I really like the story,but I don't think there's going to be another update

You have my curiosity peaked with such a great beginning

Will Cynthia join ash mid journey or until he may or may not beat her to become champion. I also love that you decided to make her younger instead of making ash older, it’s something I have not seen before. Keep it up.

I like the begin and the end of it. It is not like other stories where ash get betrayed. He doesn't think of getting revenge on the ones who betrayed him or he doesn't has Pikachu.
is there a reason why you didn't continued?I know it is not my business, but I like your storyeven if it is only one chapter)).

So been a year almost, will there be any updates at all?

Have it as a harem

Cause like u said dawn and Cynthia stand out more than any other of ash's companions

I’m speechless man, This is a betrayal story I cannot wait for, Good Job!

all for rayshipping m8 :D

Like it! I'm all up for Rayshipping.

I like it I like it alot it's an excellent start imo looking forward to reading more

Good.

Great start I'd definitely go Rayshipping on this one.

Can this be a Ash and Cynthia please!

Up
Date
Now!
Just kidding lol. This is a nice take so far. Yes another betrayal, but eh. Ash would be 14 right? Since Kanto and Jhoto took a year each and Hoenn 1.5years.
Hope Ash and Cynthia bump into each other soon hehe. Or will she keep an eye on his progress? Hmm

I have very mixed feelings about this story thus far (which is better than most Ash betrayal fics get out of me) because while it suffers from many of the same problems most betrayal fics have, some aspects of it are much better than the other fics.

Let's start with the positives:

The direction of the story is different, and it's not incredibly strange or anything. Most betrayal fics are oversaturated with the plot of having a mary sue Ash go to a tournament where he screws with his former friends. Instead, yours goes with a more relaxed "conquering another region" approach, which, while overdone with many other fan fics, isn't often used in conjunction with a betrayal aspect with it. This opens up an wide array of possibilities with the plot, and it allows your story to stand out a bit more.

You didn't write Ash to be a lone wolf. Lone wolf Ashes in betrayal are very common because authors just really, really want to have a dark Ash. You wrote Ash to be much more believable in how he acts around others. Most of his friends betrayed him, but it doesn't automatically mean that Ash instantly becomes a cold, dark character that just hates humanity; you seem to grasp that fairly well, which is a plus. It also leads to potentially better dialogue and scenarios when you have more than just one character clinging to one personality.

Now for the negatives:

- You're trying to take on too much with one chapter, yet simultaneously not doing enough. Nearly every betrayal fic has the problem with pacing - yours not being an exception, although *why* yours has this problem is different. Most fics' pacing issue stems from too much dialogue with next-to-no narration; this story actually does a decent job at avoiding that as it has a good dialogue/narration ratio. But your pacing issue is rooted in your scenes being both undercooked and not spaced out enough. In this chapter, you have four main scenes: Ash's betrayal and the comforting from Brock, arriving at Sinnoh/Rowan's lab to the chaos that is Salamence, hunting down and subduing Salamence, and the scene with Cynthia, all in ~3800 words (ignoring the A/Ns). That's an awful lot to be writing about in that short of an amount of words. There's so much more you could elaborate on, but because you didn't, it leaves the readers yearning for more content. Not more content as in more chapters but rather more meaning and detail. This should have been stretched out to be at least 8-10k words, or fill maybe two short(er) chapters.
The way you could go about elaborating is expanding the narration and dialogue to be less blunt. A lot of this just kind of... happens. We don't know how many of the characters are really feeling. We read *what's* going on, but we don't *feel* what's going on. Now, admittedly, you have avoided this at times in this chapter. Key phrase: "at times." A good example of doing this well is the part where Brock reflects on Ash's growth just before getting off the boat to Sinnoh (from "Sinnoh marks a new beginning for him...'I spoke too soon.'"). This is the type of insight that this story needs more of. This especially could be used in the section immediately after his betrayal. Surely, the Ash, whose family and friends turned their backs on him, would have some questions or an internal debate about what just happened. It's a lot to process, yet he just accepts it and moves on rather quickly. I get that Ash probably doesn't want to think about it, but I know that if I were to go through something like that, I would dwell on the event for at least more than a few minutes. Try expanding upon this more.

- The mechanism for your betrayal is too blunt and doesn't make sense. Your scenario for how Ash's friends betray him is *exactly* like everyone else's. After he loses a tournament, Ash comes home to family and friends who suddenly tell him that he's crap and should give up. Ash tells them to piss off, and he runs away vowing to become stronger to prove to them that they're terrible people, or something. Virtually every betrayal fic does this, and they all suffer from the same problems: there's no good motive, no real end goal, and it's egregiously OOC for everyone to the point where it just becomes bad.
"there's no good motive/it's egregiously OOC for everyone" are both related here. It seems rather sudden for them to be telling him to give up on his dream, and we don't know why they do. This idea comes out of nowhere in the story. These are Ash's closest friends (and family) who have been through so much together with Ash even supporting all of their dreams. Them telling him to give up (especially when many haven't given up theirs) is just unusually cruel, and it's just there to scream "Look at us! We're the bad guys", or just having villains for the sake of having villains. It's not like the rest of the chapter even touches on this. The element of betrayal is not mentioned again. If you got rid of the entire betrayal portion of the chapter, literally nothing would change plot-wise except for Pikachu, whose betrayal makes even less sense as they both share the same dream. Also, "Just end it already, cause nobody wants to see you sulk after you lose every time" doesn't fit because Ash's personality just before was incredibly happy and cheery, not exactly what one would consider to be "sulking."
Because of the half-baked motive, there's no end goal as well. After the betrayal, Ash vows to become the very best, like no one ever was, but what does that really mean? At what point does Ash's motive get fulfilled? Does he have an epic battle against the traitors? If he does, why would he expect them to take him back (if he even wants to be taken back)? It leads to a story that had no set ending leading to an audience that is more disengaged and disinterested. Most betrayal fics have a tournament mentioned at the beginning, and, while it's deathly overused and boring by now, it at least gives the plot a foreseeable ending, and thus a reason to stick around: to see how it ends. This story does not. Fix it.

- Get rid of the caps lock text. Seriously. Caps lock makes the text seem childishly written; something a stereotypical Tumblr user or a random "teh penguin of d00m" would do, not an author. Lower case text with an exclamation point will suffice.

- Stop it with the A/Ns. You're using them in the worst possible way. Never, ever put an A/N *in* the story. It totally shatters the immersion that authors so meticulously try to create. Never, ever, ever foreshadow or spoil the story with A/Ns. That A/N at the beginning where you said that Brock would be the only one who doesn't betray Ash? Congratulations, now you just made your crappy betrayal scene even less meaningful when the reader already knows that Ash will have an ally. Furthermore, don't do A/Ns at the beginning of the chapter, especially if it's going to be long. Long A/Ns are bad enough, long A/Ns at the beginning of the chapter is even worse. There are no excuses. Stop it.

There are other problems I have with the story, but they are a bit more specific (e.g. Cynthia so casually accepting a stranger's clothes that were put on her without her permission. Or why Brock didn't just warn Ash ahead of time about the betrayal via Xtranceiver/Pokedex/whatever), and don't warrant a separate point to be made.

I'd be willing to help you if you want. You certainly seem like a capable author; you're just exhibiting some flaws in this writing. By all means, PM if you get the chance. I could further elaborate any of the points I made here if you desire.