So Blake only has two pokemon left, and both of them are injured. He needs to defeat Elaina, but will he be able to manage? Can Elaina's overwhelming harmonia even be defeated? If Blake wants to get through to her, he has to try.
KedharS: We can only hope he does.
Rowlets and Oshawotts: It's definitely getting tense alright, the climax has come!
Guest: Hopefully they'll be enough.
Aakareo Kokokuhikari: Blake is definitely an interesting character alright, I'm glad you like him and are so invested in him! Hopefully the chapters you have to read will be satisfactory.
Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings
Chapter 724
"Crawdaunt!" Cory emerged from his pokeball, pincers raised, glaring up at the Minior. The second he landed, the sharp stones dug into his shell and he let out a grunt of pain, his glare darkening as he roared at Hope.
"That's your next pokemon?" Elaina scoffed. "Look at how damaged he is. He'll barely be able to withstand one of our attacks! Hope, stone edge!"
The Minior spun through the air, ripping up massive stones from the ground and flinging them at Cory from above.
"This isn't good," Ayame said. "Before, Uni was able to dodge the Minior's attacks due to the fact that trick room boosted her speed quite a bit. But comparatively, Cory's speed is only a little lower than that Minior's, meaning that the gap between the two of them, and thus, the benefits of the trick room, are only marginal."
Sango didn't like the sound of that.
"Cory will be fine!" Cynthia assured them, even though she didn't sound all that sure herself. "He's really tough and loves fighting!"
As the stones rained down on Cory, Cynthia was thankfully proven correct.
"Protect!" Blake ordered, a blue barrier rising up around Cory to protect him from the hail of stones, which smashed harmlessly against him. "You're going to have to do much more than that if you want to get through, Elaina. I would have thought you'd be the expert on how strong someone's defenses can be."
Elaina scowled, another throb of pain searing through her temple.
"You can't hide behind that barrier forever!" Elaina snarled.
"That's what I should be telling you," Blake fired back. "Cory, use bubblebeam!"
"Crawdaunt!" Cory raised his pincer, firing a barrage of bubbles at Hope. But with how high Hope's defenses had been boosted, the bubbles popped helplessly against their shell, not even inflicting a scratch.
"Well, that's not good," Blake noted. "Your defenses are good as always. But that's fine. Cory, swords dance!"
"Crawdaunt!" Cory gnashed his pincers together and began to spin, his attack stat boosting.
"Shoot him down while he's busy with that," Elaina ordered. Hope fired more stones, preparing to bombard Cory from above once more. Blake knew that with how much power there was burning through Hope, a single strike from one of those stones would be enough to finish Cory off immediately, so they had to play this one smart.
"Cory, aqua jet," Blake ordered. Water danced around Cory and he jumped forward, skillfully dodging all of the stones as they fell.
Blake smiled. "The last time you and I were fighting, Cory was more inclined to charge head-on into battle and get himself all tripped up. But now we've learned a thing or two, and he's way better at dodging!"
"Yeah, way to go!" Cynthia cheered.
"But dodging won't get him anywhere," Sango reminded her. "He's still got to find a way to attack a pokemon all the way up there, and as we saw with that bubblebeam, that isn't going to work all that well."
"True, Crawdaunt aren't exactly known for special attacks," Cynthia admitted. "But unfortunately, there isn't exactly a way to launch a powerful physical attack from the ground, either."
"So it's a doomed matchup?" Kitty asked, her anxiety clearly starting to take over.
"No, I wouldn't go that far," Reiner said, shaking his head. Cynthia looked curiously his way. He'd been pretty silent through the exchange.
"Oh? Explain," Cynthia said, intrigued.
"Blake is a really resourceful guy," Reiner said. "And you know as well as I do that his battle instincts are nothing to scoff at. He wouldn't just send out Cory because of the type advantage. There's definitely something more to all this. He's got something planned."
Cynthia beamed. "Yeah, you're right," she agreed. "He totally does!" She whirled back to the battlefield and cheered. "Yay! Go, Blake, take her down!"
"Cory, iron defense," Blake ordered. Now that he was out of harm's way, it was time to boost his defenses next to try and give him some more endurance, low as his health might have been.
