Chapter 5 – Combat Practices

Leo and Xavier walked to Cyndaquil’s home from town in a very short time period. They didn’t really know what to talk about on their way there, so it was kind of awkward for both of them. Until Leo thought of something when he gave further thought to his dream.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you, do you know what are natural artefacts?” Leo asked.

“That’s a question out of nowhere, but no, not really” Xavier felt a little bad “Do you know something about them? Maybe it will help me remember”

“I… would not like to talk about that yet. I will tell you… when I’m ready”

“You know that this will only make me press this to you a lot?”

“Well, it’s already too late since I mentioned it. Let’s just continue”

“Well, I should also tell you something.”

“What is it?”

“Thank you so much for giving Atlas a second chance. You surprised me a little as you didn’t seem to be the type of a person to forgive this quickly.”

“I think…, that’s because of you. After what you told me in the restaurant, you really wanted me to look at this from a different light and you just sounded… so honest, that I just would feel really bad if I were to refuse. Especially after how much you have already sacrificed yourself for me, I needed to somehow repay you, even indirectly.”

“Well, I would guess we are even now.”

“Yeah…, we are getting close. Let’s get whatever you have in that chest.”

The two found themselves at the entrance to Xavier’s home. Both of them quickly crawled through and the Cyndaquil, without even thinking for a second, reached his chest and scoured through it. He first tried to find what he wanted without throwing stuff out, but he quickly gave up and started putting things out.

“Do you need help?” Leo noticed Xavier was struggling.

“Not for now, you can help me with getting all of this back into the chest later… and… there it is,” Xavier took out what looked like a long stick with a wooden plate at the top and a sharp end at the bottom “This will come in handy, I should also grab some things for exhaustion.”

“What’s this?” Leo picked up a book with a hard paper cover.

“Oh, that? That’s my notes that I have taken from this world: different Pokémon species, some cities, islands you name it”

“Can I have a peek?”

“Sure. I still need to find more things in the chest.”

Leo sat down on his haystack and looked at the book. The cover was completely blank with no title nor any imagery on it. He opened the book on the first page and he could immediately see a hand-drawn map of the world. In the middle, there was a big island named Adunatio Island and three smaller islands surrounding it. There was the Crepido Island, about half the size of Adunatio Island, in the top left corner of the map, a tiny island named Leifil Island on the left side, and a long, horizontally as big as Adunatio Island, Pertubatio Island at the bottom.

“Where are we on this map?” Leo asked.

“Just… give me a second… and, that should be all,” Xavier grabbed some kind of brown bottles with a green marker out of the chest, “so, what is it?”

“Where are we on this?” Leo pointed out the book.

“Umm, let me take a look,” Xavier got behind Leo “Weee…, should be around… here, near the bottom of Leifil Island”

“Wow, this is a really small island, and it still has so much to see.”

“As I’ve told you, it’s pretty isolated, but it’s a nice place if you just want to hold back for some time and feel the peace surrounding you. It doesn’t have many mystery dungeons either.”

“What were you doing all this time then? The world is pretty big and you just stayed here for six months without barely seeing anyone, because of Ryder?”

“…Yes, I just stayed here in the cave and gathered food that grew in the forest. I even learned how to grow plants by myself.”

“That’s what were you doing when I fell from the sky? But you didn’t even have a bag to gather all of the food.” 

“… yes, I was not collecting food back then, but… I really don’t want to tell you what I did back there, just please… honor my secret as I did yours”

“…I guess we have a deal.”

“Good, now we don’t have much time, so please close the book for now and help me here put all of those items into the chest, don’t put the ones close to the sign I put on your right”

“Okay” Leo closed the book and stood up “Let’s do it.”

Leo and Xavier quickly organised every item before putting it into the chest. There were many different bottles as well as badges and apples. 

“All finished” Xavier summed up and closed the chest “Now grab the sign and let’s go to a place where we can train.”

“You know that I can’t pick it up because I’m quadrupedal?” Leo frowned at the words. 

“Oh…, right sorry. Well then do you have any idea what can we do? Those bottles and herbs are going to take up all of my arms.”

