Selina hadn’t gone far into the sewers before a swarm of Rattata blocked her path—led by a Raticate.
Altogether, there were about two to three hundred of them, all baring their teeth and glaring aggressively at Selina and the Machamp by her side.
To the sewer-dwelling Rattata, humans were their natural enemies—every year, many of their kind were killed by humans.
So when they saw Selina, their only thought was to kill her and feast on her flesh.
With a screeching order from the Raticate leader, the horde of Rattata let out sharp squeaks and charged forward.
“Useless vermin. Machamp—handle them” Selina snorted coldly.
Machamp set Julian down and charged into the oncoming swarm.
Most of the Rattata were low-leveled—around 10-20, with a few in their 20s. Even the Raticate leader was only level 30-ish, while Machamp was a Pseudo-Elite (Lv. 62).
With such a level gap, unless their numbers exceeded a thousand, they stood no chance.
Machamp’s four fists blurred, each strike instantly KO’ing a Rattata.
But despite its efforts, a few Rattata managed to slip past its defense and lunged toward Selina.
Instead of sending out another Pokémon, Selina pulled out a handgun and fired at the oncoming Rattata.
A few shots later, each Rattata dropped dead—bullet holes straight through their skulls.
Her marksmanship was scary accurate—especially against moving targets.
A Rattata latched onto her shoulder, sinking its teeth in. With a pained hiss, Selina grabbed it and slammed it violently against the ground, sending it flying—along with her backpack.
She initially tried to go after the bag, but more Rattata rushed toward her. With no other choice, she gave up on the bag for now and raised her gun again to deal with the new threat.
Meanwhile, Gengar took the opportunity to snatch the Poké Balls from the bag and stuff them into its mouth.
It didn’t put them into its stomach-space, since that dimension couldn’t hold living beings.
But they were fine to keep in its mouth.
To keep the bag’s weight from changing and raising suspicion, Gengar replaced them with dummy Poké Balls from its own hoard.
Its stomach-space was a junk drawer of random items—including spare Poké Balls.
After everything was secured, it returned silently to Julian’s side.
Julian didn’t reclaim the Poké Balls yet—no place to hide them. Without the backpack, clipping them to his belt would alert Machamp immediately.
So for now, they stayed tucked in Gengar’s mouth—ready for retrieval when the time came.
Fortunately, Gengar's unique physiology allowed it to securely hold several Poké Balls in its mouth without issue.
A few minutes later, Machamp returned to Selina's side, its hands stained with blood after crushing the Raticate leader's skull. It looked at her shoulder wound with visible guilt.
“It's not your fault. I'm fine,” she reassured it.
Selina only had Machamp as her Pokémon—otherwise, she wouldn’t have needed to resort to a handgun.
Why did she only have one Pokémon? Because in Drakoria, non-professional trainers were legally allowed to own only one Pokémon.
That’s why ordinary families usually raised only one or two Pokémon at most.
As for her deadly accuracy with a gun? That came from shooting club practice—facilities available in most cities where anyone could experience live-fire training for a fee.
And as for how she got the gun—considering her secret identity, getting her hands on a firearm wasn’t exactly difficult.
She picked up the backpack from the ground, carefully checked inside, and confirmed that the Poké Balls were still there before slinging it over her shoulder. And Machamp once again hoisted the "unconscious" Julian.
Meanwhile, back at the grilled beef intestine restaurant, the unconscious Howard and Raina were carried out by firefighters.
Since the fire wasn’t very large, and it hadn’t spread to their floor, neither Howard nor Raina were harmed.
They were quickly rushed to the hospital via ambulance.
After a series of tests, it was confirmed they were in stable condition. As for why they had passed out—it might’ve been due to inhaling smoke, and they were expected to wake up soon.
Even so, blood samples were taken for further testing—to rule out toxicity.
Hospital staff identified them via their IDs, prompting Raina’s father, Raymond, and grandfather, Elliot, to rush over.
Seeing Raina unharmed, both of them breathed a deep sigh of relief.
“I’m going to check on Julian,” said Elliot.
Raina had mentioned beforehand that she was going out for a late-night meal with Julian and Howard, so Elliot naturally assumed that since Raina and Howard were both at the hospital, Julian must be here too.
But after asking around, he learned that among the people brought in due to the fire, Julian wasn’t one of them—this instantly made Elliot’s heart skip a beat.
His first reaction was that Julian might’ve been caught in the fire. But then he quickly shook that thought off—with Julian’s strength, how could a fire possibly trap him?
'Did he leave early, maybe?'
Since Julian wasn’t at the hospital, Elliot didn’t dwell on it too much for now.
Just then, a doctor wearing a white coat walked into the room and asked:
“Which of you are the family members of Raina and Howard?”
“The two of us are Raina's family members. I’m her father, and he’s Raina’s grandfather.” Raymond stepped forward.
"Doctor, is my daughter okay?" Raymond asked anxiously.
The doctor shook his head and replied, "Physically, yes. But we detected Rophenine in her and Howard’s blood—that’s why they were unconscious. We’ve already notified the Inspection Bureau."
Rophenine was an extremely potent sedative extracted from the petals Roselia. Its effects were over a hundred times stronger than regular sleeping pills.
If the dosage exceeded the safe limit, the person might fall into a coma and never wake up.
Because of this, Rophenine was strictly banned for civilian use in Drakoria, and in many other nations as well.
Now that traces of it had been found in their blood, the hospital had no choice but to report it to the Inspection Bureau.
“Rophenine? That’s impossible, doctor. You must’ve made a mistake,” Raymond said in disbelief.
His daughter wasn’t the kind of person to use substances, nor did she suffer from severe insomnia—how could Rophenine be in her system?
“We didn’t make a mistake,” the doctor said firmly, shaking his head. “Please remain here and wait for the Inspection Bureau to arrive.”
With that, he left the room.
"Rophenine… how could that be? Could someone have drugged them?" Raymond muttered under his breath.
He meant it offhandedly, but the words struck Elliot like lightning. His face darkened as he pulled out his phone and dialed Julian’s number—only to hear:
"The number you have called is currently switched off—"
“Dad? What’s wrong? Ranran will be fine. There must be some kind of misunderstanding,” Raymond said, thinking his father’s face looked that way out of concern for Raina.
But the old man just kept repeating Julian’s name under his breath.
“Right—where is Julian? He wasn’t brought here?” Raymond finally noticed his absence.
Upto 30 chapters ahead on :-