241 Chapter 30 Tournament awards (1/2)

It has been nearly three days since Bill, Alex and his pokemons have been travelling on the S S Smith for Hoenn Region.

During this time, they visited various parts of the ship yet many parts were still left undiscovered.

The places they visit the most in this endeavor is the restaurant for it served many different dishes from different parts of the world. This place is especially loved by Pikachu,Happiny and Growlithe for whenever he is out, the trio try to drag him into the restaurant.

It is times like those, Alex is glad for the 30 percent discount or these expenses may put a dent to his financial reserves.

Of course Alex has earned more than he spent during his stay on the cruise ship. The casino in the ship are the source of his income in this cruise ship. His friend is the owner of the ship, so he cannot win too much, so he kept a ratio.

He only wins more than 10 percent of the money he spent during his stay. And he has won at least 50 million dollars on his stay.

He also fought some trainers using his Pikachu, Swablu, Growlithe, Riolu and even Happiny. He has won about 60 percent of those matches. This was a good chance for Dratini to get some decent fighting experience, but his current condition made it difficult for him.

Dratini isn't particularly I'll or anything. It is his body which can cause problem. Dratini is a serpentine Pokemon and a Pokemon with shedding skin ability.

This ability is both a boon and a curse. It is a boon because it helps them from getting too much hurt by status aliments.

It is good, but for serpentine pokemons it is a defect. Serpentine pokemons grow bigger by shedding their skins every now and then. This makes the softer skin in the inner parts come out and without much protection.

Although, after some time the skins hardens becoming stronger than the previous shedded one, but the time just after their molting, is the weakest stage of the serpentine pokemons.

This weakened time is different for different pokemons. For ekans and dratini it is a month, for arbok and seviper it is two weeks while Dragonair only has a week of weakness.

This weakness is not weakness in their strength but in their defense. For any of the attack can harm them more in this condition.

Ekans and dratini are in their youth and growth stages so theytake longer time. The newly borns shelf every two months while as they grow, it happens every three to four month.

Molting increase the Pokemon strength greatly so this process is good for them, but the weakness time is something a trainer must put into thoughts.

But, as they near the evolution time, they molt much frequently. It starts from once every month to every week and then to five days. Of course dratini need enough life energy or else it won't evolve even though the interval between two molting is decreased.

The food they eat only determine how much their length and strength increase after molting. This doesn't This is just for ekans and dratini.

Just after their evolution to arbok and Dragonair, the molting takes place in four to five months time. And it grows to as long as a few years till every molting period as they grow older.

Of course in Dragonair the interval between molting decreases as he nears evolution. One can determine how close they are close to evolving by knowing the interval between the two molting.

If it has reached one month gap,then it may evolve within a month or two.

The fact that dratini couldn't fight along with his friends made him sad, but Alex convinced him with a his special dragon Pokemon food as well as spicy bitter berry he likes.

The cruise ship has also decided to organise a tournament every week in the month long journey, but the clause is that one person can participate in only two such events.

Alex is currently looking at the brochure and the reward details of the tournament,

The prizes for the winner is based on their performance. For example,

Winner : 10000 dollar, two ultra balls

2nd rank : 3000 dollars, three great balls

3rd rank: 1000 dollars, five pokeballs.

This is the reward for winning one Pokemon tournament.

But if the top three of the last tournament wins in another tournament their reward is enhanced greatly,

If the third ranker of the last tournament wins, he gets:

1st rank: 25000 dollars,three evolutionary stone(fire, thunder, water)

2nd rank : 18000 dollars, one evolutionary stone of choice

3rd rank : 15000 dollars, one ultra ball

If it is 2nd rank before, then

1st rank : 50000 dollars, evolutionary stone set( fire, water, thunder, grass, moon stone, sun stone)