I've probably been spending much too much time harvesting berries. I follow the path from Mauville to Lilycove, visiting each berry patch on the way. Back and forth I go, watering the growing saplings and picking the berries from the matured plants. You can tell from the drastic time increase netween Diary entries 7 and 8 (13 hours) just how much time I've lost doing these berry runs.

I did get the seventh Gym Badge somewhere in there, but the battle was so short that I've since forgotten most of it. Darkling and Gringo could do no wrong; just about every attack was super-effective.

Also, Grovyle evolved into Sceptile... which is a much cooler name, but a far sillier looking pokemon. The Grovyle reminded me of those feathered dinosaurs. The Sceptile looks like part bidepal lizard and part boarbristle hairbrush. You can see why I haven't bothered to come up with a nickname for Sceptile... I just haven't made a connection to it like some of the others. Which is a shame since - back when it was just a little Treecko - it was my very first pokemon of the game.

Similarly, my Tentacool was becoming rather boring, so I caught a Psyduck back in the Safari Zone to be my new token water type. With the help of the EXP.SHARE item, Psyduck quickly evolved into Golduck, and it is now my carrier of the Surf and Dive HMs. I imagine Waterfall will soon follow suit.

But back to the plot. Team Aqua's flood led me to Sootopolis, an isolated undersea island town. I can't quite figure that one out. Sootopolis does hold the eighth Gym, so it can't be all bad. Sootopolis's other big battle is against the legendary Kyogre itself, deep inside the Cave of Origin. Since everyone said not to waste my Master Ball on it, I stocked up on Ultra Balls and eventually I caught the beast. Now it's off to battle Sootopolis's Gym Leader, the flamboyant Wallace...

Time: 39:38
Badges: 7
Pokedex: 65 (seen: 126)
Party: Sceptile lv38, Voltorb lv37, Darkling (Sableye) lv42, Golduck lv41, Gringo (Mightyena) lv42, Razorbeak (Swellow) lv37