“Why do we even need them, and do we even need that sign?

“We need a target to practice on, and those bottles will be WAY more useful than you think.”

“…Fine, but then how do we take both?”

“Hmm…,” Xavier thought for a second, “Wait! I think I have it,” Xavier opened the chest and scoured through it. He took out of it what looked like a cloth strap.

“What is this?”

“Well since we can’t really make you pick up something, we will instead strap something to you. The bottles and the herbs should do just fine while being strapped.”

“How did you get this?”

“Umm…, let’s just say I got it in recognition of me helping someone. Now, let me put everything on you.”

“Okay.”

Xavier passed through the bottom of Leo a cloth strap and then tightened it a little on his body. Then he started picking up from the ground 3 brown bottles and some green herbs and put them into the strap, so the items would be on top of the shinx.

“Ah! Don’t tighten it too much!” Leo groaned in pain.

“Sorry! Is it good now?”

“Yeah,”  he answered, trying to shake it off, “I think it holds well enough.”

“Then,” Xavier picked up a sign with his right arm, “Let’s go get some training!”

“Wait, I think we are forgetting something. We will have lunch after this, right?”

“Yeah, oh right, I almost forgot,” Xavier put down a sign and looked into the chest, taking some coins out of it, “We should return the money to Ruby and yeah we need to pay for another meal. I will just hold onto it.”

Xavier and Leo got through the tight hole but managed to do it without damaging any of the items. The cyndaquil led them back to the road and to the crossroads, but when they got there, instead of taking one of the roads, they went into the open field and started walking in a random direction just to get some distance.

“I think… this is far enough,” Xavier commented while pinning the stick to the ground.

“Should I put those bottles and herbs here?” Leo asked, standing a little further from Xavier.

“Yeah, it should be good. Let me take it off you, I’ll leave the money here too for the meantime.”

“So now, how do we train?”

“Well, there are only two ways of training in combat,” Xavier pointed out, “You can cast attacks onto objects like that stick or do sparing with another Pokémon. Firstly, you need to learn the basics, which is successfully casting the attack that you want. Every quadrupedal Pokémon should be able to do an attack which is called “Tackle”, which you should have no problem with. Just try to ram into this stick.”

“Is it that simple?”

“Yeah, it should be.”

Leo got into position and then he tried running into the sign. With the momentum, he hit it with his head, but it didn’t even budge, the power rebounding back to Leo. The floor swayed beneath him as he tried to shake the dizziness out.

“Ouch! My head!”

“Oh, sorry! I’ve never tried making a Tackle myself. I have an idea how to help you cast it properly”

“Are you sure there is an attack like that?”

“Yeah, you could have seen a very similar attack to this on the tournament.”

“And what was it then?”

“It was a Quick Attack as it gave a steady speed boost to Cora during that battle we watched.”

“Then maybe I should try that one?”

“It’s just a more advanced version of Tackle, I don’t think it will be easier to do it” Xavier huffed, “Look, try imaging your head being a lot harder and it should work.”

“Just imagine? How does that make sense? I don’t think I have any other idea though” Leo thought.

Leo got into position and tried running again into the wooden stick, but this time, imagining his head was toughened and that he could easily pierce through the air into the enemy. He could hear the air splashing onto him and he felt as if he really was faster than before. He hit the stick with his head and this time, he didn’t feel injured by the ricochet of the stick.

“See? You did it!” Xavier congratulated “It even was a Quick Attack instead of Tackle, really good job!”

“Thanks, so what now?”

“Well, now we will try to make you use the same attack that you used against Braxton, which is called Spark. It may be harder to cast as you need to somehow combine a physical attack with your electricity, but you can do it.”

“The stick is still the target?”

“Yeah, we are attacking the sign as I don’t think the rock would be much better at this.”

“Fair point and it also sounds like a bad idea to hit that with the front head.” 

“Try imagining electricity around yourself and try to focus it around yourself. Try closing your  eyes for that, then run into the target and imagine moving all of that electricity into it.”

“I guess that makes sense.”

