The world is like a jungle, just waiting to be explored. The world is still quite new, the humans and even some pokémon use swords and bows to protect themselves from each other, or other things they might run into. Little is known about medicine, but with each passing war new things are learned about the bodies of humans and Pokemon alike, and stronger blunt weapons, arrows, and blades are created to bash, pierce, and cut through them. Most people depend on the healing magic of the few that can perform it to stay alive after being wounded and new tonics and drinks are created to help the body fight off illnesses and diseases. Some of these cures work, the rest are nothing but water mixed with something else to make it taste strange that usually do more harm than good. Everyone has much to learn, but the only things that seem to be getting learned are new ways to keep soldiers alive and fighting, and to keep buildings strong and standing even against the toughest of sieges.

Now, four men walked down a dirt road in the middle of a forest, their fur armor had blood splattered all over it, but they didn't care. They felt like heroes coming out of a battle, in a way, they were. They came from a different region from the one they were in now, their region was cold and harsh, but this region seemed warmer, they hadn't seen snow for a while. One of the men, the shortest out of all of them, had dark dirty blonde hair which reached to his shoulders. He's five foot and ten inches tall, he had stubble on his face and despite the people who he traveled with, who looked like bearded warmongers, he himself was quite attractive. He knew he was, he noticed a few of the human and pokémon girls back home giving him looks, some of which made him feel uncomfortable as he knew some were the wives of other men.

This man's name is Rulf, but many who he meets for the first time mistake his name for wolf. He's 28 years old and wears a fur armor which is sleeveless, fur gauntlets, some battered looking trousers and fur boots. Each item of clothing he wore had at least one spot of blood on it. The other men with him wore similar clothing, some more bloodstained than others. They all had the same weapons, iron shields and steel axes. Rulf was the only one who wasn't wearing a helmet; he lost his after almost getting his head chopped off by a horse rider. Two of the others wore leather helmets while the other one wore a full-face steel helmet.

All four of these men were chanting some old war song, and chanting it badly, hardly a word could be made, but that was probably expected as one of the men's words were muffled by a full-face helmet and one of the other men in the leather helmets had four of his teeth knocked out after getting a shield slammed into his face. As for the other two men, their only excuses were that they were bad singers. They walked on for a few hours, washing the blood off their armor when they eventually found a river. The only reason they had blood on their armor was because their people and a very influential man in this region disagreed on who's land belonged to who, and had a battle over it. Rulf and his people won the battle and killed that man, but now there were only four of them left. Rulf thought now would be the perfect time to do something he had only thought of doing, he was going to tell his brothers in arms, but first, he was going to make sure they were drunk.

The skies were now black, and the men were now in a tavern, drinking heavily, laughing as they shared their tales of their recent battle, until Rulf shut them up. He unsteadily got off his chair and stood up on a table as both his men, and other people in the tavern began to look at him. "Men! I have an announcement to make!" he said as he raised his mug full of ale to his lips.

"Make it then, you daft bastard!" one of the men shouted at him.

"I will! I've known you men a long time, I know you're all planning to go back home and tell our people of how we fought and won," Rulf paused as the men cheered, "But, I won't be coming with you. I've fought for my people long enough now, and all I want to do is see the world and become an adventurer!"

"Do whatever you like, we won't miss you!" One of the men in the leather helmets teased him.

"You say that but I know you'll miss me!" Rulf said very loudly before he drank a little more ale.

"Aye, we will. So let's make this a night to remember, and drink 'til we pass out!" the same man shouted as the others cheered and drank.

Rulf and his men did just that, he couldn't remember much after that little speech of his, only a few moments stood out for him. He left the tavern, and said his goodbyes to his men. He needed to empty his bladder, so he walked over to a nearby tree. The moment he urinated on a tree, he heard a dog barking behind him. He turned around, and accidentally urinated on the dog. The dog quickly bolted away from him. He apologized using slurred words before staggering off down the dirt road.

The next morning, Rulf awoke in the forest with a massive headache. He quickly stood up as he soon realized he really was in the middle of a forest, he had no idea how he got there. On the bright side, he wasn't unarmed. He had his steel shield and his worn iron war axe with him. Even though he had all his clothes on and his scratched axe and shield, he felt like he was missing something. He guessed he'd figure out what he was missing after a long walk. He needed to try and find a path anyway. He walked on for four hours. The sun was starting to go down. Eventually, he came across a dirt path which he followed until he reached a small town. Some of the guards that were dressed in chainmail armor gave him some suspicious looks, but he expected that seeing as he's armed with a war axe. He ignored them, and walked over to a wooden structure, judging by the drunken people outside it and some chanting coming from the inside; he guessed it was some kind of inn. He walked passed some of the men who looked like farmers and headed straight in.

He looked around, in the middle of the room; he could see a long table which many men and pokémon sat at. He could see a few gallades around the table, as well as a few gardevoirs. The gallades all wore armor except for one who was dressed much like a farmer. Rulf guessed that farming must have been how a lot of people around here made a living. The gardevoirs wore purple and blue robes, he guessed maybe they were alchemists or mages, or maybe they were just wearing them because they thought they looked nice in it. He didn't really know. Up at the end of the table, a few feet away from it was the bar, there were a few pokémon at the bar, and a human behind it, serving drinks. Not wanting to waste any more time looking around, Rulf headed straight up to the bar and sat on a high stool, next to a lucario whom he didn't really get a good look at. "Give me some mead," Rulf said to the barkeep to get his attention.

