My name is Chase Blake. Not too long ago I was a human living a human life with a loving family. Then I up and died like a jackass and wound up here, in the world of Pokémon. No idea what world, no idea what timeline, no idea even what I am supposed to do besides some slurred words from what I think was a drunk mew. I was having an existential crisis and panic attack at the time so my memory is a little fuzzy on the details. That's even counting my new levels of memory since I became a Pokémon. Oh and I also got turned into a Pokémon too, yay me.
After a week of crying, running, starving, etc.. I got my shit together and stopped trying to figure out why and started moving forward. Forward being south as winter was something I didn't want to even think about trying to survive. I had no doubt I would die without the berry bushes that grew so abundantly.
It took me until my second week of travel to notice something strange. I had avoided other Pokémon as much as I could, but they in turn also did everything to run from me on sight. I understood them too surprisingly. At least it surprised me at the time. All the shouts of alarm, curses, panic, I understood what they were saying even if their mouths didn't quite match the words I was hearing, like a dubbed anime only they half assed the mouth animations. I had to actively stare at their mouths to notice so it was easy enough to ignore.
The weeks passed as I adjusted to my small four legged form. The fur was nice but keeping it clean was an absolute bitch. I could complain for hours relearning how to use the bathroom, but I don't want to retell that particular horror show. I was just thankful I was still a guy, scared me for the longest time as my junk just wasn't there until I had to use it. Child friendly world I guessed and never looked into it again. I started out in a forest and after three or four weeks I found myself in yet more forest. Honestly it was starting to get boring even if the sight of new types of trees, amazing views, and untamed nature always left me in awe. But where the forest I began in was mostly pines and other evergreens, the ones I found myself in now were related to birch trees by the bark coloring. White trunks with oak and maple trees were everywhere. I'd snap a picture if I had anything to do so.
As night fell on the last night of my first month in the world of Pokémon I stared up at the unfamiliar stars and moon. A vast expansive galaxy stretched far from one horizon to the other, interspaced within were various shades of red, blue and purple. In what I thought was the center of the beautiful collision of star nurseries was a bulge where the three colors mixed beautifully like clouds on a gas giant. White, red, and pale blue dots of various sizes made up constellations that I could only guess at, but were as beautiful as they were countless in number. As I sat there that night, staring at foreign stars in a foreign world, I began to cry. Not for what I had lost, but for what my family would never get to see.
That and the crippling loneliness, but I'll deny that till my dying breath.
I didn't sleep much that night. I stayed up and talked to myself, not out loud but I started thinking about what I wanted to do. What I was going to do here in this world. Everything I knew of Pokémon was hazy, but I could still remember all of the games, the first three regions stories in the manga, and parts of the anime. My memory wouldn't hold up, I knew it wouldn't as I had a horrible memory as a human, so I wouldn't beat myself up about the less important memories slipping away. As long as I remembered my family and where I came from I knew I would be fine.
'It will be alright.' I thought to myself, 'All the stories worked out for the better. If this is my second chance I'm going to use it.' I narrowed my eyes at the moon above, 'I'm going to take this world by storm. The whole world will remember me, that's a promise. For better or worse it will remember me.'
With a promise made to myself I set myself down a path a torture, torment, and grueling agony. It began the very next day when I started doing the one thing my former fat self was too lazy to do. I started working out, or in Pokémon terms training.
My first attempts at using Pokémon moves were disastrous. An attempted dark pulse had left me in a crater with a massive headache. I had sworn off using any moves till I got a teacher after repeated attempts at dark moves did nothing but blow up in my face. Incidentally that was also when I figured out I have an energy field of some sort. It sits directly on top of my skin and only really becomes noticeable after I get hit with a move. Anything non magical in nature just goes right past it. Thank the multitude of brier patches for that discovery.
I also worked out a time system so that I wouldn't go insane. Until I figured out what month it was here and the day I decided to document in my head that my arrival was month one, day one. Each odd month would have five weeks and each even would have four. So as not to confuse myself and to help me keep track of my progress until I got to civilization.
The fifth week of the first month I spent trying to use the move Quick Attack. A normal type of attack that hopefully wouldn't blow up in my face. While the plan had been to find a teacher I couldn't help myself but to keep trying. It seemed like the easiest thing to do in theory, just gather some energy and move fast towards your target, it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure that out. I could feel the energy inside me but I had the instinctive feeling that it wasn't normal type energy. Try and try as I might I just wasn't able to get the Quick Attack to work as I couldn't summon any normal type energy at all.
Week one of the second month came and it was getting warmer as I kept moving down south. In my head I went over every piece of Pokémon knowledge that I could remember from official to fan made. I decided to try meditating. It seemed like the most cliche thing to do so I figured it's either going to work or it'll disprove a cliche, win-win in my book.
Through week one of month two I kept at it. Meditating through the night and moving during the day. I only needed about four hours of sleep, something I think had to do with my dark typing on top of never using the energy I had inside me to battle, but I digress. The meditation did help me get a sixth sense of sorts. After I started feeling my dark energy I began to feel other Pokémon's energies too. Grass types were the most common, right next to bug and flying. Other types passed by me too though they never got close enough for me to know what they were.
By the end of week two in month two I had meditation down and I could feel my dark type energy within myself as easily as I could breath. I felt no other energies besides my dark typing within me. I knew Zorua's were able to learn normal type moves at least though so I was confused. A stray thought hit me when I was thinking of being stuck only using my dark typing, 'At least I'll have the Same Type Advantage Boost when I use my dark-type moves... Wait a minute, why do STAB moves hit harder than regular moves?'
This line of thought led me to the realization that Pokémon had massive power for their type of moves because it was their power. So where did they get the energy for their other moves? Where else than the very world around them.
On the first day of week three, month two I put my thoughts to practice and tried to pull energy from the air around me to my body. It was a slow trickle at first, and the energy felt neutral, like it was shifting even as I felt it. A stray thought and I felt the energy start to burn like fire. I was taken back at first and let go of the sensation. The energy faded away and I couldn't stop a smile from forming on my muzzle. I had figured it out, now the training could finally begin.
The next few days I spent getting a feel for the energies, trying to pull them in faster and make them into what I wanted as quickly as I could. I assumed this type of training would cut down on the time between attacks or cut any build up I might need to actually use an attack. Any moment I could spare I would meditate. My physical training, if one could call running around and jumping off various things in the woods training, took a back seat.
My first task was to gather the energy that I could make in front of me like a ball. I cycled through grass, bug, flying, normal, and the accidental fire energy. Normal felt the strongest besides my natural dark type. I could feel bug only slightly weaker than the others I tried, but all of them felt like smoke. They needed something, what I could only guess was a move, in order for them to actually manifest. I do remember Zoroark didn't have the greatest move pool. It, like many others, had to use TMs for type coverage. That's how the one I had in White 2 was like anyway, but I never was that good at meta gaming Pokémon so I could be entirely wrong.
Beginning week four I started off small. Scratch and Fury Swipes, two staples of normal type moves and all I had to do was focus the energy into the claws on my paws. It took me a day to get the moves down and the surrounding trees were the perfect targets. It wasn't without its mishaps though. The very first attempt I collected energy for a Scratch for five minutes before rushing the closest tree and using said move. The tree was cut straight through along the three diagonal lines my claws caused. The sight was the coolest thing I had seen yet in this world.
Testing after that was with much less power and in a much farther away area as the display of power also scared me. It even made a few dozen of the local Pokémon cry out from wherever they were hiding. Fury Swipes was much the same, only the energy crept further up my legs and made the repeated movements faster and more fluid while losing power behind the strikes.