Leo got into position and closed his eyes. Suddenly, electricity sparked all over him and then he tried running into the stick. When he hit it with his forehead, he tried focusing all of the electricity into it, but for some reason, it ricocheted back into him. 

“AH!” Leo screamed as his own attack hurt him. After the electricity disappeared, he fell onto the ground, Xavier rushing to help him as he did.

“Are you all right?!” Xavier called.

“Yeah, just… a little hurt and tired.” 

“Can you get up?”

Leo tried standing up on his legs, but after a few seconds, he fell again.

“Maybe… I need some rest… I feel… so tired”

“Give me a second, that’s why I brought those bottles.”

“Hmm?”

Xavier reached for one of the brown bottles, when he got closer, Leo saw the bottle had a green label on it.

“Please, drink all the contents of this.”

“How is this going to help me?”

“You remember that berry? You somehow didn’t question it last time.”

“…Fine.” 

Leo drank the bottle with a little help from Xavier. Xavier put the empty bottle next to the rest of them. There weren’t immediate effects, but after a minute or so, Leo felt a lot less exhaustion and pain. When he tried to stand up now, he successfully stayed on his feet. 

“Thanks, a lot. Can you tell me why I felt so exhausted?”

“So, as you can most likely guess, fighting tires your body,” Xavier explained “If you use a lot of moves, especially heavy damage ones, you’ll get exhausted very quickly. There is one exception, that is if your attack that was meant for the enemy somehow reflects back to you, which will get you tired much faster. Here, the bottle I gave you is called a herbapotion, it helps with exhaustion, but you shouldn’t be dependent on it, as: firstly using any items in tournaments is banned, and secondly, there have been some cases of overdose with various negative effects so you should watch out.”

“Okay, but then how do I prevent the attack from hitting me back?”

“It will come with time, you should learn how to make that happen with more experience. Now that we know you can hit your attacks, go up against me.”

“What?!”

“The best way to learn to fight is to practice actually doing it. So, as I’m the only Pokémon around, you have to spar with me. Use everything you can, but without knocking me out.”

“Why do we have to do this? Can’t I jus-“

And then in an instant, Xavier covered the surrounding terrain with smoke that came from his mouth. Leo coughed, but then Xavier quickly knocked him out of the smoke by hitting him with his body, sending him flying for a few seconds, until he hit the ground. Leo quickly got up, still feeling a little dazed out.

“As you could have seen, you need to watch out for enemies using status moves for their visibility advantage, and that they will use any opportunity to attack you,” Xavier informed.

“But how am I even supposed to fight back against something like that?” Leo got angry “Maybe tell me how yo-“

Xavier, without letting Leo finish, took a deep breath and then he sent a burst of fire from his mouth, some fire coming out of his back at the same time. Leo didn’t expect that and, he got slightly burnt from the fire. Feeling immense pain, he could barely keep himself together. After it went out, he felt hurt all over his body with many bruises, but with no further damage. Leo could still hold on and stand to Xavier.

“Stand up! This is not over!” Xavier exclaimed. 

Those words made Leo realise that Xavier’s personality changed drastically. He wasn’t anymore as caring to others as he was and was fighting without being scared at all. Leo got really angry slowly losing control of his actions. Electricity started going through him violently making sparks everywhere around his body. A yellow electric ball formed right in front of him and Leo started putting all of his electricity into it. The ball changed its colour to blue with rage flowing through Leo’s veins. Xavier tried running towards the ball and hitting it with his arm, but when he touched it, the ball discharged all of its electricity around it hitting both Xavier and Leo. Both of them were knocked to the ground.

“Is this what you wanted!?” Leo yelled as he tried to stand up. The electricity around him started gathering again, growing violent very quickly.

“Okay, okay, stop it! Let me explain!” Xavier got up, trying to reason the shinx. 

“Like if you just didn’t act like a psycho just a few seconds ago!” 

“I know I have no right to speak up after what I did, but I had a reason for my actions, please just calm down!”

Leo, for a second, got lost in his thoughts, but after that, the electricity around him started disappearing.

