Set in the original region of Arciel, Legends Rising is a route-inspired, but not strictly route-based, Pokemon roleplay. Pick a faction, pick a class, and strike out into the wild to take on the League, master Contest coordination, research the mysteries of Pokemon and Arciel, and much, much more. Will you be a classic trainer? A criminal? A farmer? Choose your destiny on Legends Rising.
"Come on mates, get the lead out and keep moving!" Marley called out as he ran along the path, accompanied by five of his pokemon. Granted, he was more calling out to the four pokemon behind him. His Doduo, Janus, was already running ahead, clearly the faster of everyone in the ground. But that was to be expected. What Marley wanted to do was make sure that his own team was zipping around the battlefield at high speed, and was working on boosting the mobility of some of his slower pokemon. And if he could get himself running faster as well, all the more better. On his back in his pack, he had the Yamask egg he had gotten a hold of. May as well keep the egg with him while he worked.
So far, the others were keeping up with him. The only one having any real trouble was Shep, and that was more because of his stubby little legs. The little guy was certainly enthusiastic enough to keep on trying. Kamoda and Ally, having longer legs, were having an easier time keeping up, while Brawly, with his lanky mankey legs, had no trouble at all. Though the fighting type was certainly eager for a fight, constantly running was a good way to burn off steam. Marley was keeping up a pretty good stride. He kept at a steady pace for the most part, only bursting into a sprint now and again to catch his pokemon off guard. So far they were proving pretty capable of keeping up.
As the group came to the foot of a hill, Marley decided to take a quick break. Once everyone had the chance to recover, they were going to charge up that hill as fast as they could. As usual, Janus was raring to go.
Post by James "Jamie" Wilson on Dec 19, 2019 19:05:24 GMT
"Let's try that again without going for the eyes, Gracie? We're only practicing..."
Jamie sat with this legs over the ledge of a porch that overlooked the outdoor area of the training grounds. Astaire, his Baile-style (and shiny) Oricorio was seated in his lap, his long black wings wrapped around his coordinator's torso and shaking horribly. There were faint markings on his otherwise pristine feathers--little scratches just next to his beak. Jamie had one hand on Astaire's back and the other was extended out, pressing hard against the chest of Gracieuse, his Sensu-style Oricorio. She was not only much larger than Astair but was also far angrier than scared. In response to his words she snapped her beak and stepped back, turning away with her fan-shaped wings crossed. Jamie furrowed his brow and retracted his arm. Ever since he received Gracie in the Wonder Trade, she and Astaire had been going at each other--well, she had been going at him, not the other way around. It was obvious she was envious of his shiny coat, but nothing could be done about that until he had the money to buy her shiny powder.
She was just going to have to bare it...and not beat up poor Astaire in the meanwhile. But, sadly, that was easier said than accomplished. Several attempts to get the two to work together rather than fight had ended up with Gracie trying to pluck her dance partner's feathers out. So rather than practicing their routine, Jamie was trying to put her anger into an actual training session. It did not have the desired effect, as while Gracie could take out her anger on Astaire in a proper battle, Astaire only knew Normal type moves and...well...Gracie was a Sensu-style. A Ghost type. It did nothing to hurt her.
So it was all very one-sided. Again. Jamie didn't know what to do.
He could have fed her nectar to change her typing, but...she really was the most elegant of his team. She was made for either Sensu or Baile, and until he had enough powder to go around...he wanted Astaire to stay in this form. Thus, she had the type advantage.
"Hey," he spoke softly gently, to his poor frazzled starter, "I know this isn't fun, but you're so close to mastering Peck, and then you can get back at her if you really need to. And once I have enough money for shiny powder she won't have any reason to pick on you." Astaire coo'd in a less-than-convinced manner, not helped by Gracie huffing at them both from a few feet away. Jamie gave her a wary look. "I mean it! If I can't get you to work nicely with him, I'll trade you out for Jackson." That got her to turn around. She flapped her wings and let out an angered squawk that curled his lips into a faint grin. he didn't know what she was saying but he could guess. "I don't care if you're better at dancing than he is, you're being too mean. So I might just need to bench you 'til you show me some better behavior...and then I'll turn Jackson into a shiny, since he'll be front-lining instead of you. Is that what you waaaaant?"
Gracieuse, mortified at the thought of being upstaged by a goofball like Jackson, Jamie's Pom-Pom-style Oricorio, shook her head very fast. Jamie snickered and Astaire calmed ever so slightly in his lap. Jamie set him back down on the porch besides him and stood back up, dusting off his black jeans of the bit of snow that clung to them. "Good! I'm glad we're understanding each other better! Shall we get back to what we were doing?"