"Craw," Cory nodded, heightening his defensive strength as his shell began to shine a bright silver-white. He kept an eye on the Minior as he did, ready to dodge the incoming attack.
"How useless! Boosting your defenses in your present condition is pointless!" Elaina shouted. "A single hit, and you'll still collapse!" She sent her harmonia into Hope, who sent more rocks flying down towards Cory.
"You keep saying that, but don't you see that you're exactly the same way?" Blake asked. "Elaina, look at yourself! You've torn yourself down to the bare bones, and for what? All to hide from the truth about what you really want?"
"You don't know what I want!" Elaina screamed. "I just want to be free! I just want to be normal! I just want… I just…"
Elaina's thoughts were so clouded. Her head was screaming at her and she just felt scared and angry and hurt. She just wanted to curl up in her room and cry, she didn't… she didn't want to be doing this. She didn't want to be feeling this pain and hate.
"Elaina, I told you already, I'm going to smash through those defenses of yours and bring you out of your shell," Blake said. "I'm going to save you. Make you see that all these walls you put up, you don't need them. I know you're afraid of facing the world without your mask, but I promise, Elaina, you don't need it. I'll accept you. Because I know the pain you're going through."
Elaina didn't want to believe him, but she couldn't help herself. She shut out those hopes from her mind, and focused her attention on hating him instead. The idea that Blake would accept her for who she was, it was an old one. One that had comforted her, once upon a time. But now that she was forced to confront it, she knew that she didn't want it.
No, she wanted it, she did, but she was scared.
"No. No!" She shouted, shaking her head frantically. "You have no idea what you're talking about! I don't want to hear another word coming out of your mouth! I don't need you! I don't need you to save me, I don't need you to come inside me! Stay out! Stay away! Just leave me alone!"
The wind kicked up, and more stones rained down on Cory, this time more than enough to prevent his escape. But fortunately, Cory was able to raise another protective barrier to shield himself. But Blake could see it clearly now, this tactic wasn't going to last much longer. Cory couldn't keep throwing up protects, and he definitely couldn't take one of those hits.
I guess it's time for that tactic, Blake decided. He was hoping that Cory would be able to last a little longer, wear down Hope a little more. But right now, there wasn't any other option. He just had to hope that it wouldn't be too dangerous for Elaina.
Blake couldn't understand it. It was clear that Elaina wanted to be saved. She was dying for it. Every time he spoke to her, she made it clear over and over that she wanted out of this. And even though he knew now that it was all a terrible ruse, and that she was really just trying to convince herself when deep down she was afraid to take a step forward…
There had to be something. Something that was keeping her sane, keeping her from snapping, keeping her with Gerard. The false hope that she clung to… "Elaina, why? Why do you keep lying to yourself? Why can't you just be honest that you're afraid?"
"I'm not afraid!" Elaina shouted. "I'm not! I'm going to seize the future with my own two hands! You can't save me, but… but I…"
Elaina's old words flashed through her mind.
"Please save me from all this pain! If this is my life… I don't want it! I don't want ANY of this! So… if I'm going to live a life with just pain and hatred, then I don't want it! Let me die, then! Take me or grant my wish, please!"
"I wished… I wished for a future… a future free of this pain…" Elaina sobbed. Her head was on fire, and she couldn't fight back the tears any longer. She didn't care what anyone thought, looking at her in this condition. Not Blake, not Gerard, not anyone in the audience. Aside from the mask on her face, she was totally bared.
It was her last defense. Blake had exposed everything else.
"And Hope… Hope brought Gerard to me!" She shouted. "They granted my wish, they set me down on this road! And as long as they're with me, they will bring me into a future where I am free from this horrible power!"
Tears rolled down her face. "This… This power of theirs… the ability to destroy everything that opposes me… this is my hope!"
Blake realized it. So that was it. A way to finally reach her.
"Cory!" Blake shouted. "We're going back to our original plan!"
"Craw?" Cory looked back at him, surprised. He may have loved a fight, but that was a little too brutal even for his trainer.
"It's the only way," Blake said. It was hard, but it was what they had to do.
"I don't know what you two are whispering about, but it doesn't matter," Elaina said. "All your words… all your attempts to try and make me believe in your false hope… I'm going to smash them into the ground, right here and now."
