227 CH96 (226), Using Pressure To Train (2)

As soon as we arrived at the periphery of Mt.Moon I called out Osiris/Marowak and Thor/Pikachu. Osiris would make sure we did not get attacked or ambushed from below which was a possibility with the numerous ground types that called this place their home.

Thor would keep the flying types in check, both on the outside while we were traversing the mountain range and also while we were inside the mountain traveling through caves as well as tunnels since the Zubat line was a thing.

Those two along with Horus/Xatu were going to ensure our safety and make sure no one interferes with Saphira/Swablu's battles. As for Hashirama/Ivysaur, we would have to see if I found any worthy opponents for him.

Anyway, I called Saphira out and we began to move deeper into the mountain range, or we would have if an epic fight for my head seat did not break out between Thor and Saphira.

Both fought for dominance throwing around lightning bolts and dragon flames. Well, at least it could have looked like that. Instead, Thor settled on top of my head and Saphira sat on my shoulder.

"Alright, the plan is simple we'll spend the day in and around Mt.Moon to find some (low) bronze, maybe even some (mid) bronze stage opponents for Saphira to fight.

Hopefully, they'll push her enough to stimulate her. We'll keep doing that for the next few weeks until she's ready for her breakthrough. Hashirama will go through a similar regime." I explained and we set off, this time for real.

I began walking down the path that was slowly raising along the outside of Mt. Moon. I was going to look for a cave opening midway up the mountain instead of using the alliance patrolled main tunnel/cavern.

While this was much more dangerous it was also much more interesting. In case of emergency, we could run away or hide if even that was not possible. Well, I could do that as long as we did not get ambushed by a hostile platinum stage Pokemon, but the chance of that was close to nil.

We shouldn't be that unlucky. Ey, Murphy stay where you are. Don't come any closer, that was just a statement, not a provocation. I'll shoot any flag bearer that dares raise the flag.

Anyway, I knew that because I asked Big Sis Milotic and Uncle Raichu to help me test my current reaction time and awareness. The result was that I could react to the attack of a dark gold stage Pokemon but at the platinum stage, most were too fast for me to react as long as they were not from really far away.

The reaction time I'm talking about here is registering the incoming attack, which gave me a second or two to realize how f*cked I was since I could not block the attack anyway. However, those seconds were enough for me to hide inside Utopia and that was the purpose of the test.

Obviously, I could not react if the Pokemon was too close or bothered to ambush me, which considering the strength difference between us would be totally unfair.

Ugh, enough internal debates about why walking into uncharted territory was not a mega-stupid idea or suicide. Honestly, as long as you did not have a cheat or were extremely strong then you shouldn't go around strolling inside any uncharted area.

Still, back to what was happening right now. We were going up the mountain, but we were 5 minutes in, and all Pokemon we came across were either too strong or too weak for Saphira.

Actually, I just thought of something that made the urge to hit myself rise. I called for a stop before I called out Luna/Clefairy.

"Hey, Luna. I know that you don't necessarily know the whole place just because you're originally from Mt.Moon, but could you take the lead and bring us around.

I think a local showing us around would be much better than us just randomly running around the place. If nothing else you probably know which places to avoid due to the warnings of your elders.

Moreover, you told me you liked to wander around the area before joining me, so you probably have covered enough of Mt.Moon to know where to lead us. We're searching for some (low) and (mid) bronze stage Pokemon so that Saphira can fight against them," I explained to her and she agreed with a happy smile.

She seemed to be happy to be around the place. The last time she saw Mt.Moon was some 5 or 6 months ago when I brought her over for a little visit to her tribe so that she could visit her family.

She started skipping ahead and we honestly followed behind her like good little children. We quickly came across some Rattata, Diglett, Spearow, and Sandshrew, but unfortunately, the strongest was only at the (high) iron stage.

Still, the frequency of wild Pokemon was higher than before so we were off to a good start and as expected we soon came across a fitting enemy. Actually, there were two of them, two (low) bronze-stage Sandshrew to be specific. They had three cute little Sandshrew with them, most likely their children.

I could have just attacked them but my bleeding heart decided to offer them the chance to fight for rumination instead. I went up to the pair that had taken their three chibis behind them with my calming aura on full blast.

"Hello there," I greeted them with a wave. "I have an offer for you if you're willing to listen." I offered them and they looked at each other before they asked what the offer was.

From their "speech" it became obvious that they were not sapient so I adjusted my offer accordingly.

"I'll give you a lot of food and these three items if you are willing to battle against Saphira here" I offered while showing them 3 F-Class Ground Chips and pointing at Saphira.

They seemed tempted but they exchanged looks and looked back at their children.

"I'll heal you back to full health after the battle," I offered after I felt that they were worried about being unable to ensure their safety.

They finally agreed and the male stepped forward to fight first. I stepped back and whispered to Saphira that I would leave the fight to her. She took off from my shoulder and as soon as she was in the air the battle began without any signal.

The Sandshrew send a volley of Swift over which start homing in on Saphira. She kept dodging them until she managed to destroy the last one with her Dragon Breath. Sandshrew used her distraction to go underground waiting for his chance, while Saphira rose a bit more to increase the distance to the ground before she executed a Safeguard.

That was one of the first steps/openings in any battle that I had impressed on her, and she heeded my advice. It proved to be the right decision because Saphira got hit in the back by a shower of Poison Sting from Sandshrew who silently raised his head out of the ground behind her.

