightly raising due to the electricity being emitted through contact.

“Shinx?” Shinx mewled before Arthur decided it was enough of the coddling and slowly put down the Shinx who looked satisfied with the affection it had just received causing Heath smile silly at it.

Arthur who hairs were still standing, coughed slightly and they continued the allusive tour, Heath saw a variety of pokémon but the common thing was all of them were way beyond his price range. 1 million, 2, 4 million, even 10 million for a Togepi which Heath found a little excessive as its potential was only gold.

After a while the only words that came to mind for Heath were

“I see.”

A little depressed seeing all of the pokémon they had on stock. Heath sighed and looked at Arthur who had took notice Heath’s long face.

“I can’t even afford the cheapest pokémon here” Heath blurted. Arthur stood there opening the door, not saying what Heath thought he would’ve said.

The store even had a request to get pokémon if the customers were willing to pay some price. One thing for certain, getting a pokémon was massively expensive. He would have to see dozens of pokémon to get anything clearly worth it.

“That’s most people. What are you looking for?” Arthur said as he got the door open. Noises were heard in the distance coming from the back of the shop.

“I have a couple of pokémon I wanted to get but all if not most of them are rare because of the region or species.”

“So, you do have something for your team?” Arthur clarified.

“Yeah, but I have two pokémon right now so I’m not in a rush at all. I just wanted to look-”

“look, so you could find out how much you need to save in order to get it. For later”

“Exactly” Heath nodded.

They continued talking with Heath giving examples of pokémon in his wish list and Arthur making various expressions and thoughtful glances at him. They say saw pokémon here and there, but the facility was a lot larger than Heath originally thought, especially when the front only takes an extremely small portion of the area.

“So, if you were to get one pokémon today which would get then?”

“Maybe Rookiedee or Fletchling? Both of them are aviation pokémon and It would do me wonders to ride Corviknight” Heath explained. Arthur once again nodded meaningfully at Heath’s words.

“Yeah, I can tell you that would cost a lot of money. Not that either of those two are really uncommon, it’s just the fact that they are so far away. Even a Starly, the national bird of Sinnoh, our cousin up North is about 60,000 pokédollars. Now you add in a more helpful typing, the shipping and things like that. You might as well consider buying them off a trainer or trading even.” Arthur explained. They arrived back to the front where Erwin and Purrloin was still asleep. They both sighed and Arthur continued giving advice.

“Well, if you are looking for pokémon that are cheaper than normal. Come here on the first to second day of each week. Erwin usually has adoption for pokémon that are left by trainers. If not bought, they are given to the Gym Leaders or the Union.” Arthur concluded as they both walked to the door and opening it to let Heath and Piplup who was still on his head up.

“Well, have a good day kid. Feel free to visit the shop. I’ll make sure Erwin greets you properly next time” Arthur waved, and Heath waved back and started walking off to the next shop location.