Nearing the end of week four, month two, I suppressed my fear of my dark type energy blowing up in my face and tried one of the only dark type moves I knew off the top of my head. I gathered the dark type energy in my right forepaw, jumped up into the air and sliced towards a boulder some ten feet away. The energy flared up and then faded away with nothing happening, it seems the Night Slash wasn't meant to be. I racked my mind for another dark type move and Hone Claws jumped to mind. The move was a staple of my Liepard through White 1 and I thought that maybe I could use it now.
I focused the dark typing into my claws and imagined them getting stronger and sharper. After I let the energy go consciously it refused to leave my claws. The claws had glowed with an unearthly white light. It was dim but I could feel the power in them, making them sharper. Slowly over the course of four to five minutes the energy dissipated and I smiled. I had learned my first dark type move.
Week one of month three I found myself in a bit of a situation. There were mountains in front of me. High mountains that had snow gathering in their peaks and a great many steep cliffs around them. As I reached the foot of one of the mountains, where the trees started to become sparse and rocky terrain became the norm, I decided to set up a camp of sorts. Pokémon were few and far between around here, besides the slumbering slash hiding ground and rock types, so I could train in somewhat peace.
With the surrounding ground and rock types as an example I decided to try and gauge my power in comparison. I could feel their energies in them, their pools of power inside their cores differed from Pokémon to Pokémon. The smaller ones, Geodudes, Slandslashes, a rocky Minior and others were like a small kiddie pool. Larger ones like the sleeping Onix, the digging Dugtrio, or the completely sand covered Hippowdon were the size of large community pools, the larger kind with diving boards attached before they got taken out for legality reasons. The sizes varied greatly and it was anywhere in between.
'Maybe it was a matter of perspective but my power feels like an ocean in comparison...' The thought had sent my mind to a screeching halt. My meditation ended as I lost concentration and the rock energy I had been gathering faded away into the air, 'That makes too much sense.' I thought to myself. In my past life animals ran away from danger, when a predator came by they would hide and wait until it was safe again. I thought this in the earlier days but dismissed it as Pokémon are portrayed as battle hungry most of the time.
Despite the unconfirmed discovery I stayed true to my training plan and started practicing moves on the rocks and trees nearby that weren't hiding Pokémon. Almost naturally my moves came from me now. A mere thought and the minimum required energy was at my paws. After trying a Quick Attack again with dark energy I accidently used Pursuit as my mind called it. I remember the move now but it took seeing how it performed to remember what it was called. I would continue to refine them until I could call upon their maxed out power versions without a single second of build up time. This training would continue through week two and three of month three.
It was during week four that I had an amazing discovery. One night I was lying down, looking at the stars and trying to remember the types of shows in my old world that I could steal moves from. If I was a Lucario you bet your ass I would be turning the Aura Sphere into a Kamehameha from Dragon Ball, natural feeling or not I'd make it happen. I'll have to settle for trying to remake Double Sunday with two Dark Pulses, or any move that I can make in one paw. Along that line of thought I started thinking about other powers in Dragon Ball, particularly how they are able to suppress them. As I was laying in the grass I felt for my dark-type energy and for the first time I turned my mind outwards and saw the dark energy radiating out from me like a beacon. I assumed my meditative stance, or as it looked, I just sat up and closed my eyes.
In my mind I saw my dark type energy, I saw it as a swirling abyss from which there was no end in sight. I saw its tendrils stretching out in all directions, as if ready for something. I imagined two large hands slowly closing in on that energy, condensing it. With great reluctance, and more than a few hours of effort, I felt the energy start to give way. Slowly it started to creep back towards me. Ever so slowly did my power start to lower.
I heard a crack somewhere in front of me and it broke my concentration. I had opened my eyes and saw one of the Gravelers had started to move and it looked at me with narrowed eyes. The energy I had held back snapped back into place at his look. The Graveler's eyes widened and he quickly returned to trying to look like a rock. I was up the next moment and I was happy that the Graveler had looked away as my legs felt like jelly and my heart was pounding.
After that night I no longer tried to suppress my power, not until I learned how to fight. My thought process was one of fear at the time. Fear of the inevitability of fighting, fear of what would happen if I lost a fight in the wild, fear of the world around me for the first time since my first few weeks here.
Without much ceremony, week five of month three I left my little territory and began following the edge of the forest around the first mountain. I followed the fertile valleys and only climbed rocky terrain when I had no other choice. The most annoying part was traversing up, down, and around the hollers that dotted the area.
The days passed without much happening. I walked from dawn to midafternoon, eating berries whenever I found them. Then I would meditate till night came and then I would practice on my moves and how quickly I could gather the energy for them. Pokémon continued to hide from me and I couldn't help but feel alone, even suppressing the emotion as much as I could.
It took until week two of month four, fifteen weeks, one-hundred and five fucking days, until I remembered this one fact. My ability was to make illusions.
I had seen a Spritzee darting between the blooming pink rose trees that I had found myself in. My thought at the time was, 'The seasons here are really messed up. The trees were acting like it was fall a couple dozen miles back.' my second thought was, 'Damn, that is one bright pink Pokémon though.' which led to the last thought of, 'Wonder if it's a Mew in disguise watching me?' After I was done chuckling at my own joke I thought about it. The more I thought about it the more something was nagging at the back of my head. Something about disguises made the revelation in my brain finally click.
'Oh my god I'm a Zorua... I'm the 'master of illusions' Pokémon.'
That led to all of week two of month four being devoted to my ability. I skipped out on training my moves that night and focused entirely on my mind. In the movie Zorua and Zoroark could take the appearance of Pokémon and Zoroark could create illusions real enough to trap legendaries and an entire city even if only for a small time. My mind was spinning from the thought of it. Finishing whole fights without ever leaving the safety of my illusions. Cowardly thoughts but damn if I wasn't going to abuse my own powers.
The tendrils that came off my dark type core, the ones that were all around my body, were not present on any other dark type that I had seen. When I first saw this I thought it was just a matter of perspective. That everyone saw their own energy as tendrils surrounding them, but I started thinking that wasn't the case. Looking at any Pokémon I saw their power condensed into the energy barrier that surrounded them. No swirling, no tendrils, hardly any movement at all.
By the third day of week two I had a good understanding of each tendril that was wrapped around my core and I could make them appear or disappear at will. I thought of what the Zorua and the Zoroark did in the movie to change into different Pokémon and I tried to replicate it. In my mind I envisioned a Pikachu, a Pokémon that everyone knows, and then I jumped into the air and focused on the tendrils of dark energy. The tendrils turned into sharp spikes that stretched about a foot out from my body. My vision turned white for a moment and then the spikes of dark energy broke apart completely and turned into an aura around me.
I landed on all fours and stood up comfortably on my rear paws. Everything felt different, my perspective felt just a bit higher, my body felt off, my vision just a bit wider to the sides. I pulled up my forepaws and saw fuzzy yellow paw-like hands. I turned around and saw the trademarked lightning bolt tail. A grin spread across my muzzle as I realized just how utterly broken a power like this was. If people didn't have a way to see through my illusions I could just turn into a legendary and start a cult. Replace the right person and I could take over the world fairly easily.
I wouldn't but that doesn't mean I couldn't.