Elaina felt her harmonia surge. The wind wrapped around her, preparing a storm, even though Hope didn't use any Flying type attacks. It was more than enough that the windstorm propelled their stone edges, though.
Elaina was wild. Hope flung boulder after boulder at Cory, each larger and faster than the last. It was all Cory could do to dodge them, and things were starting to get tense. The idea of a counterattack was practically a non-starter at this point.
"This… really isn't good, is it?" Sango whispered, swallowing.
"Come on, Cory," Cynthia pleaded, holding her hand over her chest. "I know you can do it, please, you can get her!"
"Elaina, just because your pokemon is more powerful than Cory is, that doesn't mean we're going to give up, you should know that by now!" Blake shouted. "And just because you're threatening to overpower us with that harmonia of yours, that doesn't mean for an instant that either one of us is going to back down."
"More pretty words, and what can you accomplish with them?!" Elaina demanded. "Not a damn thing! Just give up already!"
"You give up!" Blake countered, with all the maturity of a whiny kid on the schoolyard. He didn't care how it sounded, though. "Just give up on trying to keep your heart closed off! It's only causing you more and more pain, Elaina! You won't be able to find happiness as long as you keep pretending that there's some magic future you can get to, where you can be happy without having to take any risks or let anyone in!"
Elaina would not accept the truth in his words. It never even crossed her mind, because she refused to let it. So she did what she did when faced with anything she hated; she lashed out in rage, the wind tearing the sky around her.
"I'm upset that you keep lashing out like this, Elaina," Blake said, bracing himself against the wind striking him in the face. "But thanks to that, I've finally figured out what I can do to reach you, so I'm glad."
That sent a chill down Elaina's spine. She didn't know what it was that Blake was considering, or what he could possibly do to "reach her" but she was terrified of finding out. All she had left to shield her heart, to prevent people from reaching out to her…
She shook her head and banished those feelings of doubt from her heart. Locking them away behind her mask like all her other fears and doubts, hardening her heart behind a porcelain mask, forcing herself to be strong.
She clenched her hands, and directed her energy into Hope. Everything she had, it was pushed forward into her pokemon, to unleash the most devastating attack she had yet. An attack aimed not at Cory, but at Blake.
"Rock slide!" She roared.
"Minior!" Hope's voice was like a droning grunt. They spun, and a massive wave of stones reared up, rolling towards Blake.
"N-No!" Elaina gasped in shock as she saw the stones falling towards him. She… she hadn't meant to do it! She had just… she'd just gotten so angry, and wanted to shut him up, and her mind had blended together with Hope, and she hadn't been thinking clearly. Her anger must have made Hope turn on Blake, attacking him like he was his Crawdaunt…
"BLAKE!" Elaina screamed, nearly falling over as her face went as white as the mask it hid behind. Suddenly, it didn't matter anymore, keeping up her defenses or keeping him from reaching her. She just wanted to take it back! But she couldn't, the rocks were already raining down upon him.
"BLAKE!" Ayame sprung into action immediately, running forward at top speed and jumping up to the stage, but she couldn't get past the green bubble of the trick room. She pounded against it, screaming tearfully as she watched helplessly as her boyfriend was about to face his end. Claire was right beside her, tears streaming down her face and banging against the barrier herself.
Everyone else was momentarily in shock, a chorus of screams and cries ringing out. Elaina had hurt a lot of people before, but no one could see Blake making it out of this alive.
Luckily, there was nothing to worry about. None of them could get to him in time, but Cory could. He turned and shot forward, his body wrapped in water as he charged with aqua jet, leaping in front of his trainer. Raising his pincers, a protective barrier appeared around him, shielding the two of them from the onslaught just in time.
When the dust settled, a mountain of rubble covered Blake's side of the battlefield, along with the hovering stones surrounding it as well. And in the center was a sphere of blue light, which protected Blake from the attack.
Everyone breathed a collective sigh of relief as the barrier dropped, revealing Blake to be fine. Elaina was no exception.
"He made it out okay…" Cynthia sighed, holding her hand over her pounding heart. Ayame fell back, her cool façade shattered as she smiled in relief.
"It was nothing to be concerned about," Dokukage assured them. "Someone trained by a ninja such as myself would never succumb to such an attack."