The barkeep, who looked overweight and poorly dressed, simply said, "Got any coin?"

Rulf nodded as he reached for his coin purse, which he then quickly realized was missing. "Son of..." Rulf was about to end that sentence with a curse word, but he was interrupted by the lucario, who sounded surprisingly sophisticated.

"Give this man his drink." The male lucario said as he put a few gold coins down on the table.

Rulf now looked at the lucario, he seemed like any other lucario, black legs, blue furry thighs, cream colored fur torso, blue arms, black paws and that strange black and blue pattern on his face. There were some things different about this lucario though, like his eyes, they were dark green, and this lucario wore clothing, not much though, just a loincloth. Rulf could also see that besides the lucario, there appeared to be some sort of staff which he assumed belonged to the black and blue pokemon. His staff appeared to be mostly solid oak, but on the end of the staff is a small silver spike and in the middle of the silver spike was what looked to be a gold diamond shape. "That was very kind of you, what do you want in return?" Rulf questioned the lucario as the barkeep placed a mug of mead next to him.

The lucario smirked before saying, "I was just being a nice upstanding citizen, and what better way to be one of them than getting random people drunk? What is your name?"

Rulf smiled a little before drinking some mead and then answering, "Rulf, my name is Rulf. What's yours?"

"My name is Sarkis. You're not from around here are you?" Sarkis questioned him.

"No, I'm from Lothsaar." Rulf answered him.

"You're a long way from home. Now, onto business." Sarkis said as he rubbed his paws together whilst he grinned.

"I knew that drink wasn't for free, what do you need?" Rulf asked him.

"Nothing much, I just want to make a small bet." Sarkis said as his grin seemed to grow wider.

"I have no coin on me." Rulf quickly pointed out.

"We're not betting coin here, we're betting pride. I bet you can't out drink me!" Sarkis exclaimed, catching the attention of some of the people around him.

"Are you paying for the drinks?" Rulf inquired.

"Indeed I am." Sarkis replied, knowing that this man wouldn't walk away from an offer like that.

"Well then, let's drink!" Rulf exclaimed as he now wore a smile on his face.

Together, they drank through the night. At first, Rulf could only see two empty mugs in front of him, but before he knew it, that number doubled, then doubled again, and again. He couldn't even make out how many were in front of him. He felt like he was going to pass out.

It was now the next day, he opened his eyes, finding himself in a room he did not recognize, in a bed that did not belong to him. He was under the covers of the bed, and felt the heat of someone behind him. He was lay on his side so he couldn't see who was behind him. But he smiled as he realized it was probably one of those Gardevoirs from the inn, he remembered Sarkis chatting them up and almost getting slapped. He now turned around to find out who he got lucky with, but he got a surprise. "By the gods!" Rulf exclaimed as he jumped up out of the bed and saw that lucario, Sarkis, laying in bed with a smile on his face.

"Problem?" Sarkis asked as he chuckled.

Rulf covered his private parts with his hands as he asked, "We Didn't do anything... Did we?"

"Maybe..." Sarkis responded with a coy smile on his face, enjoying seeing how the strong human was now all embarrassed in front of him.

"Maybe! What kind of answer is that? Did we or didn't we?" Rulf quickly questioned him.

"Relax, we didn't. You were too drunk." Sarkis responded with a smirk.

"Hey, I don't go that way." Rulf firmly stated.

"Really? Could have fooled me, you couldn't stop going on about how you'd like the attention of a strong loving lucario." Sarkis told him as he laughed.

"That's a lie!" Rulf yelled at him, not sure if it actually was or not.

"Yeah, it was. But you seemed keen to get out of your armor around me when I suggested we should sleep in my bed for the night." Sarkis replied.

"Where are my clothes anyway?" Rulf questioned the smirking lucario.

"Over there." Sarkis said as he pointed over to the floor near the door.

Rulf quickly walked over to the door and picked up his clothing which looked like they had just been tossed there. He quickly clothed his lower body first before putting on his fur armor.

Sarkis watched him dress, making Rulf feel uncomfortable. "So, you're going to become an adventurer?" Sarkis questioned him.

"I plan to." Rulf said as he got fully dressed and rubbed his face, before noticing something. "Wait..." he said as he now rubbed the top of his head to find his shoulder length hair had been cut down to only half an inch long.

Sarkis chuckled as he noted that he looked more dark haired than blond with his hair cut that short. "Before you ask, you did that to yourself." he told him.

"Why would I do that?" Rulf inquired.

"You bet your pride that you could cut your hair with your axe. There was a point where I thought you were going to cut your head off. Anyway, I know of this place where people say this abandoned mine is full of treasure, want to come with me and check it out?" Sarkis asked him as he grinned.

"Why should I trust you? I've only known you a short time and look what happened to me!" Rulf exclaimed as he pointed to his very short hair.

"Oh, shush now. You look good with short hair anyway. Now let's go!" Sarkis said with enthusiasm as he picked up his staff, made sure his loincloth was on properly and walked out the room with Rulf.

Rulf followed the lucario, not knowing what to expect from him. He just hoped he wasn't lying about treasure to get him to follow on.

Author's note: Okay, I'd like to thank BigBossSonic for editing this! I know Hironada is working on another edit for this but I said this would be up to day so I'll just upload this edit for now. ^^ Ok, and thank you for reading my new story!

Updated this, hironada said that maybe I could add a little it the intro so I did just that. :3

I have updated it again just to make the words flow a bit better. This is one of my older stories so I figured I had better fix a few things.