"It's an extremely rare, unfathomably ugly, yet incredibly docile Pokémon. It's also one of the most misunderstood fish Pokémon in the world," Miles stated plainly. "Its name is... Feebas!"
The moment the name left Miles's lips with absolute certainty, the livestream—previously gripped by suffocating dread over the supposed "dead man's face"—fell into complete silence for three seconds.
Then, it exploded into an unprecedented wave of frantic complaints and emotional whiplash.
The tightly wound nerves of tens of thousands of viewers snapped all at once, replaced by the absurd feeling of bracing for a horror movie only to get a comedy. The chat feed burst open like a floodgate.
[Viewer "Late Night Cultivator": Feebas?! Bro, did I hear that right? That name is way too random! Master Miles, I seriously suspect you just made that up on the spot to calm the fishing bro down! But honestly, that face looks like rotting mud.]
[Viewer "Canyon's Most Affectionate Jungler": Phew... scared the crap out of me! So it really is just a normal Water-type Pokémon! Seeing that dead man's face in that pitch-black, murky pool earlier, I was practically drafting my will! But this fish is seriously repulsive. Staring at it too long actually makes me sick!]
[Viewer "Veteran Breeder Old Wang": The world is full of wonders. To think there's a Pokémon like this. From an ecological and evolutionary standpoint, this extreme ugliness is a rather sad form of protective camouflage. It makes large predators lose their appetite just by looking at it, prompting them to give up the hunt. While it isn't as terrifying as a water ghost, those looks definitely don't make it pet material.]
[Viewer "Outlaw John Doe": Talk about a false alarm! I thought we were about to witness a bloody wilderness tragedy where a water monkey drags a man under. This twist is insane. Bro's luck is built different—fishing in an abandoned wild pond and reeling in a bizarre creature too!]
[Viewer "Quiet Sugar Mommy": Eww... make it go away! Those thick, pink sausage lips and those bulging dead fish eyes are giving me goosebumps. Even if Master Miles guarantees it's docile and harmless, I absolutely cannot accept a weird fish with a rotting human face swimming around in my bathtub!]
[Viewer "Gold Medal Instructor": Since Master Miles staked his reputation as an appraiser to guarantee it's not dangerous, my heart can finally settle back into my chest. But with a Pokémon looking like that, it's probably treated like a punching bag wherever it goes in the wild. Let's lay off mocking its appearance; the poor thing doesn't have it easy.]
[Viewer "Broke Wage Slave": I heard from the old fishermen on the coast that in nature, the weirder and uglier the wild seafood, the richer the amino acids in its meat, making it super tender and delicious! Even though this thing looks like a biological weapon, wouldn't it be incredibly nutritious if we tossed it into a pot for a spicy fish stew?]
Hearing that it was merely an incredibly ugly Pokémon—and seeing the chat eagerly debating whether it was "tasty" or "good for stew"—the fisherman's fear shattered.
In its place surged the pure, almost fanatical hunting instinct of a seasoned angler.
He panted heavily, his eyes locked onto the muddy brown figure beneath the surface. It was still spacing out, observing him with a clear yet foolish gaze. The terror on his face melted away, replaced by an eager, almost manic excitement.
"M-Master!" the fisherman's voice trembled with excitement as he hurriedly rolled up his sleeves. "Since it's just a normal fish Pokémon, can I go down there and catch it myself?! I've already caught a whole basket of wild carp today, but if I can land the internet's ugliest fish and take it back, I'll be able to brag about it for the rest of my life!"
"You can catch it," Miles said. "Aside from having slightly more tenacious vitality than ordinary fish, it doesn't have any real offensive capabilities. It's just that..."
Before Miles could even finish his sentence, the fisherman completely lost his mind.
Without hesitation, he tossed his high-end, thousand-dollar phone onto the soft grass. Ignoring his heavy waterproof gear and waders, he turned like a starving predator spotting its prey.
Without even a running start, he leapt.
Splash!
A loud, exaggerated crash echoed across the quiet lake as the fisherman slammed into the murky shallows like a falling boulder, sending muddy water spraying everywhere.
Up on the grassy bank, the Sentret that had been diligently keeping watch was completely startled by its owner's sudden, reckless dive.
"Sentret?!"
Its brown fur puffed up instantly, as if jolted by electricity, and it hopped back several steps. Its pink, pointed ears perked straight up as it stared in bewildered vigilance at the fisherman, who was thrashing in the mud like a wild boar taking a bath. Its tiny eyes seemed to ask: 'Did this human get water in his brain?'
Through the wide-angle lens of the mud-splattered phone, tens of thousands of viewers watched as a chaotic, hand-to-hand struggle unfolded beneath the surface.
Thick mud, tangled waterweeds, and murky green lake water were completely churned up by the sudden man-versus-fish struggle. Sand and silt swirled wildly as both the fisherman and the Feebas disappeared from sight, leaving behind only a trail of violently bubbling air on the surface.
[Viewer "Wilderness Survival Big Bro": Holy crap! This guy is absolutely ruthless! A minute ago he was screaming bloody murder about water ghosts, and the second he hears it's a rare fish, he dive-bombs straight into the water?! Didn't even take his clothes off! Is this the invincible ultimate bond of an angler? Risking his life just so he doesn't get skunked?!]
[Viewer "Stingy Squirtle": Bad news! Master Miles didn't even finish speaking before he jumped in like an idiot! What if there really is some unknown danger down there?! Even if the Feebas isn't poisonous, if the mud at the bottom is too deep and he gets stuck, he's GG!]
[Viewer "Hardcore Data Analyst": Physically diving into an abandoned wild lake without knowing the topography or the density of the waterweeds is the number one fatal mistake of wilderness survival! This guy's guts are a hundred times bigger than his fish basket!]
