Pokémon: Starting with a Pokémon Ranch.

Chapter 27: The Key Finding by the Caterpillar (Please continue reading)

"Meow, meow~" That's the farmland that the rancher cultivates every day.

There, the ranchers grow a lot of grains, vegetables, and fruits, and they can harvest a lot of delicious food every day.

Recently, ranchers have even been researching how to grow medicinal herbs.

"I brought the caterpillar to visit the edge of the farmland," said the Woolstätter.

"Hiss?" Medicinal herbs?

Upon hearing this, the green caterpillar immediately recalled the first time it met Su Yu, when Su Yu seemed to be picking medicinal herbs.

So, he was preparing for this all along?

In the forest, the green caterpillar had seen many medicinal herbs, but it had never heard of any that could be cultivated artificially. After all, the growth of medicinal herbs requires extremely demanding conditions.

Just like how inland saline lakes, which are also brackish water, are difficult to cultivate seafood in the same way as seawater, this is due to the difference in aquaculture conditions.

So this trainer of mine... seems pretty good.

"Meow~" Of course.

Hearing the caterpillar praising their rancher, the Woolstaff sheep spoke with pride.

Then, Wooloo brought Caterpie to the lakeside, where there were even more Water-type Pokémon than when Wooloo had last visited.

"Meow~"

This lake is a major source of income for the ranch. Every morning, the rancher comes here to fish and then delivers the fish to restaurants in town.

The fish here are very popular in town.

Upon hearing this, the green caterpillar carefully examined the lake. In the lake, many large tongue shells were living in groups, and in the green caterpillar's mind, they seemed capable of producing valuable pearls.

For giant tongue oysters, these pearls are quite a nuisance, and they usually spit them out. There are many such pearls in the lake right now.

"Hiss~!" If these pearls were taken to town and sold, they could probably fetch a lot of money. Why doesn't Su Yu take these pearls to sell?

"That's what the caterpillar said."

The Woolstice sheep, however, was taken aback. It hadn't considered such a complicated issue before; after all, it had never thought about such things before.

"Meow...meow~" Okay, that makes sense. We can go back and ask Su Yu.

"Meow~" Let's go.

With that, the Woolbraided Sheep led the Caterpillar back home.

……

Meanwhile, on the other side...

Upon arriving in the backyard, Su Yu released all the hairy cliff crabs he had brought back from the forest. There were over a hundred of these hairy cliff crabs.

As soon as they were released, the hairy cliff crabs immediately climbed up the cliff face and each occupied a cave entrance as their own nest, almost taking over the entire cliff face.

In doing so, Su Yu was able to fulfill his promise to the initial few hairy cliff crabs by bringing their kin over.

As long as they are fed and cared for well, Su Yu believes that these hairy crabs will not choose to leave the ranch.

At the same time, the claws produced by the hairy cliff crabs are currently in high demand in the pastoral areas, which will bring the ranch a lot more income.

Just then, Yang Hao from the neighboring ranch walked over. He glanced at the hundreds of hairy cliff crabs on the cliff face and exclaimed in surprise:

"Good heavens, did you catch the entire crab colony?"

"More or less. What's wrong? Is there something you need from me all of a sudden?" Su Yu asked.

"Didn't you tell my dad before that you wanted to buy a few riding sheep from my house? So my dad asked me to come and ask you what kind of riding sheep you want, so he can keep an eye out for them."

The Mount Lamb is a Grass-type Pokémon. It can milk animals and learn the Grass-type move "Grassy Terrain," which increases the fertility of the soil in the pasture.

Therefore, this is the Pokémon that Su Yu believes is currently the most suitable for his ranch. As long as his mount, the sheep, can learn the move "Grass Terrace," Su Yu will no longer have to worry about problems such as grassland degradation and soil fertility loss.

After thinking for a moment, Su Yu realized that he didn't seem to have any special requirements for his mount, the little sheep, so he said:

"I guess... I'd like a little lamb as a mount?"

With such a good thing as grass cake in hand, all the little sheep needs to do is probably eat.

As long as they can eat, they can grow up healthily, and all problems will be solved.

Yang Hao, however, found the request rather baffling. What kind of requirement was being able to eat? Most people would ask for a Pokémon that was strong or had learned more moves, wouldn't they?

But never mind, none of this concerns him. All he needs to do is relay Su Yu's request to his father.

Thinking this, Yang Hao turned to leave. However, Su Yu called him back at that moment:

"Oh, by the way, are there any suitable places for battles near our pasture?"

"I want to find a place where the tropical dragon has more opportunities to battle and hone its combat experience."

Upon hearing this, Yang Hao replied:

"Oh...yes, about two weeks from now, the town should be holding a competition that only ranchers can participate in. The rewards for the competition are quite generous, including various Pokémon training resources, and even move manuals written by professional trainers."

"But you haven't been at the ranch for very long, have you?... Hmm, never mind, your tropical dragon is pretty strong. It should be able to get a good ranking when we go there."

Is this a rancher competition?

Su Yu became interested, even though his initial goal was simply to give the tropical dragon some practice.

But if I can win the prize, it should be worth a lot of money, right?

……

After seeing Yang Hao off, the green caterpillar and the woofer approached Su Yu again and talked about the pearls in the lake.

Those pearls were indeed quite valuable, and Su Yu, who often fished by the lake, naturally noticed this, but...

"But we don't have any Pokémon that can swim on our ranch, so no matter how many pearls are in the lake, we can't retrieve them."

Su Yu explained it this way.

However, if he catches a Pokémon that can retrieve pearls from the water in the future, he might do it then, right? Anyway, those pearls aren't going anywhere, and the ranch isn't exactly short of money right now. Therefore, Su Yu isn't in a hurry.

……

(End of this chapter)