Winter in Equestria.
The existence of Ice-Type Pokemon had changed everything. Snow isn't meant to fall this early on. But on the plus side, this also means that the snow is vastly more comfortable than regular snow. That's just one of the few upsides of Ice-Type effects.
At the moment, other than Enkindle Island, there was no place in Equestria where snow wasn't present. But today, the snow seemed to pour on harder than before. To the point where windows were completely covered and huge sheets of snow took up most of the ground. If you were to dig your hoof, feet or whatever limb you own in it, chances are you might sink. Which doesn't spell good news for foals and smaller Pokemon.
"What's with this snow?" Rainbow Dash looked out her window. The snow was falling so hard that it looked like it could break through glass. She tried heading outside, but she was met with a bombardment of snowflakes, forcing her back inside her home. "Ow!" She wiped the snow off her face. "Guess I'm stuck here for a while." She sat on her bed, slumped over. Rainbow Dash felt like finding something to do in order to kill some time. Surely the snow won't pour like this forever.
Looking around for something to do, she spotted a particular Pokemon outside the window. This Pokemon was new to her, but it was whose name wasn't unfamiliar with her.
"What is that?" Rainbow Dash held out her dex.
"Castform. The Weather Pokemon. Castform’s appearance changes with the weather. This Pokémon gained the ability to use the vast power of nature to protect its tiny body, transforming itself into the guises of the sun, rain, and snow clouds. This Pokémon’s feelings change with the weather as well. Although its form morphs with the weather, that is apparently the result of a chemical reaction and not the result of its own free will. The rougher conditions get, the rougher Castform’s disposition!"
"Castform..." Rainbow Dash's mind took a second to process that name. She's heard it before a while back actually. "...Wait...That's Castform?!" Her mane, wings and tail stood up. "Yes! Finally, I found one! But uh...it's not what I expected it to look like." Rainbow Dash was expecting a large creature with huge clouds swarming around it, not this tiny little thing. "Ah, whatever."
"Cast..." Just like what the dex said, the weather was influencing Castform's body. All this snow transformed the Weather Pokemon into its Snowy Form. "Castform!"
"No way...It actually can change forms depending on the weather." Rainbow Dash's jaw dropped. The dex was still facing Castform and it even had information on its Snowy Form.
"Castform. The Weather Pokemon. Snowy Form. This is the form Castform takes when covered in snow. Its body becomes an ice-like material, with a temperature near 23 degrees Fahrenheit. In an experiment where it was placed in a freezer, it didn’t change to this form."
"That's what I need for the fifth gym! Come to ma-" Rainbow Dash was prepared to head out, but once again, the snow forced her back inside. "Oh...right. How am I gonna get that Castform...?" She pressed her face on the window. She could try luring Castform out with some food, but she didn't have any at her disposal at the moment. Perhaps, banging on the window will grab its attention. "Hey!" Rainbow Dash banged her hooves on her window, attempting to grab the attention of the Weather Pokemon.
"C-C-Castform!" The harsh weather was actually getting to Castform, causing it to sneeze. Even for a Pokemon who was all about the weather, this was overwhelming to it. Thinking it was alone in the skies, Castform picked up on the sound of Rainbow Dash's knocking, turning its entire body to her direction. "Castform?"
"Yeah...right here. Come on..." Rainbow Dash was luring in Castform perfectly. The Pokemon seemed to have a curious nature so it wasn't too hard to grab its attention. "There we go...Gotcha!" Rainbow Dash quickly opened the door, grabbing Castform before the snow could pelt her. The multi-coloured-maned mare had gained a hold of the Weather Pokemon, shutting the door behind her."
"Cast?"
"Hehe! Yes! I got a Castform! Well...not officially yet. Get in the ball." Rainbow Dash held out a Pokeball.
"Castform!" The Weather Pokemon decided to play around, flying all over the place in her home.
"Hey, wait!" Rainbow Dash was being dragged across her own home whilst still holding on to the Normal-Type. For a Pokemon that weighs only 0.8kg, it has some surprising girthy weight to it.
"Cast...Castform!" Castform had sneezed in its snowy form, causing an explosion of snow so great that it filled Rainbow Dash's home. It seems that the weather was taking a toll on Castform so much that it could pump out a huge sheet of snow in an instant.
"U-Ugh..." Rainbow Dash was buried in snow with her hoof sticking out.
"Castform..." Castform's snowy form was fading away. Being inside Rainbow Dash's home was making it a bit warmer. The Weather Pokemon laid itself down on Rainbow Dash's bed to rest up.