“Okay…, I should be sorry myself. I shouldn’t have reacted this far.”

“I’m more to blame, but this was necessary. Now, have you noticed anything strange with your attacks?”

“…Well, everything is strange to me so I really cannot tell apart.”

“Your electricity, it changed its colour. It happened because of your emotions. If you know how to deal with them correctly, they can make your attacks much stronger.”

“Is this really what you wanted from all of this?”

“…Yes”

Xavier sighed, “Wasn’t there literally any better way to do it? Like, maybe you could have warned me beforehand.”

“Then you wouldn’t remember this moment as much. Either way, let’s do some kind of different training for now”

“What then?”

“We will do some kind of different sparing. In other words, I will be only preventing you from hitting me and you will try to hit me. No using moves, I think that’s enough for today.”

“Okay…,” he panted,  “Can I get some rest first? This “training” drained me a lot.”

“I will just give you, another herbapotion, we really need all the time we can get as we need your combat skills to be the highest possible.”

“…Fine.”

Xavier went up to the bottles and gave one to Leo. As similarly as before, Leo felt refreshed quickly after consuming it. 

“Can I get that empty bottle?” Xavier asked.

“Why do you need those even?” Leo gave the bottle back.

“It’s a lot cheaper to pay for the refilling at shops than outright buying the new ones” Xavier answered as he put the bottle back with the rest.

“Okay…, so how do we do this different kind of sparring.?”

“Did you not listen to me at all just a few seconds ago?”

“Okay! Don’t blame me, I was too tired to really listen.”

Xavier sighed,  “Just try to hit me without casting full-on moves and I will try to deflect them. This is to test your agility skills.”

“Okay-“ Leo suddenly tried rushing into him with his front legs, but Xavier blocked the attack, having already expected it.

“My strategy won’t work against me, you need to think of something else.”

“Huh…, then let me try more.”

Leo tried hitting Xavier incessantly for a very long time. They took some breaks in between, but without using the bottles as they had only one left. Training in agility, Leo started to understand the importance of it. Sometime later…

“Why is it still so hard to hit you?” Leo huffed.

“Well you know, I have more exp-“

And then finally, Leo managed to finally land an attack on the shinx. He was shocked as he was sent reeling back a little bit.

“That was a good one,” he huffed, ”I think… We are both a little tired, but I think we did enough for you to at least be considered for being in a guild”

“Yeah, I hope so… Are we going for lunch?”

“Oh, right. Look at the sun, I don’t think we have much time before the restaurant closes! This will be more of a dinner at this hour.”

“Well, then let’s hurry over.”

“Wait, let’s take those bottles at least. We can put the herbs inside them for now. We should also take the money, I will just keep it with my arm”

“And what about the wooden stick?” Leo noticed.

“Just leave it,” Xavier answered as he put the herbs in, “I just wanted you to try your attacks and as you can tell, it’s not really good training equipment.”

“Then why did you keep it?”

“Uhh…, it’s not really that important” Xavier dodged the question “Let me put that strap back on you with the bottles.”

“…Okay.”

Xavier put the cloth strap back on Leo and put the bottles in it for transport. After that, they started walking somewhere in the direction back to the crossroads.

“Xavier, I’ve wanted to ask this. I have to say, I was very surprised by you changing your attitude towards me so suddenly when you wanted me to prove that emotions matter. I really thought you were not capable of doing something like this… My question is… Did it cause you to lose someone you liked, because of your ability to change suddenly?”

“No…, as far as I know… You can say that you were an exception, I just did something similar to what teachers did to us in school, because I didn’t have a better idea of how to trigger your anger in a battle.” 

“Well… If you experienced it yourself, then I guess I’m better off with it now”

“Just one thing I should mention about battles. Both of us don’t have any kind of natural armour, so we can’t take many hits. So, remember that, because of our lack of armour, we are instead way more agile. That allows us to most of the time be faster than the enemy and be able to cast more moves than him in a given amount of time. This “feature” will prove useful when you want to fight against a Pokémon way more powerful than yourself”

“Yeah, I understand… Wait, so that’s why Cora was able to attack twice in a row during that battle with Ronan?”

