Pokémon: Did you play Pokémon today?

Chapter 200 Eevee! UR Eevee!

More than a week has passed since the earth-shattering "rules-free battle" between Bai Zhou and Yu Long Du.

From that moment on, Lance and Daigo's gazes toward Shirafuji completely changed.

It was a complex emotion mixed with awe, disbelief, and a hint of "this guy isn't even human."

They came to a profound realization: the gap between people can sometimes be even more absurd than the gap between humans and Pokémon.

An interesting little anecdote is...

Just as the dust settled on that battle in the inner arena, Bai Zhou received a progress notification from Xiao A regarding the faction mission.

He had been puzzled before, since there were prominent figures in the Kanto region who could be inducted into the "Hall of Fame".

He has "friendly" pulled most of them into Team Rainbow Rocket, but the mission progress is stuck at 99% and can't move.

After all that, the problem lies with Ah-du, ​​that traitor with thick eyebrows and big eyes!

Although this guy physically joined Team Rainbow Rocket, he clearly hasn't completely let go of his "dragon pride" and "championship burden."

He didn't completely trust Bai Zhou, the new leader who had been parachuted in.

Fortunately, after this friendly, unconventional sparring session, he finally joined Shiraishu Moshiro willingly!

The only downside is that the mission rewards have not been distributed immediately.

According to Xiao A, the feedback submitted by Bai Zhou was accepted, and it needs to be updated.

Once the update is complete, the updated content will be distributed together with the rewards for this task.

Bai Zhou, however, was not in a hurry.

Good things come to those who wait; they're not going anywhere.

He has more important things to focus on now.

Today marks the official offline release of Pokémon Trading Cards and a major update for the Pokémon game.

He had to personally immerse himself in player communities and forums to get firsthand feedback from players.

After all, there's a live stream tonight, and if some tricky or strange questions suddenly pop up in the comments, and he, the producer, doesn't know the answer...

That would have been incredibly awkward.

"Let me see what new things we can copy from the gaming community today—uh, what valuable player feedback we can get out of it~"

On the top floor of the Pokémon Company building, in a spacious and brightly lit office area.

Bai Zhou sprawled unceremoniously on the soft, comfortable leather sofa, leisurely pulled out his phone, logged into the official Pokémon player community, and began a pleasant online surfing session.

This is definitely not him slacking off at work!

This is the most important and direct step in gaining a deep understanding of the market and getting close to the voice of users! (Confident and self-assured.jpg)

Opening the community homepage, the most popular post, pinned to the top, is about the newly released book...

Unboxing video of Pokémon trading cards.

The cover features an excited, blurry figure and a close-up of a glittering card.

Bai Zhou raised an eyebrow and decisively clicked play.

Donghuang region, Shanghai.

In a slightly cramped but fairly tidy rental room.

Router, a Bilibili UP master with the ID "Pocket Speaker Shuai", carefully cleaned his computer desktop and adjusted the angle of his camera.

Then he solemnly placed the two items on the table.

A box of unopened Pokémon trading cards that he had gone through great lengths to buy, and his precious Pokédex.

Today marks the official release of the physical Pokémon trading cards.

To this end, he barely slept all night and went to wait outside the largest Pokémon Center store in Shanghai a day in advance.

However, even though he thought he had arrived early enough, he was still taken aback when he saw the long, seemingly endless line of enthusiastic shoppers stretching from the store entrance to the street corner.

His heart sank, and he thought he might go home empty-handed this time.

Fortunately, due to the overwhelming number of buyers, the authorities implemented purchase limits.

In the end, Lu managed to snag a whole box of Pokémon Trading Cards basic packs without any major mishaps.

As a relatively unknown content creator with only a few hundred thousand followers in the gaming section of Bilibili, Lu You has been paying close attention to Pokémon Card Game ever since it was first announced.

From the earliest concept promotional images to the recent card battle livestream demonstration by "Teacher Salty Fish" himself, he has almost never missed any related information.

He truly loves Pokémon trading cards.

Or rather, he loves everything owned by The Pokémon Company.

Because he had always kept a dream buried deep in his heart.

Become a true trainer who can fight alongside Pokémon.

However, due to economic pressure and other practical factors, he had to bury this dream deep in his heart.

It was the game Pokémon that gave him renewed hope of becoming a Pokémon Trainer.