"Gagh!" Rainbow burst out of the snow, breathing in and out. "Finally! Geez...that was a lot of snow for something that small. It's perfect!" She flew up. "With this Pokemon, I'll be able to ace that 5th gym with the weather on my side! Alright...Here goes!" She picked up the Pokeball from the snow, aiming it towards Castform. The monster-catching ball had been thrown, giving Castform a bonk on the head.
"Cast?" Inside the Weather Pokemon went, pulled in by that red light. Now for the outcome.
1...2...3...Gotcha!
Castform was now in Rainbow Dash's possession.
She picked up the Pokeball, gazing at her fifth team member. "Welcome to the team, Castform!" She grinned. But that enjoyment had quickly diminished in a short amount of time. The Pokeball was shaking uncontrollably all of a sudden. Before she knew it, her Pokeball had frozen in ice. But it didn't quite end there. Not only did it freeze, but Castform burst out of the Pokeball by shattering both the ball and the ice. "H-How did you..."
"Castform!" The Weather Pokemon had sneezed once more. It seems that whenever it sneezes, it exerts high amounts of snow and frost in the process. "Cast..." Castform felt hungry. It craved something to eat. Its wish was granted as an aromatic scent caught its attention. "Form?" The Weather Pokemon floated towards the smell, opening the door by itself by biting onto it.
"Hey! Where are you going?!" Rainbow Dash turned to her newly caught Pokemon. Before she could chase the Weather Pokemon down, the harsh snow had bombarded her once more. Castform's form changed into its Snowy form once more, giving it the strength to press on through the cold. "Urgh..." Rainbow Dash groaned, buried in snow yet again.
All the way down at peaceful Ponyville, this scent was the cause of Pinkie Pie obviously. She and the Slurpuff had baked the largest Cindercake there was. It had hot chocolate all over it in order to counteract the cold weather. The scent it gave off was the cause of each of Pinkie Pie's Slurpuff using Sweet Scent to fill the Cindercake.
"That looks great. Slurpuff, your nose never lets us down." Pinkie patted one of her Slurpuff's in the back.
"Slurpuff!"
"This is meant to warm you up?" Jade went up to the cake, placing her hoof on the hot chocolate frosting.
"Oh yeah. Once you eat this, who cares about the weather?"
"Hm." Jade licked the frosting off her hoof, feeling a slight burn on her tongue. "It is pretty hot actually."
"If we can make a bunch of Cindercakes this huge, that'll solve everypony's problem. Besides, these scarves aren't really doing anything." Pinkie shuddered as even a scarf was useless against the cold. "How come you're not cold, Jade?"
"...Don't know."
"Spinda!" Spinda hopped up the table, prepared to take a bite out of the Cindercake.
"Castform..." Along came Castform, sniffing out the scent. It felt like melting from the alluring scent the cake gave off. It needed this badly.
"Hiya there! What's your name?" Pinkie popped her head up, greeting the Normal-Type.
"Castform." Castform completely bypassed Pinkie's greeting, only focusing on the cake and nothing else. The Weather Pokemon gazed at the chocolatey goodness it bestowed. All that hot chocolate mixed in with a girthy cake base was enough to make its little heart melt. No use in wasting time. Castform had decided to dig in. "Cast!" Castform chomped on the cake, digging into hot chocolate frosting that surrounded it all. The moment the chocolate hit its mouth, something else that was rather explosive occurred. Similar to what happened with its Snowy Form earlier. The hot chocolate had transformed its body into its Sunny Form.
"Oooh! How'd it do that?!" Pinkie gawked at the sight of the form change.
"Form changing?" Jade tilted her head.
"There you are!" Rainbow Dash had flown in, using her bedsheet as protection from the harsh snow. "Caught up to ya!"
"Oh, hey Rainbow Dash! You here to bite out the cake too?" Pinkie asked.
"No. I'm here to get that back!" She pointed her hoof at Castform. Just then, her eyes noticed its new form. "Another one?" She quickly took out her dex, scanning this newly seen form of the Weather Pokemon.
"Castform. The Weather Pokemon. Sunny Form. This is the form Castform takes on the brightest of days. Its skin is unexpectedly hot to the touch, so approach with care. In an experiment where Castform was placed in front of a heater, it didn’t change to this form. When you touch its glowing skin, it feels all dried out!"
"So it changes type depending on the weather?" Rainbow looked at her dex then back to Castform. "But it's not even hot right now...And if the heater didn't change its form...then what gives?"
"That means my Cindercake really is effective! Yes!" Pinkie cheered, glad that her cake was capable of negating the cold. Or it could possibly be that this Castform has a unique reaction compared to its fellow Castform's.
