Katy's tone sounded bold, but with the scale of Patisserie Soapberry, there was absolutely no problem for her to take all the milk produced by five Miltank and two Gogoat at Lucas's farm.
In Katy's plan, just as her master Kofu had taught her, she could build Patisserie Soapberry's signature around two premium raw ingredients—Moomoo Fresh Milk and goat milk—using specially developed desserts and drinks to turn them into an exclusive specialty and aggressively draw in customers under the slogan "only here."
Lucas didn't know what Katy was thinking. He simply answered honestly, "I'm afraid that won't work."
It had been a while since Moomoo Fresh Milk and goat milk were introduced in Los Platos Town.
By now, most residents in town knew about Lucas's farm—especially after they learned the deliveryman bringing fresh milk was actually a handsome Corviknight. At one point, the ordering phone calls practically exploded.
Oranguru, using a text-to-speech function to answer calls, was almost making the tablet smoke from all the tapping.
Now many households were ordering six months or even a full year at a time. You could tell some parents really spared no expense when it came to their kids.
Lucas calculated the daily delivery volume needed to guarantee current customers, added the portion the farm kept for its own Pokémon, then subtracted all that from total production and gave Katy a number.
After hearing it, Katy fell silent for quite a while before finally saying, "Then I'll take everything."
She already had an idea.
If the quantity was small, then they'd go for a boutique route—distinctive and limited.
Making the new desserts Patisserie Soapberry's signature item and selling them in limited daily quantities for "hunger marketing" wasn't a bad plan at all.
Katy clapped her hands together, her eyes narrowing slightly. "So when do we sign the contract?"
…
A little later—
After seeing off a delighted Katy, Lucas sat down in his chair and let out a small sigh of relief.
Katy's visit had interrupted his thoughts on how to special-train Combee, but it also brought two pieces of good news.
First: the farm's milk business was essentially completely sold out. In a bit, he'd go hang a sign at the farm entrance: SOLD OUT—temporarily not accepting reservations.
Second: while discussing the contract, Katy accidentally saw what was written in Lucas's notebook and asked, puzzled, whether he was struggling with how to raise Bug-type Pokémon.
Remembering that besides being a pastry chef, Katy was also a Bug-type expert, Lucas didn't hesitate. He told her about his concerns regarding training Combee.
Among the farm's Bug-types, the Bug/Rock Shuckle and the Bug/Flying Combee needed completely different approaches, so he was thinking through a dedicated training-and-breeding plan specifically for Combee.
In response, Katy offered only one piece of advice:
"As a future queen who's bound to lead her people, it's better to start training a queenly presence from the Combee stage."
Train a queenly presence?
Lucas suddenly understood.
Right—just like Milotic, known as the most beautiful Pokémon. Studies show that if you boost Feebas's confidence and increase its "beauty" while it's still Feebas, it can transform into Milotic.
The same logic applied to Combee evolving into Vespiquen.
As long as it was a female Combee, there wasn't an evolutionary restriction. Once it accumulated enough, it would naturally evolve.
But a Vespiquen raised from the Combee stage to carry a queen's aura should be quite different from ordinary Vespiquen.
Perfect—the farm had a Pokémon whose queen—no, empress—aura was so oppressive it was terrifying.
After making his decision, Lucas didn't immediately toss Combee to Serperior.
He worried that in Combee's current state, it would have a hard time holding up under Serperior's Vine Whip.
Better to build a foundation first, then in spare time Lucas would bring Combee around Serperior to absorb that queenly bearing by constant exposure.
…
That afternoon—
Riding Dragonite, Lucas flew straight to Naranja Academy.
It wasn't that he had class that afternoon. It was that there was an activity being held that he needed to attend.
An extracurricular activity: Treasure Hunt.
A special program proposed by Director Clavell.
By traveling freely to destinations, encountering many Pokémon, and finding a treasure that belongs to you.
Although it was called a treasure hunt, it didn't mean there was literally treasure hidden somewhere. It meant freely adventuring across the Paldea region—experiencing all kinds of things—challenging Gyms, helping people in need, or even searching for actual treasure if you wanted.