I decided to test it more, in the games a single hit broke an illusion no matter the strength, but in the movie Zorua had been able to take some damage while illusioned as Celebi. Though that might have been me misremembering the movie I still tried to test it. Moving in the form felt kind of natural in a weird way. The less I thought about it being a completely different body the more easily I moved. And move I did as I rammed straight into a tree for the test.
The pain made me grit my teeth but my dark aura, which I took a guess was making the real illusion, didn't so much as flicker. I was surprised at the results. I fully expected the illusion to shatter the moment something so much as grazed me, but instead the opposite happened. The illusion was held with no issue whatsoever. My next thought was that it had to be a move using energy to disrupt my illusion. Without a Pokémon willing to fight, me included, I decided that test could wait.
The rest of week two, month four was spent taking different forms and moving around in them. My favorite thing I found during this time was my evolved form. I don't know if it was instinctual or something else but the form felt amazing to be in. I changed forms often though. It was training that I could do while moving so I did it everyday when I was walking. I would take the form of a random Pokémon I either remembered or saw and I would spend time just learning them, from how they walked to how they saw the world. The speed at which I moved through the mountain range slowed to a crawl but I was making progress regardless.
Small side point I learned was changing into something smaller than me, like a Joltic, had some interesting results as it felt very hard to move. It will take some more testing at a later date to figure out if it's a weight thing, a size problem, or a control issue.
The two weeks that followed I spent constantly changing into different Pokémon and it completely changed how I saw the world around me. No longer was it as scary as it was before, a simple shift into something different, suppression of my power, and I was able to hide from anything that might want to hurt me. Change into a Salamence and I was even more feared than I already was. Flying still eluded me though as I think flying type Pokémon use flying type energy in some capacity when they fly. It honestly seems like everything in this world came back to energy.
If everything did come back to energy I couldn't wait to see how humans in this world differed from mine.
During this time I started trying new things with the energies I could gather. Dark type was the most malleable and I started trying different types of moves that I could remember. It wasn't much but I had found one more move whose name popped up in my head once I learned it. Sadly Night Slash was not the move and still eluded me.
It was week one of month five when things changed.
I don't know when it started but Pokémon around me had more and more power at their disposal. None of them reached my reserves yet but it was concerning nonetheless. On top of the Pokémon around me being stronger, a storm was blowing in. I had experienced dreary days and nights in the rain before but it was always a light drizzle that did nothing more than get things wet. There was a sinking feeling in my gut as I watched the storm clouds grow closer and darken even more. Thunder became a constant companion, then rain and lighting joined me as well. A part of me, at the time, wanted nothing more than to turn into a Golem or Onix and take shelter from the storm.
I never got to try that sadly before I was attacked.
I felt an energy flare to my right and side swipe me completely. My world was sent spinning and my side lit up with pain. The Kecleon illusion I had been holding shattered and I felt my fur become covered in mud as I slid across the ground. I'd prepared for this though. I was up on my paws fast enough to surprise even myself. Some ten feet from me was a Riolu. It said nothing but its legs were shaking. Its teeth were clenched like it was growling and its eyes spoke of concentration.
The Riolu's forepaws were brought up in a very poor boxing stance with the backs of its paws facing me. I could see the small ovals of steel that would turn into spikes when it evolved. The two aura sensors on its head were not being used I assumed as they stayed limp.
Honestly this might be the worst match up I could think of. He has me on type advantage, his aura sight might be able to see through my illusions, and if he's willing to fight me when nothing else will he's got experience battling. Experience that I don't have.
At the time almost a full minute passed with us just staring each other down as the rain fell. I was making plans in my head, what forms to change into, moves to use, the power of said moves, ect. The Riolu was the first to break the silence though.
"F-fight me!" a definitely male voice shouted. With that little stutter I took a moment and sensed his power. His well of fighting type energy was fairly small, especially for the amount of energy the local Pokémon had. Level wise he'd have to be around... fifteen? Maybe? It was definitely on the low end. Just like that my worry about fighting him evaporated into thin air.
"Why?" I asked honestly. Every scenario in my head for my first fight was always me wandering into some ancient Pokémon's territory and being forced to fight for my life. I entertained the idea of battling some random Pokémon but I could have all the power in the world and still be as inexperienced as a child when it came to fighting. I held no mental illusions of that.
"What?" he seemed taken back, "What do you mean 'why'? We're supposed to fight now. Tha-that's how it works. I'll put up a good fight! I'm no weakling!"
My only thought at the time was how much of a weakling he was to be honest, but I liked his style. He chose the biggest, baddest Pokémon he could find and pretty much said 'Fight me bitch.'
A full on smile spread across my muzzle, "Fine I'll fight you, but I want something out of it when I win."
Now worry spread across his face, "Like w-what?"
"You'll have to follow me around and answer any question I ask." even in my head I sounded desperate, but I was lonely damn it.
Riolu's eyes narrowed, "What do I get if I win?"
"A fight and what I think will be one of your first wins." I stated honestly, "Heck when you lose I'll even show you a thing or two about how to fight." blatant lie as I didn't know shit beyond what I've haphazardly put together over the past few months.
"Fine." he nodded his head, "I accept your challenge."
"I'll let you have the first move."
And move he did. The moment the words left my mouth he was enveloped in a silver glow and rushed at me with a Quick Attack. The move connected and I was slammed backwards into a tree. The pain was a secondary thought, my mind almost seemed to naturally block it out. I saw him start gathering the energy for another Quick Attack and I knew he would win if he just spammed the move before I could react.
I enveloped myself with my dark energy and shot towards him with a quickly made pursuit. He was taken by surprise and was tossed back through the trees he had come from. I kept my eye on him and watched him roll to a stop and facing straight towards the stormy sky. Normal type energy gathered in my claws for Fury Swipes as I ran as fast as my four legs could carry me. The energy wasn't needed though.
As I got closer and he still didn't move I slowed down but kept the Fury Swipes at the ready on low power. I could see the rise and fall of his chest so he wasn't dead. That would have been a horrible first battle, not to mention traumatizing, if my attack had killed him. I cast out my sensing powers and felt that the barrier around his body was gone and his fighting type energy was sucking in the surrounding natural energy.
My mind worked with this new information, 'When a Pokémon gets knocked out they go into full recovery mode. In just a couple hours, with how that energy is spreading through his body, he'd be fully healed.' a cough brought to my attention that he was facing the raining sky with his mouth open.
I rolled my eyes before rolling him onto his side in the 'passed out drunk' position. Then I sat there wondering just what the hell I was supposed to do with a knocked out Riolu that could barely put up a fight. I turned myself into a Pidgeot and extended a wing out over the unconscious Pokémon while I tried to think about my situation.
The sky overhead poured rain, thunder and lighting filling the area with noise and light respectively. With the moment to focus on myself and not my surroundings I looked over at my outstretched wing. I could see the water clung to my feathers. I could feel it becoming completely drenched. After about a minute the whole wing was waterlogged and I could feel the weight of each feather there.
And at the same time I couldn't feel anything, 'Damn this is so weird now that I'm noticing it.'
While not part of the illusion I could still feel my body through some means. It was distant, like an echo, but if I focused I could feel my whole Zorua body simply floating somewhere. Then there's my current wing. While I can feel it, it's ever so slightly delayed and muted. Phantom sensations on my, currently fake, corporeal form. Tracing the line of sensation it went from the wing to my dark core and then to my body wherever the hell it was. This line of thought took some minutes to reach and I had stopped paying attention to my surroundings.