The appearance of Pokémon Cards reignited his purest love for Pokémon.

Setting the Pokédex aside as background decoration, Lu pushed the brand-new card box in front of the camera and pressed the record button on the camera.

Pokémon Trading Cards is currently enjoying great popularity, and this is also driven by a deep passion for the game.

Regardless of reason or emotion, he was determined to record this unboxing video seriously.

"Hi everyone, this is Pocket Fan Speaker Shuai. Today I'm recording an unpacking video for you all. That's right, it's about the newly released Pokémon trading cards!"

Lu gave the camera a slightly nervous but enthusiastic smile.

"To be honest, I went through a lot of trouble to get this card set! I went to the store a day in advance, but still had to queue for almost four hours! I hope you guys will give this poor uploader a like, comment, and share to show your support for me, considering how hard I worked!"

After a brief opening and "begging" segment, Lu carefully removed the plastic seal from the card box.

He pulled out a pack of cards, turned it over to show the camera, and introduced it:

"Look, everyone, the packaging design of this card holder is very exquisite. The pattern is very high-quality, and it makes you want to open it right away! Because of the purchase limit, I bought a whole box, which contains twenty packs of cards."

"A whole box costs 20 League Coins, which works out to just 1 League Coin per pack. That's incredibly affordable and a great deal! Plus, as you all know, Pokémon cards have a tiered system, so if you're lucky enough to get a high-rarity special card, it's a huge profit!"

"I just secretly checked the market prices on online secondhand trading platforms. Even relatively common rare cards like R-grade and SR-grade cards, the cheapest 'Walking Grass' card sells for tens of Alliance Coins! Not to mention the top-tier HR cards and UR cards..."

It's frozen; there's no market for it!

"Alright, enough chit-chat, let's get started on the exciting unpacking!"

He picked up the prepared scissors, cut along the pre-designed dotted line at the top of the card holder, then poured out the cards and neatly stacked them.

Luck seems to be on his side!

The first card that catches the eye is the extremely popular Pokémon—Charizard!

"Hey! The first one is a Breathaur!"

Router's eyes lit up instantly, and the joy in his voice was almost overflowing.

"Honestly, just getting this Charizard card makes this card pack worth the price! Let's continue!"

"Weedle, Pidgey, Protect, Sandshrew, Meowth, Rare Candy—oh! This is a U card, and there are also Potion, Onix, and finally Pikachu."

"I got a card, and it's clear I'm pretty lucky. Besides the Dragonite, I also got a U-card, the Rare Candy. Don't underestimate it just because it's a U-card; it sells for thirty on the secondhand market. Not only have I broken even, but I've also made a huge profit of ten League Coins."

He happily pulled out the two "heroic" cards, Charizard and Rare Candy, and placed them aside, his smile impossible to hide.

However, Lady Luck seemed to have only given him a perfunctory greeting.

The subsequent unpacking process seemed to be caught in some strange "unlucky" curse.

Let alone U cards, he rarely even sees a few of the more popular Pokémon regular cards.

As the number of regular cards piling up on the desktop increased, the smile on Router's face gradually froze.

"—The last pack!"

Lu took a deep breath, trying to encourage himself, or perhaps explaining to the camera.

"I feel like this isn't just a matter of my personal luck; The Pokémon Company has definitely secretly adjusted the drop rates for the cards! Yes, that must be it! It can't be just me having bad luck!"

As he muttered to himself, he cut open the seal of the last pack of cards and poured the cards inside onto the table.

The moment the card fell, his fingers felt something strange when they touched it.

The thickness and feel of this stack of cards seem slightly different from the previous ones?

However, the previous series of defeats had already lowered his expectations to rock bottom, so he didn't pay too much attention to this minor difference.

"Electrify, Chansey, Starmie—these are all common cards. It seems there's no hope in the end. Sigh."

-wrong!"

Just as he was dejectedly flipping through the cards to the second-to-last card, he felt the completely different texture of the last card because the thickness of the stacked cards had decreased!

The feel—heavy, cool, with the hardness characteristic of metal—

Could it be—a metal card?!

HR? Or—UR?!

No way?! Really?!

As a seasoned Pokémon trading card enthusiast, Router knows all too well what metal cards represent.