Clavell believed it would let students learn many things they couldn't learn in school, and also give them more opportunities to battle.
It reminded Lucas of something he'd heard when traveling in Kanto not long ago: the "Kanto specialty"—
The conflict between Academy-types and Travel-types.
The most typical example was like that school Ash and his group reached in the old anime after passing through heavy fog.
The students there were familiar with all kinds of theory. They'd even modeled which moves Pokémon could learn at which levels, and they trained their battle commanding experience through computer simulations.
Those academy students looked down on travelers like Ash who battled on instinct.
Lucas remembered that among those academy folks, there was a female student—something like an honor student—who managed to make steel-straight Ash blush.
Holding an extracurricular treasure hunt was probably Clavell's bold attempt to balance theory and practice.
Originally, Clavell planned to start this activity not long after the semester began.
But because it was the first time, the procedures were hard to manage in every aspect. On top of that, many parents opposed letting their children move freely outside—
After all, many parents sent their kids to Naranja Academy specifically so they wouldn't start traveling with only a bit of basic knowledge and no real understanding.
So the treasure hunt was delayed all the way until the end of August before it officially launched.
Even so, under pressure from many parents, the first treasure hunt was far from the scale Lucas remembered from the games—where the entire school participated.
That was also why he'd asked Nemona and the others earlier whether they wanted to sign up.
Out of several thousand students, excluding those held back because they couldn't get parental permission, there were only a bit over two hundred participants.
More than half were students several rounds older than Lucas. Students like Nemona, Eri and Arven who personally wanted to join and also had understanding parents were ultimately a minority.
A fairly large crowd had gathered on the field, but ninety percent were just there to watch. The real main characters participating were only a small cluster in the center.
As Lucas walked through the crowd that automatically parted for him, Clavell on the platform happened to have already finished his speech. Amid applause, the excited students dispersed.
From today on, except during exam weeks, they could leave Naranja Academy anytime and go adventuring through Paldea's various regions.
In terms of freedom, it was maxed out.
Among the three—Nemona, Eri, and Arven—sharp-eyed Eri noticed Lucas waiting nearby first.
With her reminder, Nemona and Arven also spotted him and jogged over.
"Teacher!"
After Arven and Eri arrived, Nemona came running over a full minute later, panting.
Lucas smiled at them and reminded them deliberately, "Since you can come and go freely and adventure in Paldea now, you haven't forgotten the second lesson I taught you, right?"
Arven and Eri nodded seriously, while Nemona stiffened, her expression turning extremely guilty.
Seeing Nemona's guilt written all over her face, Lucas no longer felt speechless—rather, he was already used to it. With a blank face, he gave a brief, compressed reminder:
"In the wild, your first priority is your own safety. Don't do dangerous things you're not confident about. Pokémon are terrifying creatures. That's why I have you train your stamina with your partners whenever I can."
"Running away isn't shameful."
Lucas could guarantee that Nemona's head was full of battles and Gym challenges right now. All he could do was give her one last stern reminder before she bolted from the academy like an unbridled wild horse, hoping she'd remember it for longer.
Nemona nodded like a pecking chick. Whether she actually took it in was anyone's guess.
Lucas looked at Arven and Eri again. After thinking a little, he decided to set a goal for all three in advance.
"You three are planning to travel together as a team, right?"
They nodded. That was indeed the plan.
"The division is pretty reasonable."
Lucas's gaze moved from Nemona to Eri to Arven.
A battle maniac, a trainer with niche hobbies, and the one in charge of cooking—such a familiar lineup.
He coughed lightly. Under their curious stares, Lucas first looked at Nemona.
"Do you remember I said I'd give you a reward if you successfully challenged all eight Gyms?"
"I remember!"
Nemona answered energetically.
"Good." Lucas nodded in satisfaction and tossed out his bait. "As long as you collect all eight Gym Badges, I'll tell you how Ursaring evolves, and I'll provide the evolution item—something extremely hard to find in the outside world!"