It was only a moment that I wasn't paying attention but it was more than enough. Something slammed into my back from the forest and I was thrown into a nearby brier patch as my illusion was broken, "Out of my way." I was quick to turn around, even as the thorny plants pulled at my fur and skin, and saw the massive form of a Victreebel, "I have you now you little thief." One of its vines wrapped around the unconscious Riolu.
My pursuit was up and I was rushing at the Pokémon before I could even think about what it said. The grass type was able to hop backwards once in surprise before the attack hit it dead center. Riolu was dropped and Victreebel slid along the slick ground for a few meters. Its eyes locked with mine and the Victreebel screeched in rage. A Vine Whip slammed into my side too quickly for me to see. The attack sent me to the ground but I rolled with the hit and was back up on my paws the next moment. I felt my dark energy gather in my paws and my Hone Claws took effect as the Victreebel stared me down.
Victreebel leaned its whole body back before it snapped back towards me and a big glob of purple energy shot out of its mouth. I didn't know what the move was, but the glob was moving much slower than its vines did, allowing me to dodge the attack. Then another one came and I dodged that one too, then a third, and a fourth. The eyes that I could see on the thing were leering at me in rage. A fifth shot sailed over my head and I took the opportunity.
Dark energy gathered around my body as I used Pursuit. I slammed into the Victeebel with all the energy I could gather in a few seconds' time frame. It let out a howl of pain before its vines surprised me and shot towards me. Five of the Vine Whips were wrapped around my body before I could even touch the ground from my last attack. One around each leg and another around my midsection. I was brought up to eye level with the Pokémon before it just roared in my face, "You dare protect this thief?! Then you shall face the same punishment!"
My mind went into overdrive as the vines started pressing down on my body. Fear for my life made my adrenaline start pumping and my energy start flaring. My barrier was holding but my energy was dropping much too fast for my liking. A quick glance at Riolu told me he was out for the count. There would be no rescue for me here, I would die if I didn't do something. I stared at the offending Pokémon with malice in my eyes. At the time the thought that he wouldn't kill me never even crossed my mind. All I could think of was the worst case senario and I responded in kind, 'You can't kill me if I kill you first.'
Darkness gathered around me as thunder and lightning boomed overhead. A bottle neck for my power in my core became apparent as I drew as much power as I could for my next move. To gather the power faster I drew power away from my barrier for this attack to make sure the Victreebel wouldn't be getting back up. In my mind I envisioned my dark energy gathering around me, I felt his vines tighten. I refused to lose concentration though and my eyes locked with it. Something clicked in my head and I felt my eyes flash for a moment.
A large push of my will and the Night Daze attack surged forth from me. A black, pink, and crimson sphere pushed outwards from my body and slammed into everything around me with the force of a cannon.
Its vines were torn apart and it let out a cry of pain as an explosion of energy flung us in different directions. My eyes snapped shut as I was thrown right back into the same stupid brier patch. I didn't bother with trying to see what happened to the Victreebel, instead I brought my muzzle to my closest leg and started tearing off what was left of the vines. Once one leg was done the others followed quickly as Scratch made quick work of the offending greenery.
Despite the knicks and cuts that somehow got through my fur I pushed my way out of the brier patch and took a deep breath. Said breath immediately hitched in my throat as I saw the damage my attack had done.
The closest trees to my blast were toppled over and any that weren't had their bark torn off. There was now a hole in the ground about a foot deep and three wide that was quickly filling with water and mud. The ground was covered with various leaves that had been forced out of trees and the stormy day seemed darker with how much dark energy was in the clearing. Lightning flashed and I could see the Victreebel some twenty yards away under a downed tree.
It was still conscious. I could tell from the glare it was shooting my way even as it was trapped under a shattered tree trunk. I dared not engage with another Pursuit. I had the energy to spare, but I could feel my body's fatigue. I was tired despite having so much energy left to burn and my barrier was dangerously low. On top of that there's Night Daze, the move was uncooperative at even the best of times. With so many things wrong and things I didn't know I did the only thing that I could think of.
I turned myself into a Zoroark, grabbed the little Riolu, and fucking booked it as fast as I could back the way I came. With how the Pokémon kept getting stronger by the day on my path of going around the mountain range. I held no illusions that the situation would get better if I continued, so I went back. I was in the middle of the wilderness, nothing was forcing me to take the path I had been on. There were mountain paths that I had avoided as they had seemed too dangerous. Compared to the higher level Pokémon I was finding though I'd take the risk of falling over fighting anyday.
Mud and water splashed up behind me from my clawed paws. I made a sudden right turn and started suppressing my power. Running would do me no good if I was shooting up a metaphorical flare saying 'Hey I'm over here'.
After a few minutes of running, and with my power suppressed as much as I could, I jumped onto the nearest tree branch and began going as far away from the area as I could. Any time I touched the ground I changed direction slightly. I used as much finesse as I could to not leave claw marks on the branches.
It would be hours later before I felt safe enough to rest. Riolu was still out cold and I was about to pass out as the adrenalin left my system. This moment was the closest I had ever been to feinting and it would be a memorable one.
As I layed there as a Zorua, under the leaves of what looked like a dogwood tree, my power started to seep into my barrier to replenish it. The rain had even let up a little bit. It was now a soft background noise, perfect for falling asleep too. My mind wanted to run through everything that I had just gone through but my body was having none of it. It was only a few moments after laying on the wet ground that sleep took me.
~Scene Change~
As I began to wake up I became aware of something. There was a feeling of pressure along my back and something was wrapped around my body. My thoughts immediately went to the Victreebel from the previous night and my adrenaline starts pumping. That adrenaline came crashing back down as I heard a very child-like whimper behind me. I felt paws pull me into a crushing hug as, who I assume was the Riolu, cried into my back.
I took a deep breath as memories of after the fight came back to me. Rushing through the forest, focused on being as impossible to track as I could, not getting a single moment for my thoughts as we ran. I calmed myself down and focused my attention on myself.
Much to my surprise I felt no pain from the attacks I had been hit by. My back and side felt fine and the nicks and scratches I had gotten from the damn brier bushes had seemingly disappeared. My power was also back to full as well.
Riolu shivered and my mind flashed with an old memory. A memory of my niece, one night after she had a nightmare, laying her head on her favorite pillow which just had to be on top of my, now numb, arm. Cartoons played on the tv for her as I secretly watched YouTube on my phone. I looked over as she slightly shifted and snuggled up closer to me before pulling her blanket to her chin. I smiled and-I shook my head to clear the memory before the waterworks came.
I started repressing what energy had leaked out over the night as I tried to wiggle out of the iron grip of the fighting type. We needed to get moving soon, the Victreebel could still be looking for us. However, with Riolu holding onto me for dear life I couldn't transform into anything that would get me out of this situation. I was stuck here till Riolu woke up and decided to release me, so I decided to look around the area I had brought us to.
With it being a forest there were of course trees, bushes and all sorts of leaves on the ground. Sticks of every size too as the storm had brought many branches to the forest floor. Beyond the closest trees I could make out the darting shapes of Pokémon. A Pidgey flew past. A Flebebe landed on a flower for a few seconds and then took off again. I could barely see two Nidorinos ramming heads a few trees away. So much life even with everything from the tops of the trees to the ground itself soaked all the way through, myself and company included. A pleasant scent wafted through the trees. It smelled like pine and rain, obviously, but with a bit of something mixed in. Berries were nearby and just the thought made my stomach growl. Apparently the fighting had taken a lot more out of me than I thought. Usually I was able to go a day or two without eating when I was just training, 'My first two fights and it'll be the lack of food that does me in, ha!'
