Gijinka

A gijinka, or an anthropomorphized Pokémon, is a Pokémon given Human characteristics and body proportions to more closely resemble what a person in real life looks like. The degree to which a Pokémon is altered in order to look more like a human will vary from designer to designer or from Pokémon to Pokémon. In some cases, a gijinka is simply an actual human but with thematic elements reminiscent of a certain Pokémon—for instance, a human with green hair and a white dress may be called a Gardevoir gijinka. In other cases, a Pokémon may simply be turned bipedal instead of quadrupedal and given the ability to speak a human language while keeping the rest of their traits the same. A gijinka may retain a Pokémon's moves, abilities, or other stats or they may not.

In this alternate universe, gijinkas will typically fall somewhere in the middle ground between "just a stylish human" and "a human-language-speaking animal." Memo Loir, for instance, is a Jirachi gijinka that looks mostly humanoid. She has the same skin tone as a Jirachi, but her skin is otherwise the same as it would be on a human. Her hair is reminiscent of the head of a Jirachi in shape and colour but is simply normal, human hair. However, she does also have streamers attached to her back like a Jirachi does and a third eye located on her torso, traits that are decidedly nonhuman. This blend between Pokémon and human represents the average degree of anthropomorphizing that will be done to create any given gijinka, however it can vary in either direction or have specific exceptions at either extreme.

Gijinkas in this AU do not typically have the ability to use most Pokémon moves, however they do retain other stats, such as natures and types, that can grant them advantages over their human counterparts. Gijinkas are also capable of speaking to and being understood by Pokémon through an unvocalized Pokémon language that is "spoken" in the same breaths as their ordinary language. That is, when a gijinka asks "How are you?" to a Pokémon, though you and the Pokémon may hear the words "how" and "are" and "you," it is a subconscious utterance that one cannot hear that is actually getting the meaning across and the audible words are unimportant.

Within the Pokémon World, gijinkas are not referred to as gijinkas. They are referred to as "people" just like humans are. Their existence is not seen as out of the ordinary or special as, again, there is little technical distinction between Pokémon and human in this AU. However it is important to note that, like humans, they are exempt from being caught in standard Poké Balls.