Before he got a yes or no from his birds, a herd of Pokemon came running up the trail by them, stopping not too far away. Jamie craned his neck to see them better along with their trainer, wherever he was. He found them sitting atop Doduo. Wow, what a squad. Compared to Jamie's team of Oricorio--who admittedly all looked very different to one another but were still all the same Pokemon in the end--he had a very colorful bunch. Especially...oh! Jamie grinned widely at the sight of a shiny flash of blue fur in the crowd. A shiny Zorua! What a gorgeous coat! And they weren't an easy Pokemon to find, either, let alone a shiny one! Was it naturally that way, or powdered like Astaire?
"Excuse me!" He called out, cupping his hands to his mouth so his voice carried over the distance between the porch he was on and the running path, "Is your Zorua a natural shiny?? I love their fur color!!" Astaire, flustered by the sight of new people, fiddled his feathers in front of him. Gracie stepped up behind him and waved a fan to the strangers.
Marley had pulled out a water bottle and was taking a gulp of it when a voice called out to him. The one eyed galarian paused, looking over at the source of the call, seeing a young, red haired man calling out to him from a porch not far from the running path. He noticed the pair of bird pokemon with him as well. Quite fancy looking, yet at the same time similar. He thought he had read something about them, but couldn't quite put a finger on what they were. But that wasn't important right now. He glanced over at Ally, who was apparently the object of the young man's attention. He had almost forgotten that Ally was a Shiny Zoruo, having seen very few others other than her. "Yeah, that's right. All natural," he chuckled, reaching over to ruffle the hair on Ally's head. The Zoruo gave a small, cheerful yap in response.
Though now the others were curious about this young man and his pokemon as well. Tucking his hands into his pockets, Marley started to stroll over to them, looking over them curiously. Marley's height, along with the eyepatch, gave a stark contrast compared to James, who looked much better dressed than him. His pokemon trailed behind him, looking at the boy and his pokemon curiously. "So, what about you?" Marley asked, looking at the bird pokemon, noting the similarities and differences between them, "You a performer or somethin'?" That was certainly the impression Marley was getting from the young man before him.
Post by James "Jamie" Wilson on Dec 20, 2019 2:42:11 GMT
Jamie's smile only grew wider as his question was answered and the person and his Pokemon approached his porch. From where he was standing it was a short drop down to the grounds below and an easy enough climb back up, so he sat once more, dangling his legs off the ledge so he could jump if necessary. "Well, they are beautiful. I've had to use powder to get mine nice and shiny," Jamie extended a hand to ruffle the swirl of white feathers on the side of Astaire's head, who chirped gently in response to the touch, "But I hadn't ever seen a natural shiny before. Or, well, guess I can't say that anymore!"
Gracie stepped around her shorter dance partner and hopped down straight away--at her size, nearly four feet tall, she was actually a fair bit taller than most of Marley's team, so she had no fear as she started cooing among them, getting properly introduced. What a little socialite. "That's right! I'm a coordinator. You know, going through the contest halls and such," he chuckled and leaned forward, bright red hair falling around his face in a most methodical way. "M'name's James, though you can call me Jamie if you like. This here is Astaire and Gracieuse, or just Gracie. They're my front-liners!"
Jamie looked out over the impressive herd of Pokemon before him once again, trying to piece together what this fellow did. They'd been running fairly quickly, so...perhaps...
"Do you do races with these guys? That Doduo was pretty fast when I saw you coming in." He tilted his head at Janus' two, then looked down at the smallest of the lot; the little Zorua in all its absolute adorableness. "Their coat is fantastic. You could probably get them through a contest just on that shine alone! You must take good care of 'em!"
Gracie, meanwhile, found the stubby little Yamper, and was trying to tease it by flicking his ears with her fan-shaped wings. What a silly little Pokemon this was. So stumpy!
Marley tilted his head to the side as the young man explained he got his pokemon shiny via a powder. Well, he hadn't heard of such a thing. He couldn't imagine him doing something like that to his own pokemon. After all, he didn't care of they were shiny or not. What mattered was their ability to battle. "Eh, I don't see it as a big deal. Ally's Ally as far as I'm concerned. I almost forget she's a shiny sometimes."