My stomach growling must have started a chain reaction as Riolu's stomach also growled and one of his paws let go of me. I was quick to roll to my new found freedom and immediately did the most canine thing ever and shook myself free of all the water that had found its home in my fur.
"Hey, watch it!" an annoyed voice behind me called out. I turned to see Riolu covering his face with both his paws.
"You watch it." I replied childishly, "Now up and at 'em! I want to get some food before we set out and find a training area."
"What?" Riolu looked at me confused, "Wait, where am I and who are-ow!" Riolu scrambled to his feet and immediately hit his head on a low branch.
"My name is Chase, you fought me yesterday. You hit me with a sneak attack, we made a bet, we fought each other, I won, any of that ringing any bells?"
"No." Riolu moved out from under the tree and shook himself as dry as he could, "The Pokémon I fought was a monster. I'd never felt so much power from a single Pokémon since I last saw my parents."
"Thank you for the compliment, though if you had stayed awake a little while longer a Victreebel attacked us" Riolu's eyes narrowed, "and it was almost as strong as me. Damn thing refused to stay down." I shook my head before I started my morning stretches.
"What happened to the Victreebel?"
I shrugged my shoulders, "I dunno. I wasn't about to stay there and fight it. I got one good hit in, grabbed you and ran. It was stuck under a tree last I saw it."
"You're lying." Riolu shook his head dismissively, "If he's the same one I'm thinking of then he's the strongest Pokémon in this section of the forest."
"I did, now come on, let's go find some berries to munch on." I started walking away from the tree we had spent the night in. After a few steps I heard Riolu's paws scurry up beside me and I smiled.
With the sounds of the forest all around us it made me realize just how silent it had been these past four months. This was the first time I was confident enough in myself to let my power stay suppressed and I was rewarded with the sounds of the Pokémon around us. I could hear small bits of conversations between distant Pokémon. I could hear them moving around in various ways from running along the forest floor, to jumping from the tree branches, and I even heard a few flying types in the canopy above us.
It was a wondrous moment of me realizing just how alive and full the world around me was and just how much I had missed out on for so long.
"So if you are the Pokémon," then Riolu started with the questions, "Then how come your power isn't as big as it was last night?"
"I'm suppressing it so that Victreebel can't sense me out." I answer and he looks at me with a confused look on his face.
"You can do that?" he asked and I nodded.
The same Flabebe from earlier floated up to my face with two small daffodils in its hand, "Good morning!" she said cheerfully before she put one flower behind my ear.
"Good morning." I said back with a smile.
"Good morning!" she said again as she put a flower behind Riolu's ear.
"Good morning." he replied and the Flabebe floated off.
I watched the little Pokémon float away for a few seconds before I started walking again, "I'm also keeping my power low for the Pokémon around here. Any time I don't have my power suppressed, all the Pokémon hide away."
"Oh," Riolu nodded his head, "That's nice of you, but you won't find very many good fights like that. You also don't have to keep it so low either. Most Pokémon haven't trained to be able to sense someone else's energy."
"Then why were they hiding from me when I didn't suppress my power?"
"Well when you get so strong your energy has a lot of weight to it and that presence is what they feel. You're strong enough that they can sense it without even wanting to." Riolu said as he looked at me weirdly, "You've had to of run into other strong Pokémon before you got so strong. You should know what it feels like."
"Not really, I'm still training. I haven't met that many Pokémon at all." I stopped and lifted my nose. After a few sniffs I started going in a slightly different direction.
"You're still training?" he asked, "With how strong you are I thought you would be going from territory to territory fighting the strongest Pokémon you could find."
"It may surprise you but I've actually only been in two fights." I kept walking even when I heard Riolu's steps stop behind me. After a few moments his steps quickly fell back into step beside me.
"How!? How are you so strong then? My mom and dad were trained Pokémon and they were only a little bit stronger than you."
That surprised me, "Really?" I shook my head, "I don't know how I'm so powerful. I just woke up one day to a drunk soundin Mew and found out I was a Zorua. Didn't exactly get a guide to what was going on."
"...What?" he cocked his head to the side, "You just woke up with Mew and you were a Zorua? What were you before?"
"A human." I stated honestly, "I remember dying, wouldn't recommend it by the way, then I woke up with Mew in front of me slurring her words like she just walked out of a bar. She teleported away mid-sentence and I was left in this body with no idea about anything."
"Wait wait wait wait wait." Riolu was shaking his head and came to a stop. I followed his lead this time and stopped. He held up his paw and the feeler, tear drop shaped things on the side of his head levitated outwards, "Say that again."
"So you're threatening me with a force palm?"
"What?" he opened his eyes, "No, I can read your aura and see if you're lying."
"That's pretty handy." I cleared my throat and sat down as Riolu closed his eyes again and made his dreadlocks float, "My name is Chase Blake. I remember dying, waking up to a drunk Mew, and then being left in the middle of nowhere with no idea what was going on. To this day I still have no idea why I'm here but I'm going to explore this world and make the most out of my second life."
We both stood there for a few moments before he opened his eyes again and lowered his paw, "You truly believe what you just said." I grinned from ear to ear that he believed me, "You're insane." that grin fell into a frown.
I shrugged, "Oh well, believe me or not I'm getting some food." I started walking away again and Riolu surprised me by falling into step beside me.
We walked in silence for all of a minute before Riolu spoke up again, "So if you are a human what region are you from?"
"A different world. That region." I said smiling.
His eyes widened, "What kind of Pokémon were there?"
I stepped over a tree root, "No Pokémon, just animals that didn't have any magical powers."
"So you had no Pokémon in your world?" Riolu questioned.
"Not really, not any real Pokémon anyway."
His eyebrows furrowed, "But you know what Pokémon are?"
I nodded my head as I looked around some more, "Yeah. There was a game that was really popular that featured them."
Riolu just shook his head, "I'm just, gonna stop..." he placed a paw on his head and started rubbing where his temple would be in small circular motions.
A few seconds of silence pass, "Would you rather me lie so you can feel better?"
Riolu shook his head no, "What kind of training do you do?" he switched up his questions.
"Well from dawn to about mid-afternoon, so a few hours before sunset, I walk and change shapes into different Pokémon using my ability." I punctuated this by jumping into the air and changing into Riolu, "Like this. I try to get used to the form while I'm walking and I'll switch it after a few hours." I looked at him with my trademark smirk.
"Whoa." his eyes were wide as he looked me over.
Before I could start talking again a root caught onto my paw and I fell to the ground. My paws shot out in front of me to stop me but upon hitting the ground they slid forward and my face met the cold, wet ground. Mud dripped from my muzzle as I lifted myself up. I could hear snickering behind me and I could tell then, it was going to be a long day.
"Need a paw?" Riolu asked as a paw filled the side of my vision.
I took the paw and hoisted myself up, "Thank you." I 'illusioned' away the Riolu form and all the mud fell to the ground. Then I illusioned my into a Zoroark and offered a clawed paw to Riolu, "Come on, we're taking too long and I actually want to eat before noon."
Riolu looked between the paw and the imprint of my face in the mud. I interrupted his line of thought, "I spend a lot of time in this form so you'll be fine."
"That is so much cooler than my ability," he said before taking my three clawed paw. I pulled him up to my shoulder and he nestled in between my head and the end of the large, black tuft of chest fur I had, "Can you transform into anything?"
"It's not really transforming technically. Real transforming is what Mew and Ditto can do and they can hold the forms until they get knocked out. Hold on." Once I felt him grab hold of my fur I jumped into the trees and quickly made my way towards the berry scent, "My illusions are broken the moment any move hits me, though I am trying to find a way to train my illusions to handle a few hits."