He immediately dove back underground without checking if his ambush had been successful or not, and he did it right on time since an angry Saphira bathed his last position in dragon flames using Dragon Breath.

The next thing she did was to use Cotton Guard which made her fluffy wings puff up and get bigger. She used it a second time, making her look even fluffier before she swooped down to the hole Sandshrew left behind and released a Round inside.

Since it was an enclosed space her attack spread like all sound-based moves did in such cases and got slightly amplified as a bonus. I would have had her use Sing instead, but Round was not bad as well. Sandshrew was forced to break out of the ground and looked slightly hurt.

Still, it began to curl into a ball mid-air and as soon as he landed on the ground he began to spin forward in a Rollout. He began to race around the area to pick up speed before using a slightly elevated spot to shoot at Saphira who was forced to dodge.

She fired a Dragon Breath at him which he dodged as well, and her attempts to hit him became harder since he began picking up even more speed on top of swerving around.

It went on like this for a full minute with Sandshrew shooting at her using the terrain, her attacking him using Dragon Breath, and both dodging their respective attacking methods.

It looked like Sandshrew had reached his maximum speed with Rollout since he did not speed up anymore, and apparently, Saphira had been waiting for that to happen.

Instead of just dodging, she moved above the airborne Sandshrew and fired a Dragon Pulse at him at an angle that hurled him faster to the ground but instead of safely landing her attacking angle would cause him to crash.

It was a great plan, not only was her Dragon Pulse hurting him but the impact of his crash landing would damage him even further. Sandshrew tried to save the situation by trying to soften the impact using Dig, but he only half succeeded.

Still, he did reduce the damage he took and hid underground, so his impromptu reaction proved to be smart on his part. Saphira saw him going underground as well and began approaching the hole to repeat her previous tactic, but before she reached there stars began pouring out of the hole zooming towards her.

They kept pouring out, showing that Sandshrew was spamming the move as often as he could. Saphira used her Dragon Breath to destroy them and dodged those she had yet to destroy, but she still got hit by a few before she managed to take care of them all due to their high number.

Still, Sandshrew reached his spamming limit and had to pause, which Saphira made use of to approach the hole he hid in. This time around she began to release a Sing inside and she kept it up for a short while.

After he choose to stop she waited for a few moments to see if Sandshrew would resurface and when he didn't she entered the tunnel. Less than 20 seconds later Sandshrew got thrown out of the hole and Saphira followed after him.

It became obvious that she had won, so under the worried gaze of the four spectating Sandshrew, I went up to the beaten male. The female seemed to be torn between rushing up to her mate and staying with her children but I showed her a placating hand gesture before pulling out an Awakening Spray of my own making created using Chesto berries.

Once he was awake, I fed him a health pellet made from Oran Berries and Sitrus berries, before feeding him another one made of Leppa berries. I was planning to keep my word regarding healing them back up after all. He nodded in thanks before moving to his family.

They huddled together for a bit before the mother stepped out for her turn. The fight against her took Saphira a bit less than against the male, not because the female was weaker, but because she used some of her experience from the previous fight to make adjustments for her current one.

I healed up the female the same way I did her mate and she moved back to her family as soon as she was up. As promised I gave them some food, five 1-kg bags of general ground type Pokefood I made.

The Pokefood was part of the heap I produced en-mass using the F and E-Class materials I had amassed but not used. I had tonnes of such Pokefood for nearly every type lying around in Utopia, and they were perfect for any Pokemon until the (high) bronze stage.

Even silver stage Pokemon would not complain about hunger after eating those. Still, they would only be useful for sating their hunger and nothing else.

I explained to them that those five bags would be enough to feed their family for 20 to 25 days if they rationed the food correctly. I also told them that the unopened bags would last a year, while open ones would last a month.

When I added the food was also helpful for their growth/training progress their eyes began to shine like crazy and I had to chuckle. I found it cute how they would look at the bags and their children with smiles.

Still, Saphira had fewer problems beating those two than I thought she would have. The pressure was not as great as I had hoped it to be, so I decided to offer them another deal. They would fight against her in a two-vs-one battle.

I told them they could get another two bags if they agreed and 5 bags if they managed to win. For a moment I thought they would burst out of excitement when I said that and they obviously agreed. Sapphire threw me a false dirty look and Thor and the others began cheering for her.

The chibi Sandshrew seeing them cheering for Saphira began cheering for their parents, so the three began fighting supported by a lot of cheers. This time around the battle was much harder and much more brutal. The Sandshrew went all out to get those 5 bags which forced Saphira to give her all as well.

Saphira suffered a lot of injuries, but she finally managed to take down both Sandshrew one after the other. Nonetheless, it was obvious that she was working on fumes by that point. The Sandshrew on the other hand looked like a wreck since they refused to go down until they were unable to continue.

I was impressed by their tenacity and their willingness to keep going, so after I healed up all three by pulling out some higher class healing as well as energy pellets, I chose to give them 5 more bags regardless of their loss.

The parents thanked me and I waved them off telling them that they had earned it and I fully believed that. They nodded towards me, turned to their kids, and told them to take a bag each.

The mother took three bags and the father carried four before they quickly scurried away, most likely to their den to hide their prize. After they left, we kept going, there was still a lot of sunlight to burn after all.

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