Inside, he was saying something a little different. HOLY FUCKING SHIT! I FUCKING KNEW IT! I KNEW THAT WAS GOING TO FUCKING HAPPEN, THAT FUCKING IDIOT NEARLY GOT HIMSELF FUCKING KILLED! SHIT, IF WORD OF THE FACT THAT I LET HIM GO INTO THIS BATTLE AND TRAINED HIM GETS OUT, I'M SO FUCKING SCREWED, FUCK, SHIT, FUCK!
"Well, that was quite something," Gerard said. Even he had looked a little shaken at the thought of Elaina actually killing Blake in the battle. But he passed it off well with a calm smile on his face, turning his attention to Sylvia, who had moved up to stand next to him. "It even rattled you, didn't it, Sylvia? Quite a surprise."
"Oh?" Sylvia asked, tilting her head to the side and smiling coolly. "I don't know what you're talking about, Gerard."
"I didn't think you would be the kind of girl who would care so deeply about Blake Harker's wellbeing," Gerard mused. "Getting all worked up over his safety."
Sylvia continued to play dumb with her smile. "Oh?"
"So you're saying I didn't feel that surge of murderous rage when that rock slide went off?" Gerard asked. "It's quite curious. You don't seem to be the type to make attachments like that. What is Blake Harker to you, anyway? What happened during those two weeks you were off on your little honeymoon?"
"I think you best tread lightly, Gerard," Sylvia warned, her smile taking on a dangerous edge. "That isn't a road you want to go down. You best focus on your little doll. I think she's starting to break, just a little. Better watch out someone else doesn't start playing with her instead."
Gerard narrowed his eyes into a glare. He didn't respond.
"That… was certainly something," Blake said, wiping the sweat from his brow. He'd nearly shit his pants thinking that was the end. But now that he was okay, it was time to keep going. "Elaina… how are you feeling right now?"
Elaina was so shaken she couldn't even answer that question. "I… I just…"
"I told you before, that I found the way to help you, and I meant it!" Blake said. "Now, Cory, go! Aqua jet!"
Cory covered his body with water, and leapt off the ground, landing on the rubble and climbing up it as he approached Hope, hovering up above.
"You think you can reach my Hope?" Elaina couldn't believe it. The shock of seeing Blake nearly get buried had caused her harmonia to temporarily snap, but by focusing her harmonia again she was ready to strike back. "Not a chance!"
"That 'Hope' of yours is exactly the problem!" Blake shouted. Cory leapt off the pile of rubble and landed on one of the larger stealth rocks hovering around the field. It scraped against him, but it wasn't nearly enough to finish him off.
As stones fell down upon Cory, his speed increased as he jumped from rock to rock, approaching Hope faster and faster.
"You've been hiding this whole time, behind that mask of yours, and behind the false hope that your Minior gives you," Blake said. "I don't… I don't know what happened, or what they mean to you, or why you put so much faith in them. But clinging to that false delusion that things will work out, it's preventing you from taking the steps to really save yourself, Elaina! And that's why… I'm going to defeat that 'Hope' of yours and finally snap some sense into you!"
Cory jumped from the last stone, right upon Hope. He raised his pincer and struck, but the attack just harmlessly bounced off the pokemon's rough exterior.
"That won't be nearly enough!" Elaina shouted. "Our defenses can't be beaten by something like-"
"Cory, now!" Blake shouted. "Endeavor!"
Cynthia's eyes widened, and the cheer that erupted from her throat was nearly as loud as Cory's roar.
"CRAWDAUNT!" Cory shouted, glowing with bright white light. Energy gathered into his shell and he released it, sending a massive shockwave of power out that slammed into Hope. Endeavor didn't care how strong Elaina had raised her pokemon's defenses, it struck Hope's HP directly.
The backlash was immediate. Overwhelming pain surged through Elaina as her Minior tumbled out of the sky. Fragments of Hope's shell began to break off, revealing the bright light underneath.
A long crack appeared across the surface of Elaina's mask.
With a little help from an old trick of Cynthia's, Elaina's defenses have finally begun to crack! Will Blake manage to get through to her, and bring her back? Next chapter, the battle for Elaina's future comes to its thrilling conclusion!