"Whatever. Let's try this again. Okay, Castform. I got a brand new Pokeball for you. So please don't break it this time." Rainbow Dash held a new ball in her hoof. "And...go!" She launched the ball towards Castform, but to her surprise, the ball didn't activate. It just simply fell to the ground.
"Cast." Castform didn't even notice as it kept eating the cake along with Spinda.
"...Huh? What gives?" Rainbow Dash picked up her Pokeball.
"Ooh. Tough break." Pinkie said. "Wonder why it didn't work..."
"Maybe because Castform already has a Pokeball, no other ball will catch it." Jade gave an answer to them both.
"Oh. Okay, that makes sense." They both said, nodding.
"Wait! That's not a good thing! How am I supposed to keep it stored and safe if it broke its only Pokeball?!" Rainbow Dash groaned.
"I don't know. But why would you wanna keep something this cute in a ball?" Pinkie went up to Castform, looking at the Weather Pokemon's smile and how chocolate was all over it.
"Cast...form..." Time for a third effect. This time, due to it being in its Sunny Form, Castform had emanated a sudden spike in temperature. All of a sudden, the indoors of SugarCube Corner had been granted a searing feel instead of a chilly one. Castform had made the entire place hot. Scorching hot even.
"Boy...my Cindercake must really be super-effective." Pinkie Pie wiped some sweat off her forehead as her usually puffy and fun mane was drooping down.
"Too hot." Rainbow Dash's mouth had instantly become dry all of a sudden from this heat. Jade, however, was completely unaffected by it. But the ones who were really effected were the Slurpuff's. "So this is why it's called the Weather Pokemon...This is ridiculous!"
"Slurpuff..." The heat had caused many of them to fall on the floor, passing out. Some had even caught fire from the temperature spike.
"Spinda!" Spinda's tongue suddenly felt a hot burn on it. The heat was enough to affect the Cindercake as well, causing its already hot texture to intensify.
"Castform!" Castform felt satisfied with the food, no longer starving. But its Sunny Form was still active. And it progressed from just SugarCube Corner to all of Ponyville. Castform's heat had managed to melt away all the snow that surrounded Ponyville, essentially wiping the slate clean. While it was nice to have some warm weather, everypony wasn't expecting this.
The heat had forced some of them to come outside due to it reaching their homes as well. In a few seconds, everypony was sweating uncontrollably.
"Why's it so hot all of a sudden?!" Amethyst Star opened her door, holding her tongue out. She attempted to step outside, but the moment she did, her hooves felt a sharp burn all of a sudden. "Ow!"
Soon, anypony who even tried to set hoof outside on the ground was met with a burn. The entire ground had been heated up thanks to Castform. Its Sunny Form was proving to be fairly effective and potent, even from this distance. Everypony decided that it was probably best to stay inside.
But inside wasn't any better. Rarity, unfortunately, got the worst out of all of this. The heat had set all her hard work on fire, causing her dresses to set ablaze. Not only that, but her Leavanny were catching fire as well due to the temperature spike.
"Sweetie Belle! Help me put this all out!" Rarity attempted to pour water on them all, but even that didn't put the flames out.
"Don't you have a Feebas?"
"Oh...right." Rarity sent out her Feebas, who hadn't been out of its Pokeball for months. "Feebas! I know we haven't interacted as much, but please. Put this out!"
"Feebas..." The Fish Pokemon used the one move it knew. Splash. As expected it did nothing.
"Nevermind..." Rarity sighed, returning her Feebas.
"Don't worry, sis! I'll get help!" Sweetie Belle rushed outside. But the moment she did, she was also met with the scorching ground, forcing her back inside. Her mane had been charred from just setting hoof outside Ponyville. "Nevermind."
At Twilight's lab, she had gathered some Pokemon from PokePark in order to cool her off. Oshawott, Dewott and Swanna had all given her cold water to negate heat, even pouring some on Eve and Spike. Vulpix avoided this however due to it being a Fire-Type. Minccy had used Aqua Tail to cool herself off, pouring the water on her head each time.
"Ah...that's more like it." Twilight basked in the water from all three Water-Types, feeling refreshed. However, the heat still carried on across Ponyville.
"Twilight!" Starlight entered the lab with her hooves charred. "Why is it so hot?!"
"No idea. But my guess is that there's a Pokemon out there influencing the weather. Similar to how Ice-Types brought along snow much earlier than it usually arrives. So maybe, there's a Fire-Type that's so hot it can change the entire weather and bring about a hot day in an instant."