[Viewer "Midnight Heartbreak Club": RIP, he hasn't surfaced for ages! Don't tell me he got counter-killed by that ugly fish? Even if it's not aggressive, fish have the absolute home-field advantage in the water!]
Just as everyone broke into a cold sweat for the reckless fisherman—some even preparing to call for rescue—an ear-splitting burst shattered the water's surface.
Crash!
Driven to the brink in the chaotic struggle, the muddy-brown Feebas suddenly unleashed the only utterly useless move it knew—[Splash]!
Though its body was battered and scarred, it burst out of the murky water like a heavy shell launched from a spring, completely defying physics. Its clumsy-looking form soared nearly two meters into the air, hanging for a brief moment at the peak of a perfect arc.
Directly beneath it, the fisherman broke the surface, gasping for air—his face miserable, head plastered with black mud, and green weeds dangling from his ears.
In that dramatic, fateful instant, before the fisherman could even wipe the mud from his eyes, the airborne Feebas began to fall under gravity.
Its tattered, ragged gray-blue tail fin—still packed with explosive strength—sliced through the air in a fierce, graceful arc.
Smack!
An incredibly loud, crisp slap, sounding like a firecracker, landed squarely and mercilessly on the fisherman's pale face.
"Mother of God, f**k!"
The heavy, humiliating tail slap left the fisherman seeing stars. A vivid, mud-smeared red mark bloomed across his face. Losing his balance completely, his mouth fell open as he toppled backward, crashing hard into the murky water once again—only to gulp down a mouthful of foul, earthy-tasting lake water.
This vivid, dramatic, and sharply contrasting scene finally broke the tens of thousands of viewers watching the livestream. The tension in their chests shattered into relief and laughter, and the chat exploded into a wild, tsunami-like wave of mockery.
[Viewer "Canyon's Number One Troll": LMAO! Holy crap! Forgive me for laughing like an idiot—that tail slap was insane! I swear my own face started burning through the screen! The sacred dignity of an angler just got absolutely obliterated by the world's ugliest fish!]
[Viewer "Broke Wage Slave": God-tier positioning! Perfect prediction! This Feebas definitely knows the Art of War! That 'flying face slap' maneuver was a textbook defensive counterattack! Big Bro: I'm here to catch a fish. Fish: Let me reward you with a big slap to wake you up first!]
[Viewer "Late Night Cultivator": I'm dying of laughter! But this fish really does look pathetically weak. Aside from bouncing around on the water like a spring and slapping people, can't it even shoot a basic Water Gun like a normal Water-type Pokémon? Is this the sorrow of the bottom of the food chain?]
[Viewer "Veteran Breeder Old Wang": Bottom-tier Pokémon like this have terrible self-defense and attack methods. They usually rely on this horrifyingly ugly skin to disgust predators and buy a sliver of survival. But rumor has it that their cellular vitality is terrifyingly high. Even in a tiny puddle of muddy water, they can stubbornly survive for a very, very long time.]
However, it was precisely because of the Feebas's high leap and brief, unobstructed hang time in the air that Miles and everyone else finally got a clear, 360-degree look at its entirety.
Freed from the dark, murky underwater environment that easily caused severe optical illusions, its appearance, while still incredibly ugly, completely lacked the hair-raising, vengeful-spirit terror from before.
Miles sat calmly in front of his computer, watching the Pokémon reveal itself in mid-air, a look of profound understanding flashing in his eyes.
The Feebas's body was a dull, lusterless earthy yellow. Its eye sockets were deeply sunken, holding a pair of bulging, lifeless fish eyes. Its skin was pitted and mottled with rough dark brown and purplish spots, as uneven as if it had been corroded by acid.
The most striking feature was its thick, oddly pink, sausage-like lips, the corners stubbornly turned downward in a faintly contemptuous pout.
It was no wonder that, in the dim underwater light, those spots had made the fisherman mistake it for a resentful, rotting human face.
Its fins and tail were a grayish blue, with ragged, uneven edges like torn cloth. The dorsal fin had a peculiar shape, resembling a small teapot handle—the only vaguely recognizable feature on its entire body.
By now, the fisherman on the screen had scrambled back up from the muddy water, looking thoroughly battered and cursing under his breath. As a veteran angler who believed in "never getting skunked," how could he easily swallow his pride and give up after being publicly slapped by his own prey?
"Damn it! I'm definitely taking you home today!"
The fisherman spat out a mouthful of muddy water and lunged forward fiercely. Like iron tongs, his hands clamped tightly around the Feebas, which had just landed and hadn't yet had time to escape, pulling it firmly against his chest.
No matter how wet, slippery, or violently it thrashed, he refused to let go, trudging up the bank step by step, leaving a trail of muddy footprints behind.
"Hahaha! Master! I caught it! I actually caught a live Pokémon bare-handed in the water without even using a fishing rod!"
The fisherman was a complete mess—covered in mud, a bright red handprint across his cheek, and waterweeds tangled in his hair. Yet he grinned at the camera like a fool, his face glowing with the pride of victory.
Watching this, Miles offered a ruthless assessment. 'So this is the true value of D-rank potential—and knowing nothing but a harmless trash move like Splash? It's already level 13, yet it was subdued bare-handed in a muddy puddle by an unarmed rookie. This guy only succeeded because the Feebas has terrible reflexes and didn't even know how to escape.'
"Phew... I'm exhausted."
The fisherman grabbed the Feebas by its ragged tail and held it upside down in front of the camera. Still panting, he examined the wriggling fish with clear disdain.
"Master, everyone in the chat is arguing about whether it's delicious. You're the professional, give me the bottom line—can this thing actually be eaten? Is it poisonous?"
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