Nemona froze, then her eyes immediately shone with almost tangible light.
"Really!?"
"Of course. Otherwise why do you think I keep mentioning you should catch a Teddiursa or Ursaring from time to time?"
Lucas smiled, then looked at Arven and Eri.
"The evolution items are limited. So if you complete your goals too, I'll give them to you as rewards. If you run into suitable Teddiursa or Ursaring during your journey, catch them."
"Even though Ursaring becomes a Ground/Normal Pokémon after evolving, its close-combat ability will absolutely meet your expectations, Eri. And the strength will be a major help to you too, Arven, when you go to protect your parents in the Great Crater of Paldea in the future."
Hearing the temptation in Lucas's words, Eri and Arven couldn't help themselves and asked almost impatiently, "Teacher, then what goals do we need to complete for you to consider us successful?"
Lucas didn't hesitate and gave the answers he'd already thought through.
"Eri, don't you really like Fighting-type Pokémon? Recently, many cities in Paldea have been holding Fighting tournaments. Go participate, collect four city-level bronze belts, then enter the grand tournament. I'm not asking for a gold belt—getting a silver belt is enough."
"As for Arven—remember the Herba Mystica seasonings in that little plot on my farm? I'll give you four targets. Go find four Titan Pokémon, and in their nests bring back four kinds of Herba Mystica to give to me, and you'll have completed your task."
He took out a prepared Fighting-tournament flyer, and a Paldea map on which he'd roughly circled the approximate habitats of four Titan Pokémon (excluding the Asado Desert one).
Arven and Eri excitedly accepted what Lucas handed them and nodded with anticipation. "We'll work hard!"
Eri genuinely looked forward to joining the Fighting tournaments, and Arven felt it was fine too.
For some reason, he felt no resistance at all to searching for Pokémon called Titans.
"Alright, it's about time. Go back to the dorms and pack what you'll need for traveling."
Lucas patted each of their shoulders and offered his final blessing for the day.
"Go adventure. Find the treasure that belongs to you—your one and only treasure!"
…
Back at the farm, Lucas called Moltres and Ceruledge to the open training ground where the Pokémon usually practiced.
Although the ground was often mercilessly ravaged by the farm's stronger Pokémon, thanks to Swampert and Mudsdale being active, the pitted ground would always become flat again after one night—very convenient.
Noticing Moltres giving him a puzzled look, Lucas stopped polishing Ceruledge's armor and said with a smile, "Wait a moment."
Ceruledge's armor was essentially what the item Malicious Armor had transformed into. Back when he'd wanted that rare item to help Charcadet evolve, he'd gone through quite a lot of trouble.
And since Ceruledge didn't have hands for maintenance, Lucas naturally had to pay more attention.
Hearing that, Moltres waited quietly.
A moment later, Lucas wiped the sweat from his forehead. Looking at Ceruledge's gleaming armor in the sunlight—shiny enough to reflect light—he was very satisfied with his work.
Dashing and cool—a handsome, cold, shadowy swordsman. Who wouldn't love that?
"Ceru."
Ceruledge thanked him softly.
Moltres couldn't bear to look.
This guy was—the one who'd once teamed up with Luxray and Mimikyu to three-on-one it, then forcibly dragged it to the farm.
He looked cool and calm on the surface, but who knew—he was probably secretly delighted inside right now.
Ignoring the faint jealousy rising in its heart, Moltres looked at Lucas again.
So are you finally going to say why you called us here?
Lucas didn't tease it and explained gently, "I want to verify what changes you've undergone since that day at the Indigo Plateau, after the sacred fire manifested that Moltres and entrusted you with a spark."
"Both Elite Four Karen and Chairman Goodshow said that the sacred flame enshrined at the Indigo Plateau originates from that Moltres, and its fire has a power other Moltres don't have: the ability to heal injuries."
"Ceruledge is a Fire/Ghost Pokémon. It not only has keen perception of flames, it's also among the Ghost-types with the strongest ability to sense life energy."
"So I only called the two of you here."
…