"I can help you with that," he said cheerfully, "You just need someone to hit your illusions right?"
"You just want to hit me don't you?" I asked with a raised eyebrow, though I wasn't really sure what that looked like.
"No." he answered, "I don't believe all the human stuff you were talking about but you are strong and if I help you then you'll help me right?"
I nodded my head, "You might not like my training. It's a lot of meditating and focusing your energy into different moves without using them while getting a feel for the energy around you."
His muzzle scratched up like he ate something foul, "That just sounds like dumb aura training my mom always tried to get me to do..." he shook his head and gripped my hair harder, "But if it makes me stronger I'll do it!" I splashed down into a puddle of water and started running, avoiding the Pokémon in my way as some impromptu dodge training, "What are you doing now?"
"Impromptu dodge training. Anything can be training if you just think about it the right way." I said as ducked below a flock of startled Pidgey, "Dodging is one of the most important parts of a battle. Right up there with not getting hit. Usually failing the former leads to the latter."
"What does 'impromptu' mean?"
"It means really suddenly put together." a Nidoking narrowed it's eyes at us as we passed overhead, "Good morning." I called back to it.
"So do you do this a lot?" Riolu asked as I started slowing down.
"Yep, though usually I just use thicker parts of the forest and dodge branches and vines. The berries are close by the way." I stopped just before the clearing and found the usually barren berry bushes full of Pokémon. All across the small clearing, about twenty yards in any direction, were dozens of Pokémon. "Wow, I've never seen so many Pokémon gathered in one place before."
"Really?" Riolu asked as he jumped down from my shoulder and I quickly changed back into my normal form, "This is one of the smaller berry patches around here. There's whole caverns in the mountains filled with berries that sometimes hundred of Pokémon eat, as long as you can get over earthquakes from the Onix and Steelix every now and then. There was one time I saw a Dragonite and three little Dratini come there to eat. He was so strong that I hid behind my mom the entire time and barely ate anything."
I just nodded along as he kept talking and slowly led our way into the berry patch and through the pokemon eating and talking around us. The canopy above us was particularly thin with only a handful of trees across the whole berry patch. It was a nice little secluded area filled with enough talking to make a large school cafeteria seem quiet in comparison. After squeezing through a few gaps and saying 'excuse me' more than a few times we arrived at my favorite berries, the Watmel berries. Literally just strangely colored, sweetened watermelons.
"You like Watmel berries too?" Riolu asked as he picked up one of the smaller watermelons. A few members of the Pika line beside us cast a glance our way and then went back to their own conversation.
"Yep, though I'm not a fan of just how juicy they are, it's like biting into a water balloon half the time, but at least it's not dry tasting right?" I asked before I took a large bite of the berry. Despite being the Pokémon version of a watermelon it was only a bit bigger than an apple and the exterior skin was as sweet as the innards, only a bit more chewy.
"I can handle dry food, I hate anything that's sour though." Riolu followed my lead and started digging into his own meal and we settled into a comfortable silence as we ate fairly quickly.
A few minutes passed like this before I heard something in the crowd around us. A little piece of gossip, "Hey did you hear about what happened to Victreebel?"
I kept my eyes on my food even as my ears twitched and pivoted on my head towards the conversation happening a little ways away from us. A glance at Riolu and he didn't seem to have heard them at all as he kept eating away at the last of his Watmel.
"No, what happened?"
"Well, you didn't hear this from me, but I heard he got his butt handed to him by some Pokémon. He came back to the glen last night all banged up and raving about some black furred monster of a Pokémon. It blasted him through half the forest with only one move and he had to climb out from under ten trees when it finally left him alone."
I smirked at the over exaggeration and took another bite of my Watmel. I took a glance over and then back at my food just to get a look at who was talking. A Skitty and a Pidgey were right beside each other talking in hushed tones, but they were much closer than I had thought they were.
"Oh, poor guy. Right after someone took his old trainer's stuff too." I heard a ruffling of feathers that told me Pidgey had just said that.
"Rumor has it he killed his old trainer before he came back to the wild and that's why he has all his trainer's stuff." the other voice, probably the Skitty, said.
"I heard that he just stole all of it in a fit after his trainer was released him." the Pidgey said in a flat, deadpan tone.
"That's rumors for ya. Oh, hold up, you see that hunk of a Persian that just walked in over there? Well I heard-" With their topic change I swiveled my ears back to normal and thought about what I had just heard.
'Firstly, Victreebel sounds like a straight asshole.' The thought made me smile as I wouldn't have to tell Riolu to give back whatever he stole that pissed him off so bad, 'Secondly, if Victreebel is the strongest in the area then maybe this place wouldn't be so bad to train in. Better the devil you know and all that jazz.' I looked around at all the Pokémon eating peacefully and talking to each other, 'Wonder if Pokémon eat meat or is it just a strictly berry diet... Do humans eat meat in this world? It's not a deal breaker, but man would that depress the shit out of me. I'll ask Riolu about it after I teach him meditation.' I nodded my head and ate the last bite of my Watmel.
"About time." Riolu said as he stood up, "Now where to?"
I looked around at the Pokémon around us eating before nodding my head, "Now we find somewhere quiet and we start our training."
Carefully we made our way out of the clearing as Riolu spoke up, "I think I know a place but it's back towards Victreebel's territory."
"So we're looking for a new place then." I deadpanned, "I'm not too keen on running into him again."
"Yeah, I guess so... How far away did you take me anyway?" Riolu asked as we left the clearing and started pushing through some foliage.
"I don't know. I grabbed you and ran. Then I jumped through trees for a few hours before collapsing under that tree we woke up under."
"So we're just a couple hours away from where we met?"
"A good few, yeah." I narrowed my eyes and looked over to him.
"Just wanted to know." Riolu held up his paws, "I only know that area and the mountains just south of it. I guess it's up to you to find our training spot."
"Well I usually travel too fast to learn all the local spots for training and such. Looks like we're both out of luck." I let out a sigh.
"Lookin for a spot to train?" a voice asked from above us. We both looked up to see a Honchkrow perched on a branch a few feet above us. "There's a rocky clearing towards the mountains over that way." he lifted his wing, "It's not used these days, most Pokémon just go to the battle clearings to get stronger." he then shook his head, "All the youngins these days do is smash skulls till they get to thick headed to do anything else. Not a scrap of thought between a whole group in those clearings, back in my day-"
"Um, thank you sir." I interrupted the very old sounding, but not looking, Honchkrow.
"-Pokémon came from all over and we actually shared strategies our trainers taught us." the Honchkrow continued without a glance towards us, "You'd have entire groups dedicated to speed and evasion and so on. It was an amazing time for this forest."
Riolu tapped me on the shoulder and nodded to his side towards the mountains. I nodded and we started to move away from the rambling Honchkrow as he kept talking, "Then they grew old and moved on to stronger areas and the youngins didn't want to work on things like strategy, no, all they wanted was to shoot hyper beams and blow up mountains. Honestly if today's youth grew up in-"
We finally got out of range to understand the old bird and Riolu started chuckling. I transformed into my Zoroark form and offered him a paw up to my shoulder, "What are you laughing about."
He held onto my paw with both of his as I lifted him to my shoulder, "That Honchkrow reminded me of my dad. He always went off on tangents like that before he left. Talking about how today's generation has it great. He could talk for hours and not say anything you know?"
