Ryme: the Montenevera Gym Leader whose test is a concert

With her, you don't push open the door of a gym: you walk into a concert hall. Ryme runs the Montenevera Gym in Paldea, champions the Ghost type and Double Battles, and turns her Gym Test into the opening act of her own show. The character grew out of a nickname, "the MC of RIP," born of a belief about her voice; her specialty, for its part, comes from a loss in her teens.

Contents

• Montenevera: The Gym She Took Over from Her Sister
• "The MC of RIP," a Nickname Born of a Belief
• What She Says About Battling, and What She Wants to Prove
• Six Documented Pokémon, and an All-Too-Fitting Ability
• Pokémon Horizons: A Song Against the Fear of Heights
• Tera Training: Refused, Then Passed
• Ryme at a Glance
• Frequently Asked Questions

Montenevera: The Gym She Took Over from Her Sister

Ryme runs the Montenevera Gym, one of the stops on the Badge route in Scarlet and Violet, and she took over the post from her older sister, Tyme. Her profile comes down to two entries: the Ghost type, and Double Battles as her format of choice.

Her Gym Test takes an unusual form among Gym Leaders: the challenger plays the opening act of the concert by taking on three Double Battles in a row meant to warm up the crowd. Certain move choices trigger cheers from the audience, which raise a stat in the middle of the action.

As the wins pile up, the stage lights up, then Ryme arrives and takes over while her opponent gets ready. She first wins a rap battle, before offering a choice between a battle and a rhyming comeback — and the Ghost Badge comes with TM114 Shadow Ball once the Gym Leader is defeated.

"The MC of RIP," a Nickname Born of a Belief

The nickname isn't some recent marketing invention. Ryme boasts a forty-year career and international fame, and her concerts alternate between rap battles and Double Battles for Trainers passing through Montenevera on their Gym circuit.

Its origin is recorded in a book you can read at Paldea's academy, The Musician's Register. It reports the belief that her "flows" bring the dead to their feet: hence the RIP attached to the MC.

Her specialty, on the other hand, comes from a loss. In her teens, Ryme loses her "Puppy Pokémon" and writes a song for it; as she hums it, she sees her partner come back to her as a Ghost-type Pokémon. The singer and the Ghost-type specialist are born in the same moment.

What She Says About Battling, and What She Wants to Prove

She gives her definition of music no matter what the player chooses: rhymes strung together to bring out what lies at the bottom of the soul. She immediately draws the conclusion that suits her — in a Trainer, the soul speaks through battle — and warns that she won't be generous with her rhymes.

The assessment that follows the Badge shows her in a different light. She's happy to see the player again, but sending a freshly crowned Champion strikes her as a way of underestimating her on the part of Geeta.

Once the battle is over, she apologizes for thinking so, and her motive is more interesting than hurt pride: what she wants is for Geeta to recognize the power of the Ghost type. She then declares herself the player's ally, tells them to call her if there's ever a problem, and leaves them with a piece of advice: enjoy life to the very last breath.

Six Documented Pokémon, and an All-Too-Fitting Ability

Six species are recorded on her in-game teams: Banette, Golurk, Mimikyu, Toxtricity, Spiritomb and Houndstone. Her stated preference is for Ghost-type Pokémon, and her roster follows suit.

The Double Battle isn't a decorative line in her profile: it's the format she imposes from the Gym Test onward, three times in a row, before she even takes the stage to face the challenger. Her specialty is therefore as much about pairs as it is about species.

The anime takes the documentation all the way down to moves. There, her Houndstone uses Scary Face, Crunch and Phantom Force; her Toxtricity runs Boomburst, Hex, Venoshock and Overdrive, with Punk Rock as its Ability — it's hard to find anything more in tune with a concert stage.

🎤 Mimikyu looks the part: see the Pokémon plushies.

Pokémon Horizons: A Song Against the Fear of Heights

Her first anime appearance, in Pokémon Horizons, finds her out at night on an exploration mission. She hears a boy singing to lift his Pokémon's spirits: it's Roy, cheering on his Wattrel, and the Gym Leader's Ghost-type Pokémon pounces on the boy before she arrives.

She compliments the boy, realizes the song was meant for his Flying-type Pokémon, pulls out her mic and sings in turn to push Wattrel to overcome its fear of heights. The scene establishes her approach once and for all: the song comes before the battle command.

Roy then spots a Capsakid racing between the trees, something he knows is rare at night, and Ryme guesses it's fleeing "the one not of this world" — the Pokémon she was tracking before she heard him sing. She improvises a rap about the creature's devious nature, lingers over the boy's Fuecoco, whose inner fire she says she can feel, then slips away without anyone seeing her leave.

Tera Training: Refused, Then Passed

Later in the same arc, Ryme gives a concert at the Montenevera Gym and quietly watches the warm-up battle between Roy and her emcee, MC Sledge. Roy volunteers from the audience to take his Tera Training test; she recognizes him and says she's pleased he ended up crossing paths with the Annihilape she was tracking.

The battle goes badly for him. Her Houndstone knocks out Roy's Kilowattrel with a Phantom Force–Crunch combo, then falls to Fuecoco, after which Toxtricity counters every one of the boy's ideas and crushes the starter, even once it Terastallizes. Ryme refuses to pass him: she finds him too cocky and calls him a poor partner for his Fuecoco.

The rematch, in the very next episode, is a one-on-one, on her terms. Roy and Fuecoco sing, Nemona, Liko, Dot and part of the audience join in, and the starter dodges everything Toxtricity throws at it, with Terastallization on both sides. This time, Ryme says she's satisfied and passes him, now that the boy has understood that singing builds a bond.

She turns up again outside her Gym: at the Tera Training student tournament at Naranja Academy, where she chats with Geeta and Larry, then takes the mic to warm up the crowd before the battle between Liko and Roy, sings the boy's song along with the stands and congratulates him. Another short series shows her rapping in the video that introduces the school, where her colleague the streamer Iono introduces her as one of Paldea's Gym Leaders.

Ryme at a Glance

Frequently Asked Questions

• Why is Ryme nicknamed "the MC of RIP"?
  A book you can read at Paldea's academy reports the belief that her flows bring the dead to their feet. That's where the nickname comes from, and it ties in with her specialty, Ghost-type Pokémon.
• Which Badge and TM does Ryme give?
  The Ghost Badge, along with TM114 Shadow Ball, once you've beaten the Gym Leader at the end of her concert.
• What makes the Montenevera Gym Test special?
  The challenger plays the opening act of the concert: three Double Battles in a row, in front of a crowd whose cheers can raise a stat. Ryme only takes the stage afterward.
• Who was Montenevera's Gym Leader before Ryme?
  Her older sister, Tyme, whom she succeeded in the role. Ryme now has a forty-year stage career behind her.
• Does Ryme pass Roy's test in the anime?
  Not on the first try: her Toxtricity wins and she finds the boy too cocky. She faces him again in the next episode in a one-on-one, and passes him once Fuecoco has beaten her.

In short

Ryme is a rare case in the series: a Gym Leader whose Gym Test is a real concert, complete with an opening act, a stage that gradually lights up and an audience that affects stats. The character holds together because everything leads back to the same founding scene, a song she wrote as a teenager for a lost Pokémon that came back as a Ghost type. In the anime, she refuses a test before granting it, and once again it's a song that settles things.