It seemed like his suspicions of the young man were confirmed. A coordinator huh? He never saw much use for it himself. Pokemon competitions weren't that big in Galar, with everything more focused on the Gym Challenge. But, to each their own. "The name's Marley," he introduced himself, before gesturing to his pokemon, "This is Ally," he said to the Zoruo, "That's Janus," the Dodrio, "This is Brawly," he pointed to the Mankey, "Komoda," the Jangmo-o, "And this 'ere's Shep." The little Yamper gave a yap in greeting. He looked over the young man's three pokemon. They were indeed of the same kind, just different variations of them.
When he was asked if he raced with them, Marley chuckled and shook his head. "Nah, I'm a battler meself. Just training up the guys to get them a bit faster on their feet. After all, if yer fast enough to dodge attacks, yer fast enough to hit the opponent."
Meanwhile, as Shep was being teased by the larger bird, the small dog pokemon gave a small yap and dove at her, nuzzling against her. Of course, this being a Yamper, getting nuzled by one of these things had the unfortunate side effect of getting a small shock in the process. Marley blinked when he heard the zap. "Shep!" he yelled out, causing the Yamper to stop and look over at Marley with that same, dopey, happy expression. Marley rubbed the back of his head. "Sorry about that, Shep's a bit of a hugger."
Post by James "Jamie" Wilson on Dec 22, 2019 17:05:44 GMT
Well that was a little dismissive of how rare and beautiful his Zorua was, but Jamie didn't say anything and just kept smiling. Was it a bad thing that he didn't care about her looks and only cared for her personally? No, not at all! But it was still a little waste of talent.
Marley's team was made for battling. Perfectly reasonable; everyone in the world had their own styles of Pokemon rearing. "It's nice to meet you all! Hm, I hadn't considered running the grounds to build up speed...that isn't a bad idea! Though I doubt any of mine would be as fast as yours--Janus was so fast when I saw you, it was amazing!" He let out a small laugh. "Agility's also good for dancing. I should probably work on it, too!"
Before their conversation could progress, both trainers' attention was snapped up by two of their Pokemon getting into...well, not a fight, but definitely not something great. Jamie's brow furrowed and he pushed off from the porch. Gracie had not expected for her little teasing to prompt a hug from the weird stumpy Pokemon but apparently that was what was happening. She let out an indignant squawk and beat her wings to back away as best she could, but the little mutt made contact and his fur sent a jolt through her little Flying type body. Between the type advantage and level difference she did not look so good by the time Jamie had pulled her back from the excited electrical puppy.
"Gracieeee...this is why you ask permission to pet somebody's dog!" He scolded gently. She had a bit of smoke coming off her chest and was leaning back, spirals practically visible in her eyes. Jamie sighed and took out a potion to heal her back up. Whoops.
"Nah, nah, it's not your fault. She acts like she's can take on anything and then gets into things like this...a lot. It's not a bad thing that he's a very friendly boy!" The little burn on her chest began to heal the more spray took effect, and in a little bit Gracie had leaped out of his arms and was flailing her wings angrily at Shep, trills ear-achingly high-pitched. Jamie closed his fingers around her beak to get her to stop. "A'ight! Alright! It was an accident, Gracie, and I'm sure you started it somehow. And I'm pretty sure he can kick your butt if you actually tried something so how 'bout we doooon't?"
Astaire, still on the porch, alone now, looked down at Marley and shrugged his wings.
Well, at least James seemed cool about her bird getting shocked by his Yamper. Seemed like she had done this sort of thing before, and had gotten herself into trouble over it. He gave a small chuckle. "Yeah, that plus you'd have the entire team jumping on ya. They care about eachother that way. But I'm sure it's fine. You don't seem like the sort that would cause much trouble." Indeed, with only three birds, and a full team on Marley's end, any fighting would end up a one sided affair in his favour. Plus, this kid seemed nice enough. No sense in causing a scene here if it wasn't warrented.
Shep gave a small yap and ran back over to Marley's side, as Marley looked over the three birds before him. "So, you knew to this whole performin' thing? I don't recall hearing about ya." Then again, he doubted anyone had heard of him either. "Sorry, just new to this whole pokemon performin' thing. I mean, I've seen pokemon used in concerts and all that, but there aren't really any pokemon contests back where I'm from." And indeed, he never bothered to really learn. He was more interested in the battling side of things, not sending his pokemon down a runway.