“Yes, that’s correct. Now, we should speed up. I don’t really have a way for us to eat outside the restaurant”

Leo and Xavier made it to the town. They immediately walked towards the restaurant. The sun was already starting to set and many Pokémon were going about in all directions. Most of the shops were already closing for the night. When they got to the restaurant, they could thankfully see candles lit up in it. 

“I think we made it on time,” Xavier sighed with relief.

“Yeah, we sure did. Wait, we were supposed to also buy a bag here, right?”

“Great… Well, we will have to think of something tomorrow. Come inside, I’m not planning on starving to death,”

They walked inside and they could see way less traffic than when they were here in the morning. Ruby noticed them come in and went up to them.

“Oh, you are back? Did you come back to repay Xavier? We will be closing soon” Ruby informed.

“Yeah, about that. Can you still serve us food at this hour?” Xavier asked “Please, we lost the track of time recently, but this time we can properly pay you for the food, and also for the last one” 

“…Don’t worry Xavier,” Ruby smiled, “Even if you didn’t bring the money again, I would still serve you at this hour. Kirlia already went to sleep so I’m going to be the one handling you. So, what do you want”

“Thank you so much! Umm, do you want to make a selection Leo?” Xavier proposed.

“Yeah, funny joke. I think we both know that I’m still pretty clueless about this whole place.”

Ruby took notice. “Wait, Leo is not from here Xavier?”

Xavier was reserved with his response. “Uhh, he… is not from here. As he lost his memories he somehow found himself here, but he doesn’t remember how himself. I will just get to choose the meals for both of us. We want two sets of chopped vegetables and two apple juices.”

“Hmm, okay. Take a seat, it shouldn’t take too long to fulfill your order,” Ruby answered as she was going to the door, presumably to the kitchen.  

Leo and Xavier took a seat in a booth, this time with a window view of the path outside. Leo felt weird sitting in this position again as if he was a bipedal Pokémon after training so much on four legs, but it wasn’t uncomfortable for him.

“Thanks for this,” Leo said, with a guarded expression crossing his face. “I think the less people know about me the better”

A few minutes later, Ruby brought the plates with food with her as well as wooden cutlery.

“Here you go. Hope you enjoy it” Ruby said as she placed the dishes. 

“Thanks, Ruby, we will pay immediately” Xavier took out the money he held in his arm “Also, can I ask you something again please?”

“What is it?”

“Do you have a bag you can sell me? As you can see I don’t have mine for some time”

“Hmm, I think I should have one. It was used a lot, so I think 100 coins is good enough for it”

“That’s so cheap! Is it that damaged?”

“Let me bring it, give me a second”

Ruby went through the presumable kitchen door again as Leo and Xavier grabbed the cutlery. 

“Oh, so you know how to eat?” Xavier was stunned. 

“No… But it felt natural to grab this knife and a fork with my paws” 

“Well, then just follow how I do it and you should be good”

Xavier cut a piece of a carrot with a knife and grabbed it with a fork. Then, he ate the piece. Leo tried to follow the same and he did it with little difficulty. Going on, they both enjoyed their meal, but with an unsettling silence between them. After they finished, they waited a few more minutes until Ruby came back with what looked like a cloth bag that can be worn around an arm. It looked almost a perfect size for either Xavier or Leo. 

“Well I see both of you ate already, so if you want this bag, you need to pay 130 coins in total for the bag and the food.”

“That’s okay,” Xavier counted his money in his arm and gave the proper amount to Ruby.

“It seems good. I hope you will have good adventures with your friend here. Now please, the sun already set and everyone left except you. So, please leave, I have customers early in the morning.”

“Okay” Xavier responded and both Leo and Xavier got out of their seats “We will be going, but we may not see each other for a while again as we are going to Adunatio Island tomorrow.”

“Well, it was a nice reunion. It was nice to know that someone restored your hope.”

“Goodbye, then Ruby!” Leo bid farewell.

“Bye! I hope we will see each other sometime,” she called back.

