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Arriving at Dragon City Airport at 10:00 p.m., Alexis personally drove to pick Chris up.
However, instead of returning to Teacher's house, Chris was taken to Dragon University.
Today marks the eighth day, and tomorrow will be the ninth.
Teacher has already returned to school and resumed work. Students will start coming back after the Lantern Festival, with official classes beginning after the 20th. The semester at Dragon University starts relatively late.
However, Vladimir, as the principal, must prepare for the upcoming semester in advance.
After dropping Chris off, Alexis planned to return to the Ice Dragon Gym the next day. Despite his young age, as the Gym Leader, he also has a group of disciples under him, similar to Robert.
Chris pondered whether he should take on disciples once he became a Gym Leader himself. However, the thought seemed like too much trouble.
If he were to accept disciples, he might end up mentoring trainers older than him—perhaps even much older.
Ah... better to forget about it.
Aside from Alexis, Lian, Elliot, and others had already left, tending to their own families and responsibilities. So, not only did Chris leave on the eighth day of the lunar new year, but they also departed to take care of their own affairs.
"Senior, take care!" Chris said, stepping out of the car and waving at Alexis, who was still inside.
"You can visit the Ice Dragon Gym whenever you're free. I'll be waiting for your good news in a few days," Alexis replied, waving back as the night enveloped him.
The "good news" in a few days referred to the results of Chris's Gym challenge.
Riding a sonic bike to campus, Chris then Teleported back to the seaside villa.
After a relaxing bath, he let out a contented sigh.
A golden nest or a silver nest is nothing compared to his own home. Seeing his long-lost bed again, he felt a comfort that no other place could offer.
The next morning, Chris followed his usual routine: wake up, wash up, go for a run, surf, have breakfast, and then take a shower.
After that, he settled into his otaku lifestyle—playing games and watching TV shows.
Before the Lantern Festival, there was nothing else pressing for him to do.
So, he could indulge in games without worry.
Booting up his handheld console, he found his in-game character had arrived in the Hoenn region.
That's right—Chris had guided the protagonist back from the Kalos region.
It was time to advance the Hoenn region's main storyline.
However, the anticipated showdown between Groudon and Kyogre at Sootopolis City had yet to unfold. Instead, Sootopolis Gym stood under dark clouds and light rain—the calm before the storm, nothing more.
Chris suspected this was because he hadn't cleared Team Magma's base at Mt. Chimney or the hideout in Lilycove City.
Yet, despite the stalled main storyline, he could still challenge the Sootopolis Gym.
The Gym battle forced him to use a level 70 team, but his opponents posed no threat.
He easily secured the Rain Badge.
With the power of Water-type moves enhanced, Surf became even stronger—an already formidable move now reinforced further.
However, after clearing the Sootopolis Gym, Chris realized he had no main story events left to progress.
Without the Groudon and Kyogre arc, the next step was Victory Road, followed by the battles against the Elite Four and the Champion.
Victory Road wasn't particularly challenging—it was mainly filled with trainers who had previously failed against the Elite Four, their strength falling somewhere between that of Elite trainers and Gym Leaders.
But beyond that lay the real challenge: facing the Elite Four and the Champion.
In terms of difficulty, Chris felt that he had to become a real-life Champion—far surpassing ordinary Champions—before he could even consider challenging the Elite Four.
The reason was simple. In the game, he had to defeat four Elite Trainers and then the Champion in succession, with no breaks in between. Only after overcoming all of them would he be registered in the Hall of Fame, marking the end of a playthrough.
A grueling "Elite Four + Champion" gauntlet.
Without strength far beyond that of an ordinary Champion, it was impossible to clear even the first cycle of the challenge.
"I'm going to challenge the Gym in a few days. For now, I should focus on strengthening myself," Chris thought.
To advance the Hoenn Region storyline, he needed at least Elite-level strength to clear Team Magma's base at Mt. Chimney and Team Aqua's hideout in Lilycove City.
Currently, his strength was only on par with a Gym Trainer at best.
So, the priority was figuring out how to increase his power as quickly as possible.
The first method Chris considered was battling Gyms.
He had already cleared all the Gyms in the Kalos Region—earning eight Badges and five Secret Techniques, which significantly boosted his overall strength. But this world wasn't limited to just Kalos and Hoenn.
He had even challenged Ecruteak Gym in the Johto Region before. There were still seven more Johto Gyms left to defeat.
Once he finished those, he could head straight to Kanto.
Each region had eight Gyms, and each Gym awarded a Badge. Eight Badges granted an 80% attribute boost, though that boost had to be distributed among different types.
Then there were the Secret Techniques to consider.
Still, the strength boost from this plan was solid.
Since he had a few days before challenging the Green Valley Gym, he could battle one Gym in the morning and another in the afternoon, quickly sweeping through Johto and Kanto's Gyms.
Just thinking about it made him excited.
However, before that, Chris needed to gather some berries and complete the once-a-month Volcano Plan before heading to the Johto Region.
After all, it would take two days for his Pokémon to fly there.
So first, he would take care of Mt. Chimney—and take down Maxie again.
With just one use of Surf, Chris nearly extinguished the entire volcano, let alone defeat Maxie.
His reward this time was a rare Pokémon item: a Black Belt.
Fierce Strike · Black Belt: Increases the power of Fighting-type moves by 40%, and boosts the first Fighting-type move used within 24 hours by 50%.
Currently, the only Fighting-type Pokémon in Chris's lineup were Blaziken and Hariyama.
Blaziken had already absorbed the Bolt Strike · Charcoal, a Fire-type treasure that added Electric-type damage to its Fire moves and had a chance to inflict paralysis.
The Black Belt could be linked to it, allowing further absorption.
However, after some thought, Chris decided to give the Fierce Strike · Black Belt to Hariyama instead.
With its already powerful Aura Sphere, the combined 90% boost made it feel like it could instantly knock out any Pokémon of the same level that wasn't resistant to Fighting-type moves.
As for Blaziken and Greninja, if they ever mastered Aura Sphere through the power of aura, then he would look for another Fighting-type treasure for them.