Post by James "Jamie" Wilson on Jan 16, 2020 1:55:32 GMT
"I'm going to take that as a compliment," Jamie chuckled, standing back up from where he'd knelt down next to Gracieuse. Because of her size he couldn't heft her around like he could Astaire or Jackson, but at least she was still shorter than he was by a bit. He couldn't imagine having a Pokemon like her with height on him. No sir. "Getting into trouble is definitely not in my schedule. Though a legitimate Pokemon battle would be fun, even if I am totally sure you could beat me in a heartbeat. Well, mostly," he glanced at Jackson's pokeball "One of mine is level eighteen, but I'm trying to train up my other two, not keep him head and shoulders above them."
Gracie huffed and crossed her wings, beak still being held closed. "Head and shoulders above them". FEH. Jackson would only be so foolish to think he was any better than she was. Why must her trainer put so much stock into things like "levels" and "sense"?
While steering her back towards the porch Jamie continued to speak: "Yes, I only got my first Pokemon a couple weeks ago! And luck decided to bestow a bunch more of the same one on me, I guess? Oricorio are perfect for such a thing, though, so I'm not going to complain!" It was silly that hearing somebody say "I haven't heard of you" made him feel a bit sour, especially because he was still a nobody and he didn't have an ego, but...well, maybe compared to some of the other people in his life, that smarted a bit. "I've been surrounded by people in the contest scene for most of my life. I thought that I'd give it a shot, too, once I was old enough, so here I am! I guess I could say it's just woven into me at this point." He chuckled and shrugged slightly. "It's in my blood!"
"Where are you from, if you don't mind my asking? I'm, uh, really bad at accents."
So, he was new to the whole thing. Marley figured as such. "Well, I'm sure you'll make a name of yerself in no time. You certainly have got the drive for it." Marley himself was eager to build a reputation as well, though his shots at the gyms had proven, well, less than successful. But, he wasn't going to give up. He had his pride dammit! "Nice that ya managed to grab a troupe of pokemon for yerself, especially since they come in different forms as well. But don't feel like ya need to restrict yerself to just them. A little variety can certainly help ya out." Granted, he wasn't a performer himself, so he could be wrong about this, but it just made sense, right? It worked in battles, so why not in performances? Just doing the same thing over and over can get boring after a while, and predictable.
Then came up the question as to where Marley was from. Marley gave a small chuckle. "Figured the accent would give it away. I'm from Galar, mate. Though I've been living in Arciel for a few years now. Only now been able to get out and actually give the whole pokemon trainin' thing a go." He glanced back at his team, a smirk stretching across his face, "And so far, I think I'm doin' pretty well. Got meself a good team. Now I just gotta make some headway with the gym challenge and I'll be good."
Post by James "Jamie" Wilson on Feb 10, 2020 12:39:03 GMT
Marley's advice made sound sense, even if, for a moment, Jamie felt like he was being talked down to. Yes he had a team full of one kind of Pokemon right now, but it wasn't like that was all he was going to have forever. The four kinds of Oricorio were just quite popular in the contest scene, and he'd be hard pressed to find a better quartet than them--once he had the fourth form, of course. Marley didn't say that to be mean, though. He was just trying to give advice to a(n accurately assumed) newer trainer than himself.
Advice wasn't a bad thing. Besides, Jamie would never want to appear ungrateful. Nobody liked a cocky hot-shot. "I'll keep that in mind!" He nodded, smile still firmly in place, "I'll definitely be needing some more big, strong, show-boat-ey type Pokemon as well. 'Toughness' contests aren't really for little guys like them..." No matter what Gracieuse thinks, he added onto the end in his head, "Like maybe something from the Geodude or Tyrogue lines? Or maybe I could try training up a Magikarp. Do you think Gyarados are too scary to participate in a contest? They're a bit...intimidating..."
Jamie flushed a little and his hands started gesticulating about. "I mean not that Pokemon like Gyarados are bad! They're cool! Don't--don't think I'm, uh--"
Shut up, James! "Uhh, shutting up now."
Galar? Oh, well, duh, yeah, that was a really obvious accent, wasn't it. Jamie was just really really bad at them until he had a name to attach to it, and then it fell right into place. Galar, though...huh. "I'm half-Galarian myself," he rubbed at the back of his neck a little, smile turning sheepish. "Though I don't know that half, uh, well." Alright, get back to a better subject than this. He was doing the gym challenges. Of course he was! He was a trainer! Jamie could find that as exciting as contests, right? "Ooh, have you gotten any badges yet? Or figured where you want to start? The one in Bass is the closest one, right? Or...no, Birch just has a concert hall and the gardens, yeah?"