“Bye!” Xavier added.

Leo and Xavier exited the restaurant and went towards the crossroads. There weren’t many Pokémon left on the path and it was already dark, but it turned out to be a very bright night. Leo and Xavier were silent for a while until the shinx remembered what Kirlia said. 

“So, I want to know,” Leo requested “Who is Ruby to you truly? It’s like… I don’t think you keep relations with any of the adults except her.”

“Yeah, that’s true. Maybe I should even tell you how my time in school went in general.” Xavier elaborated “I was going to school with Atlas while Ruby was our language teacher. I always hated that subject as I thought I was already good enough at it, and I hated extra work. However, my time in school was bad, to put it mildly. I was… manipulated by bullies… so many times over…”

“That sounds… concerning. Did you feel powerless with them?”

“Yes, to some extent. I kept silent about it for a long time, but then I was convinced by Atlas after he discovered what I was doing, to expose those bullies”

“Atlas convinced you? How did you get together?”

“Well, we were in the same class and actually both of us didn’t like the language class. I think our relationship mostly developed because our paths to school were the same and we were scheming on many different Pokémon, teachers and students alike, criticizing them and realizing we had similar opinions. Then one day, he saw me with a few other ghost-type Pokémon bully a child from the first grade. He asked me what the hell I was doing and I said that I never had a say in what I could do. So, he convinced me, with everything he could, to stop this and report this to the teachers. In the end, those bullies were arrested and I was named innocent because of collaborating against them. Now, I owe him my life for that…”

“…That’s… I don’t know what to say… I guess, it’s good that everything turned out fine.”

“Yeah, it thankfully did.”

Leo and Xavier made it to the crossroads. An unsettling silence surrounded them, with the darkness filling the empty space. This place looked a lot more… ominously at night, especially to Leo. A single sign in the middle of nowhere, with hills covering this place from many directions, seemed like a perfect place for ambushing. Leo feared the worst and was cautious going forward. The night was still early and very bright, so with no issues, they got on the path to Xavier’s home. For a little time, Leo still was unsettled about the atmosphere, but he gave up on his cautiousness after a few minutes. That prevented them from forming a conversation again, but Xavier was fed up with the silence. 

“Anyways,” Xavier broke the silence “after that situation I felt like I really changed. Like if something unlocked inside of me. I felt I was not the same person, but I didn’t know if I was a better one as I still felt guilty for being the one who snitched.”

“And why is that?”

“Because I bullied the Pokémon who did that to their group and now that I switched islands, I felt as if I didn’t deserve the place where I was. But Atlas again, helped me focus on the future instead of dwelling on the past.”

“Wow, he was a really good friend of yours.”

“He still is, at least to me, but after my disappearance, he is acting as you have seen.”

“I think he would appreciate those words.”

“Well, I will tell him if we see each other again.”

Leo and Xavier made it to Xavier’s home. Both of them walked through the hole with little difficulty. Surprisingly, the torches were still burning after so much time had passed. Both of them got on top of their respective hay stacks.

“Just the heads up, I will be up early to make sure I bagged everything we need into the bag from the chest” Xavier informed. 

“Okay, I understand,” Leo answered.

“Let me also get that strap off you, I will handle it in the morning” Xavier took the bottles and the strap from Leo. 

“Anyways, I will quickly finish up my story” Xavier continued “Atlas made me who I am today. I became more generous and helpful to others. I managed to forgive everyone whom I hurt and they accepted my apologies. I also started to enjoy school a lot more, including the language subject. Maybe, because the main subject of lessons changed to discussions, but this made me more connected with Ruby and she seemed really grateful for me doing what I did. And I think that’s all that happened during school”

“…I think what I’m about to say was already said to you many times…., but I’m sure you’ve made  the right decisions. From what it sounds, those Pokémon got what they deserved and now you are a better version of yourself. You shouldn’t regret how you got here, the important thing is what is happening now.”

“Yeah, hope you are right. We should get some sleep, a lot of things will happen tomorrow.”

“Right, then goodnight I guess.”

“Goodnight.”