"Yeah, I used to know some people like that." I said with a smile on my muzzle, "Your mother was a Lucario right? So was your dad one too?"
"No, my dad was a Scizor." He surprised me by jumping into my long mane of hair that grew out the top of my head and got comfortable in there.
I blinked a few times as my brain tried to comprehend that. I was honestly expecting either a yes or a Blaziken because of the cliche. For a few moments I was happy that cliches wouldn't all be proven true. Then my mind went to how that would work physically and I shook my head before those thoughts could take root.
"Hey, watch it!" Riolu's head popped out the top of my hair.
"Sorry, I was thinking about something else." I turned my head to try and got a good look at him through the corner of my eye. I could feel him holding onto large strands of my hair but I could only see his head popping out and looking at me, "You good back there?"
"As long as you're not shaking your head anymore I'm fine. Now onward to training!" he raised his paw as a smile spread across his face.
I started smiling too, "Onward!" I jumped towards the nearest tree and we made our way towards the mountains.
~Scene Change~
It was an hour later we found ourselves in a rocky clearing with a small stream to the side coming down from the mountains. Greenery was sparse past the tree line a couple dozen feet behind us. We both sat on top of the largest rock in the clearing. The sides of the rock had all kinds of slash marks from practicing Pokémon and there was the stray crater here and there either from some Pokémon training itself or battling.
I was in my base Zorua form sitting on top of the rock, beside me Riolu was sitting with his legs crossed in what he called a meditative position. The first problem was his arms were stretched out in front of him and not at all relaxed. He assured me that it was how his mom taught him and I was starting to have my doubts as to how good a teacher his mother was.
Second problem-
"Hmmmmmmmmmm."
He was constantly humming. It wasn't a tune to a song or anything he was just making the sound as constantly and as frequently as he could. I at first thought it was something to do with aura and then he said something that, honestly, had me confuzzled. He said it was a special technique that his mother taught him since he was falling behind his brothers and sister. She said it was the, and I quote, 'Easiest method by which even you can access your aura abilities.' She then had him on a rock like this one for three days straight.
"Hmmmmmmmmmm."
I opened an eye and glanced at him. He looked ridiculous and I'm pretty sure I could see some Budew off to the far side of the area giggling to themselves. It cemented the fact that I was going to question Miss. Lucario the first chance I got about her training methods.
"Hmmmmmmmmmm."
"Okay then, Riolu," he turned to me with a scowl, "Can I walk you through how I do this?"
"It won't work, according to my mom I'm 'unteachable'." Riolu said with a scowl as he lowered his arms and shook his head, "I'm lucky I can use any aura at all."
"Well first off let's forget about her and the aura stuff and focus on my brand of meditating. The kind where you feel your energy core and not your life force." I was making this up as I went, for all I knew the two were the same.
"They sound like the same thing." Riolu looked at me with a raised eyebrow. He held up his paw to stop me from talking, "But I did ask for your help, so what do you want me to do?"
I smiled, "First get comfortable, your way to rigid. Sit like you're just going to relax for a while." Riolu's arms rested on his legs and I could see his shoulders sag a little as he relaxed them, "Good, now close your eyes and only focus on my voice. Tune out all other sounds." His eyes scrunched up like he was trying to force them shut, "Stay relaxed and take deep breaths."
Riolu followed my instructions and relaxed his eyes again, "Now I want you to think. Think about how it feels when you use your moves in battle, think about where that energy comes from. For Quick Attack you pull the surrounding energy to you but for your fighting type moves you do something different. You pull from your own energy core."
I saw his eyes twitch and his breathing hitched for a second, "Now turn your paws over and let them rest like that. Good, now think of a fighting type move that you can do, any fighting type move. Now begin to use that move, gather the power for it but don't move. Feel the energy being pulled and follow it back to its source. Now repeat that process of pulling the energy but not using it till you find your core. Tell me when you find it, but be prepared to not find it for a while."
With a small nod from Riolu I went back into my meditation and started feeling around my core for an idea I had. The tendrils of darkness were still there and they were moving around at seemingly random like usual. I started to pull energy into my paws with Hone Claws as slowly as I could and just watched my core respond. The swarming mass around my core didn't respond but I felt the energy move sluggish down my forepaws and into my claws. The seconds it usually took turned to minutes. It took twice the amount of time to get even half of what I'd usually be able to gather in my claws, but so far my idea had some ground.
At half power the usual glow and shine that lit up my forepaws and claws was nowhere to be found. Just after the half power mark though it was like a switch being flipped and they started glowing and my energy rushed into the move to bring it to full power without me wanting it to. My eyes furrowed in confusion, 'Now why would it do that? Some sort of domino effect maybe? Could the move still be used at half power before the light show?'
I cut the power and the move faded away as Riolu spoke up, "I think I've found it."
His words honestly surprised me. It had taken me a week to get to that point though I had no moves to use and backtrack from, "Good, good, I honestly didn't expect you to get this far today. Now what move were you using to find your core."
"I was using Counter, I could feel the energy move around me but it took me a few tries to feel it coming out of me."
"That's faster than me back when I was trying this. Though back then I was too scared to use moves since my first attempt literally blew up in my face." Riolu smiled and I continued, "Now that you can feel your core think about your Quick Attack. Think about where that normal type energy comes from and feel for it."
"It doesn't come from my core?" he asked.
"Nope, gather the energy for Quick Attack and feel where you're pulling that energy from." Riolu returned to his meditation and almost immediately he began glowing with a silver aura around him, "It helps to try and gather the energy for the move as slowly as you can."
He nodded his head and the aura faded slowly.
I smiled and turned back to my own thoughts, 'Now why did the move pull my energy on it's own like that? Is it a lack of focus or a fundamental threshold that, once crossed, starts an avalanche effect and pulls the rest of the energy? No time like the present to test!' my mind turned once more to my core as I began the move Hone Claws yet again.
"It comes from the air!?" Riolu interrupted and made me realize I should probably do this testing on my own time.
I looked over to his wide eyes with a smile, "Yep, from what I've been able to see the air is filled with energy that just needs that little nudge to be something else. I call it Neutral Energy, since it's not even normal type. This is why your fighting type attacks are stronger than your other attacks, because it's your energy that you're using. This is called STAB, it's an acronym before you ask that stands for Same Type Advantage Boost."
Riolu was looking at me with an intensity that was quite honestly intimidating. He hung off my every word and I mentally thought through everything I was saying before it left my mouth to make sure I didn't mess this up, "Now how fast can you pull your energy for a full powered counter?"
"I've never actually tried to count how long it takes, or if it was at full power or not. I just thought if you used the move then the move itself was always the same."
"You're literally the only Pokémon I've talked to so I don't know if that's a common misconception or not. I can tell you though that how much power you put into a move can change how the attack works. Like my scratch attack, the first time I used it I cut a tree into four pieces because I kept pouring power behind it for a few minutes before releasing it all at once."
"So if I just kept pouring power into counter eventually I would have enough energy to knock you out too?" Riolu asked.
"Hmm, I don't know. Counter is a weird move to overpower like that since you would need to take a hit to unleash it and it's power is affected by what move you're hit with. I could just stall off from making an attack or attack you with ranged moves. Now if you were going to overpower something then moves like Force Palm and Aura Sphere are perfect."
He frowned at the news, "That would be great if I had enough aura to attack with..."
"Now don't look so down, you're taking your first steps in this training and there are about a bajillion more till you're the strongest Lucario on the planet. Next step is mastering the moves you already know."