"Yeah, well...Can somepony tell whichever Pokemon that is to quit it?" Starlight blew on her hooves.
"I got it. Swanna. Water Sport." Twilight commanded Swanna to cool Starlight.
"Swa!" The White Bird Pokemon had soaked the unicorn in water, removing the heat from Starlight's body.
"Oh, that feels so much better..." Starlight fell on her back, relieved.
Sweet Apple Acres, however, had almost caught on fire due to the sudden heatwave. Entire trees were being set on fire due to this, causing so many ripe and fresh apples to be wiped out. Luckily, Applejack's family had the Pokemon to deal with this. Her Treecko had exhaled a smaller version of Dragonbreath to put out the flames whilst Big Mac's Machamp put the flames out with its bare hands.
The Pokemon House was an odd situation. You have Pokemon who are either enjoying the heatwave since they hate the cold, mostly Grass, Ground and Flying-Types. And you also have Pokemon who despise the heatwave, ranging from Ice, Bug, Steel and a few Fairy-Types here and there.
"Did one of you cast Sunny Day?" Fluttershy was about to pass out from all the heat as she looked over to the Pokemon. But none of them did. And even if they did cast Sunny Day, it wouldn't be this powerful.
From atop the clouds, the usual duo of Lucien and Sienna watched over the unexpected carnage being caused by one tiny little Pokemon.
"Wow. Not bad, Lucien. I didn't think about using Castform as an idea!" Sienna patted Lucien on the back.
"...I didn't do anything." He shook his head.
"You didn't?"
"No. I haven't done anything today. None of us has really interacted with anything.."
"Oh...so then...why is that Castform capable of that?"
"My guess...it's a special Castform. One of its kind. I've never heard of a Castform that can just heat up an entire town."
"Ooooh...That is pretty special." Sienna nodded.
"In any case, even I don't know how they're gonna handle this situation. It broke its Pokeball...so its essentially just out in the open forever."
"Why don't we just repair its Pokeball?" Sienna raised up her finger with a cosmic spark on it.
"We could...but that would spoil the fun." Lucien grinned. "Let's keep watching! I wanna see what its Rainy Form can do!"
On it went. Castform's Sunny Form was finally fading away. The heat from the Cindercake had finally left its mouth, causing the Weather Pokemon to return to its normal state. Not only that, but it seems that the heat it brought along with it faded away as well. As if Castform merely existing was causing the scorching temperature to be present.
"Cast!"
"Oh, finally! It's over!" Rainbow Dash groaned, falling flat on her face.
"Is everypony okay?" Jade asked as her eyes looked over to see every single one of them recovering from the heat.
"Castform." Castform flew over to Rainbow Dash, looking down at its trainer. "Cast?" The Weather Pokemon smiled at her, giving her head a soft rub.
"Castform...Can you please get in the- Oh wait...Nevermind." Rainbow sighed, slamming her face on the floor.
"Form." Castform could see that its trainer was a bit stressed out thanks to its actions. It didn't mean to cause any harm or trouble. After all, as the Pokedex said, it doesn't have any free will over its form changes. Meaning it can't do anything about it. In order to ease its first trainer's nerves, Castform had decided to use one spot as a replacement Pokeball. Rainbow Dash's saddlebag. It was just small enough to fit inside of it with ease.
"Look at that! It fits perfectly!" Pinkie set her eyes on the saddlebag.
"Hm?" Rainbow Dash opened up her bag to see the Weather Pokemon sitting inside all snug up.
"Castform!" It was the perfect place to be in. It wasn't too cold neither was it too hot. It was just right, capable of keeping the Weather Pokemon in its normal state.
"Huh...This can actually work! It's perfect!" Rainbow Dash flew up.
"So this thing controls the weather?" Jade peeked in the bag.
"Yep. It's exactly what I need for my 5th Gym Battle. If I can control the weather, I basically control the world! Right, Castform"?
"Cast!" The Weather Pokemon nodded, looking up at its trainer. Castform could sense a strong urge of victory from Rainbow Dash like her other Pokemon. It may not be the strongest Pokemon, in fact, it's most likely the weakest of her team now, but it'll do its very best to guide her to victory.
Rainbow Dash's fifth Pokemon and the Pokemon that she had been looking out for has finally been caught. Castform. A Pokemon that she is sure will help her against the fifth gym which is all about the weather. However, Rainbow knows at this point that it's not wise to underestimate the gyms, even if you know what it's about. Sunset Shimmer and Zecora made that very clear. She's keeping that in mind and planning to outsmart her opponent when the time comes to head to the fifth gym, as the journey continues.
Chapter 190 End!