That's the pinnacle of card craftsmanship, a symbol of the highest level of collectability!

His heart began to pound uncontrollably!

Router instantly held his breath, forgetting to speak, as if he had been frozen in place.

With trembling hands, he gently and slowly pulled the last card from the deck. The card was a warm brown color.

hairy!

Eevee! UR Eevee!

Lu You stared blankly at the UR Eevee card in his hand, which seemed to be glowing. His mind went blank, and he was overwhelmed by a huge sense of happiness that almost made him dizzy.

Several seconds passed before he snapped back to his senses, forcibly suppressing the urge to scream, and using a deliberately feigned...

He said in a calm and nonchalant tone:

"Ahem—oh well, my luck wasn't great, so I could only get one UR card—let's check the secondary market to see how much this UR Eevee costs!"

As he spoke, he frantically searched for the high-end card cover he had prepared beforehand and put the UR Eevee card inside.

Then, he eagerly grabbed his phone and opened the second-hand trading platform's app.

Search keywords: Pokémon card UR Eevee.

Price filtering: from high to low.

The next second, a number that made his pupils dizzy jumped out!

"Holy crap! Holy crap!!! Sixty-three thousand three?! Sixty-three thousand three Alliance Coins?!!"

The router's volume suddenly spiked, and the person became so excited that they were incoherent, their hand holding the phone trembling as if they had Parkinson's disease.

"So much money! Enough for me to live comfortably for six months!!"

Excited heart, trembling hands.

Router felt his blood pressure soaring.

He suppressed the urge to immediately roar to the sky and shakily turned off the video recording.

UR! That's a UR!

And it's the wildly popular Pokémon Eevee!

He made the decision almost without any hesitation!

He was determined to keep this card safe for himself!

I'll go back and order a top-of-the-line acrylic frame, frame it, and place it in the most prominent spot on my computer desk!

This is his first UR card ever, it's incredibly meaningful!

Feeling a blissful sense of lightness, as if walking on clouds, Router quickly edited the video and uploaded and published it.

Then, with a sweet dream in his heart, he buried himself in the covers.

The next day, early morning.

The loud notification woke up the sleeping router.

He rubbed his still-sleepy eyes, which were covered in dark circles, and sat up groggily, grabbing his phone from the bedside table to check it.

Upon seeing this, one is stunned, and all sleepiness vanishes.

The notification bar on my phone screen was completely flooded with "Bilibili" notifications!

Am I being cyberbullied?

This was the router's first reaction, and my heart skipped a beat.

With a mix of trepidation and excitement, he clicked on one of the notifications.

The phone screen immediately redirected to the unboxing video he had uploaded yesterday.

The first thing that catches the eye is the two striking red words "Hot" below the video title.

Next came a series of data that caused his heart to stop.

150,000 likes! 60,000 coins! 30,000 favorites!

And—600,000 views!

I'm famous?!

Looking at the cold, hard numbers, the router felt unreal, so it subconsciously clicked on its own video.

In an instant, a barrage of comments flooded the screen, from the initial surprise at him getting a U card, to the mockery when he was unlucky, and finally the screen full of question marks when he pulled a UR card.

He suddenly realized that he seemed to have really become famous.

His hands trembled as he clicked on the video's comment section.

Everyone there is talented, and they all speak very well.

"Unacceptable! Why?! I opened three boxes and they were all junk!"

"You dog-obsessed spiky cricket! How much did The Pokémon Company pay you?!"

"So, you have the Divine Grace trait? You still say you didn't turn it on? It wasn't turned off at all!"

"Twenty yuan a box, and I got a UR card in the gacha! I'm a speaker fanatic!"

"Unfollowed! Oh, I wasn't following you yet. I'll follow you first, then unfollow! (Tactical unfollow)"

As Lu scrolled through the comments section, reading through all sorts of envious, jealous, and hateful (as well as memes), he felt a secret sense of satisfaction.

His lips curled up uncontrollably, almost reaching behind his ears.

Just then, a special private message notification sound rang out, interrupting his self-absorption.

Upon closer inspection, he discovered that the sender was a content creator he had set to follow!

His heart skipped a beat, and with a mix of excitement and trepidation, he opened the private message.

"Dream of Retirement: Hello, this is Pokémon Studio, I'm producer Shirafuji. Interested in a collaboration?"

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