"The strongest Lucario? Really?" He looked at me with a raised eyebrow.
"Yes, really. It'll take years and you'll get your ass handed to you more than a few times along the way, but it can happen if you dedicate yourself to training."
Riolu let out a sigh, "I have trained, I've trained for months and months and I'm nowhere near as strong as my brothers or my sister. I used to be the last one to leave at our training field in the mountains. Everyday I would practice my punches, my kicks, and my moves until I couldn't anymore. They learned Quick Attack and Counter and moved on to stronger moves like Iron Defense and Bullet Punch. I only got Counter working last week..."
'He needs a confidence boost and I know just how to do it.'"... Alright stand up." I jumped down off the rock and took a few steps towards the rocky base of the mountain then turned back around, "Your family can have their multiple moves, if you can master just Quick Attack you'll be a monster to anyone on your level. Hit me with a Quick Attack. Don't charge it up, just hit me right now."
He wasted no time, the moment he touched the ground a silver aura surrounded him and he shot forward and slammed his shoulder into my face. I was pushed back about a foot before I stopped and I could feel my energy fight against how much I was still suppressing it. I'd need some more training to make sure I don't slip into my full power if I lose concentration.
"That was a good hit, now I'm going to stand here and you're going to start charging another Quick Attack. Pour as much power as you can into it and release it when I say so."
He nodded and closed his eyes. I meanwhile tried to pull my excess energy to my barrier without my power level rising... 'Heh, power level. I really am starting to apply a bit too much dragon ball logic to this world. I think I'll stop when it stops being so accurate.'
I could feel a threshold with how much I could power up my barrier. Similar to my move testing earlier I assumed I could only go so far before my power just came tumbling forward. The fact I could sense this was already an improvement I wasn't expecting. I transformed myself into a Zoroark so he wouldn't easily hit me in the face and started watching Riolu with both my eyes and my energy senses.
Already I could tell that the Quick Attack was overpowered as the silver aura he gave off was starting to look less and less transparent by the second. He had to have a lot of practice with the move to already get it to this point so fast and it made me smile. In an actual battle his Quick Attack will have already improved by leaps and bounds from what it was last night.
After about a minute passed I noticed his eyes start to clench. His arms started to shake and I knew he had either reached the point where either he couldn't hold that power or the move itself couldn't hold it. I brought my arms up into a crossguard, "Open your eyes, aim, and hit me."
He opened his eyes and then he was gone with a dust cloud kicked up behind him. His silver aura-ed form crashed into my arms and a lot of things happened.
First, with his momentum transferred, Riolu fell to the ground and onto one knee. His barrier was weak since he had pulled power from it to either knowingly or on instinct. Second, my illusion shattered and my base Zorua form took its place. Third, I fucking flew backwards, straight through the pile of rocks and stones at the base of the mountain, outright shattering more than a dozen as my barrier tried to protect my body. Lastly my power snapped to full strength as I lost concentration on suppressing it.
After that a couple dozen rocks slid down and covered my hole that I was in and I felt my heart start racing. Louder and louder it beat as the seconds ticked by. Whether it was just my adrenaline pumping from the hit or my fear of being buried alive my world was suddenly blanketed in a bright white light.
A sensation washed over me. Something hard to describe. It felt like a burning, freezing, numbness just radiated out from my core. I could feel my shadowy tendrils around my core elongate, thicken and spread out farther than my body. Every part of my body stretched to an uncomfortable amount but never did it become painful. As the light began to fade I burst out from the rocks and landed on my feet. I could feel my power grow and spread out before I could even hope to reign it in.
I looked down at my claws and saw the same sight I had the last dozen times I took the form of my evolution. It was different though. It felt... more. I moved my two claws together and I realized just how much my illusion left out. The tiny muscle movements as my claws moved, the push and pull as I rolled my wrist and got a feel for my new range of motion. The weight and heft of my hair behind my head. The power contained inside the crystal ball near the end of said mane. I looked down at my digitigrade legs and I could feel the sheer power I could pump into them. There was no doubt in my mind that I could jump over a three story building with ease.
No idea where that estimation came from but I knew I could do it.
I looked up at Riolu, ecstatic at what had happened.
He was quivering in fear with eyes as wide as dinner plates.
"Sorry-" my noticeably deeper voice surprised me but I continued, "give me one minute and I'll have this all squared away." I sat down and crossed my legs and went through the process of suppressing my power, "You know for a Quick Attack that move hit like a freight train. How often did you train with that move?"
Riolu just stared and didn't move.
"... I'd say with how quick you got it up to max power that a few weeks of practice and you'll have it mastered easily."
Riolu continued to stare and not move.
My power got to the point it had been before the attack and I kept it there, "You know I also thought your attack was amazing but you've been in awe over it for quite a little bit now."
"You were telling the truth." He finally muttered, "The only way anyone could get that strong is if a legendary gave them the power."
"Hey, I've put in my fair share of work in the time I've been here and while I might be powerful I guarantee you I'm nowhere near a champion level Pokémon in terms of experience or move variety."
"How do you know!?" Riolu shouted, "My parents were from an elite trainers team and they are nowhere near the power house you are- were when you were just a Zorua! Then you evolve because of a simple Quick Attack-"
"A simple Quick Attack? That move put me into a crater and made me evolve in fear for my life." I started trying to get this conversation back towards where we were originally.
"What?"
"It may have been overshadowed by me evolving but you put me into a crater with a simple Quick Attack. Let's not overlook that before today you could only make someone move a few feet."
His eyes relaxed as he looked down at his own paws. They were still shaking but whether it was from his previous fear or the wearing off adrenaline I could no longer say. After a moment he smiled and looked up at me with a fire blazing strongly in his eyes, "What's next Master?"
"Well for starters never, ever, call me Master again. It'll just feed my ego and let me tell ya, that ego is way too big for someone with only two fights under their belt. Just Chase is fine."
"Aren't you supposed to call the person teaching you something different than their name?" Riolu asked.
"Well, you can, and the name for that is sensei which means teacher in another language, but I didn't do that with my teachers and you don't have to either." I stopped to think for a second and a thought struck me, 'I might never get this chance again.' "If you need to call me something different, call me Big Boss or Boss for short." 'Fuckin love Metal Gear Solid.'
Riolu nodded, "I'll just stick with Chase then. What's next?"
'Welp I tried.' I chuckled to myself and nodded, "Next is to use Quick Attack as much as you can and for as long as you can. Use it to go around this whole clearing." I gestured to the wide, rocky clearing we were in, "If you don't know how to turn while using Quick Attack well today you're going to learn. Take a ten minute break when you get tired then start meditating for half an hour before resuming. While you're doing that I'm going to meditate and try to figure out how different my illusions are going to be from now on."
"I won't let you down." Riolu said as a silver aura appeared around him and he took off and I was happy to note he did know how to turn.
'Now then,' I sat down, closed my eyes, and felt out my core and the dark tendrils that came off it, 'Let's see how much I have to relearn.'
Author's Notes: I really hope the formatting is fixed this time... if not I'll fix it in a little bit.
Besides that though please tell me what you think. I've got the second chapter in the works already, I just can't find a good enough spot to stop and move to chapter 3. Moving on from that we have our Team Break down:
Chase 'Big Boss' Blake (Zoroark)
Level: fuckin high
Nature: Jolly
Moves: Scratch, Fury Swipes, Hone Claws, Pursuit, Night Daze
Riolu
Level:14
Nature: Hasty
Moves: Quick Attack, Foresight, Counter