Oreburgh didn't sleep. It just changed shifts.
Even at dawn, the city groaned with motion. Cargo cranes creaked above the rooftops. Miners trudged along steel-plated walkways with heavy boots and hollow stares. The conveyor belts never stopped—grinding raw ore, rattling metal cages, coughing soot skyward in thick, endless streams.
Orion stood at a vending unit outside the Pokémon Center, watching coins clatter into the machine one by one. He selected a protein bar and a hydration pouch, but didn't eat right away. The wrappers crinkled in his hand, unfamiliar. Manufactured. Real food, but not real.
Tyrunt padded beside him on all fours, alert now, but still visibly stiff from the gym match. His ribs had bruised deeply, and though healing had been free, the ache hadn't vanished. Nurses at the Center had treated him with a standard regen pack and a focus stimulant, warning Orion not to overdo it for the next forty-eight hours. Tyrunt had tried to ignore them.
He was like that.
"You sure you don't want a proper breakfast?" Elias's voice drifted over from the bench just beyond the Center wall.
Orion looked over. Elias had his usual gear—gloves, jacket, utility belt full of Poké Balls, and a small bag of steamed dumplings he was unwrapping with one hand. Luxio sat next to him, watching the street like a guard dog.
"I'm good," Orion replied.
"Trainer-grade protein's not gonna cut it forever," Elias said, gesturing with his dumpling. "Especially if you're planning on pushing east. Route 207's rough. Lots of rockslides this time of year. Unstable types. Starving strays."
Orion peeled open the bar and took a slow bite.
Elias watched him chew for a while. Then, finally:
"You did well yesterday."
Orion didn't look up. "We got lucky."
"You didn't," Elias said. "Tyrunt took hits and kept thinking. That tail swipe? That wasn't raw instinct. That was progress."
Orion blinked. "You saw?"
"Top level of the Gym has observation glass. I watched the whole thing."
Orion chewed in silence for another few seconds, then sat beside him.
"Roark didn't hold back," he said finally. "And it still didn't feel like enough."
Elias nodded slowly.
"Because you're smart enough to know it's only going to get worse."
Orion let out a long breath.
"You're not from here, are you?" Elias asked.
"No."
"Where then?"
"Farther than I can explain without sounding like a lunatic," Orion said honestly.
Elias gave a short chuckle. "Fair enough."
They sat in silence, steam from Elias's breakfast wafting up between them. The street in front of them had begun to stir—workers pulling carts, trainers feeding their Pokémon in alley shadows. A delivery drone buzzed overhead, descending to a distribution box on the far wall.
"I used to think the League was clean," Orion muttered. "That it protected people. That it stood for something."
"It does," Elias said. "On paper. It stands for order. Structure. Power distribution. And control."
Orion glanced at him. "That's not much of a mission statement."
"No," Elias agreed. "But it works. Most of the time."
He broke open another dumpling, split it, and offered half to Luxio. The Pokémon took it gently.
"You ever hear about 'no-trace' capsules?" Elias asked suddenly.
Orion narrowed his eyes. "Like… unregistered Poké Balls?"
"Not just unregistered. Untraceable. No network signature. No manufacturing ID. Nothing to tie it to a trainer, store, or League system. If you let a Pokémon out of one and kill the power to your PokéDex, there's no way to prove who owns it."
"That's illegal, right?"
"Should be. But technically, no. Not if you make it yourself or use a repurposed housing shell. The League doesn't like them, though. Most of the time they're used for… questionable stuff."
"Like what?"
"Smuggling. Trafficking. Storage of stolen species. Unregulated breeding. Dangerous captures."
Orion felt a cold tightness bloom in his chest.
"And that happens here? In Oreburgh?"
Elias tossed the empty wrapper into the bin beside them.
"This place is built on industry," he said. "The ore, the machines, the League supply chains. You think none of that gets abused?"
"I didn't think about it," Orion admitted.
"You're thinking now."
They sat for a moment, listening to the rattle of a passing freight cart.
"Come on," Elias said. "There's somewhere I want to show you."
They walked east, past the edge of the official trainer district and into the old freight zone—a tangle of stone lots, rusted walkways, and open-top shipping crates half-covered by tarps. There were fewer people here. Fewer lights, too.
"Used to be a market out here," Elias said. "Years ago. Local breeders, League-licensed traders, even a few food vendors. Then a fire gutted three storage halls. League never rebuilt. Said it wasn't profitable."
Orion stepped over a fallen beam.
"What happened to the people?"
"Most moved on. The ones who didn't?" Elias gave a vague shrug. "Found other ways to get by."
They passed a shuttered repair bay. A child sat inside, crouched near a bucket fire, watching them with careful eyes. A Pidgey fluttered down to her hand, took a scrap of bread, and darted off again.
Orion kept walking, but that image stayed with him.
They stopped at the edge of a loading ramp. Below it stretched a warren of narrow alleys and open spaces between old ore containers. Men smoked cigarettes with their backs to walls. Others moved crates, silently, with too much intention to be casual.
On a rust-colored crate not far off, Orion spotted a word carved into the side:
"UNMARKED."
Not painted. Etched.
Elias didn't say anything. He just let Orion look.
Eventually, Orion asked, "And if someone like me wandered in there alone?"
"You'd be ignored," Elias said. "Until you started asking questions."
"And then?"
Elias didn't answer.
A man stepped out of a nearby doorway. He was thin, scarred, and carried a tablet under one arm. His eyes swept over Elias—and paused briefly on Orion. Then he vanished back inside.
Orion turned toward Elias.
"How do you know about this?"
Elias looked down at the cracked pavement beneath his boots.
"I've been on both sides of a Poké Ball that shouldn't exist."
They returned to the main streets in silence.
Back near the Center, Orion finally broke the quiet.
"Why did you show me that?"
"Because you're not stupid," Elias said. "And you're going to find this kind of thing sooner or later. Better that you see it with someone who knows how to walk out alive."
Orion nodded.
Then he reached into his bag and pulled out a 200₽ coin. He walked into the shop beside them and bought two new Poké Balls—simple League-standard capsules, plain silver with standard tracking IDs.
He didn't need no-trace capsules.
Not yet.