War Strategies
–6 months after smoker and prince have joined the team–
Prince and Smoker both walked out with Steven. Both of them were nervous and excited and were bursting with energy to start the training for the day. Steven knew how they were feeling, he was feeling a very similar reaction on his side and it was going to be his idea in the first place. It would change how his future is shaped, and would shape possibly his whole mindset for his upcoming battles.
Steven turned around when they reached the spot of the training area. It had honestly seen better days, with steven, prince, and smokers constant training and releasing of ever more powerful moves the boulders had become more broken and smaller than when they started. This was another reason steven wanted to switch up his tactics, the same training can actually be bad for you. He suddenly remembered his fathers advice to him,'Son, when you get out we'll do all of those things and more! But you will still have to be careful though! Too much of the same can be bad even if your as healthy as ox!'. Honestly, steven could think of so many things that his dad had told him, those moments were like the relief after a hard days of work for him in his past life. Steven roused from his though and looked back at the training field. He then looked at the trees a little farther back and his plan finally cemented itself within his mind. He would fundamentally change all of pokemon history with this.
Steven turned towards to prince and thought to him,'Prince, first I need you to lift all those trees on the other end of the clearing from their roots, can you do it?'
Prince, although a little confused on his the purpose of his task, said back,'Of course my lord, even with my small power right now this much is easy.' He then telekinetically casted a large scale psychic attack on the trees and simultaneously ripped all 412 trees up completely.
Steven smiled and said,' good, now set a border two trees thick around the borders, but leave a small box about 5x5 feet with barriers over it as well on both sides.' Prince seemed to be even more confused now but still did as he was told and set the borders as was requested. There were roughly 200-ish trees left by steven guess so now he started making a wasteland battleground that would achieve the best results for what he was planning,'Next! Except for 7x7 foot area in the middle, slam half of the remaining trees into the ground as hard as you can!' Prince did as commanded and the tress scattered all around the field except for the center. Steven smiled and thought,' now drop the rest the trees over the field and let fate decide where and how they land!' Once more Prince did as he was told and simply dropped the trees and then they hit the ground very hard and scattered haphazardly all over the field.
As prince, smoker and growlithe were waiting for the dust to settle, prince asked him,' I am sorry master, but i fail to see how any of this will help with training.'
Steven smiled as the dust cleared, and he could see his new field. This was it, wasn't it? The feeling everyone always talked about in his past life, where you have an amazing idea and then you go out and achieve it. But even for steven this would only work for so long, he would have to improve, and figure out a way to do this while traveling or on the move. He turned around to see prince and smoker both looking at him with very confused expressions. He just chuckled and led them to the middle of the field while they avoided all the trees and mounds of dirt that were in the way. When they got to the middle that had almost no trees or rocks near except for a small mound of dirt and granite he turned back to the pair of pokemon.
Steven readied himself and thought to two of them with a stern face,'Gentlemen, i welcome you to our new battle arena!' he said to their shock, it wasn't a field anymore, it looked more like a warzone from his past life in all honesty. 'I won't lie to you two, you are strong right now, but you are pathetically weak compared to the vision i have for your future!,' steven as he got more into his speech he started to get more excited and his blood felt like it was boiling in excitement. He looked out at the field and thought,' we will train in these difficult, cramped, dirty, and hard to navigate battle arena from now on! Our new training will start at the same time and end at the same time, 8 AM to 6 PM, however your regimens will be completely different starting today!,' Steven was really getting into it now,' Everyday we will alternate between two different exercises along with some mini exercises and strategy exercises! There are going to be times when you are frustrated! When you want to quit! When you hate ever having met me! I am going to push you to your absolute breaking point while pushing my own as well!' Steven said as he calmed down and started to actually explain what he was rambling about. 'The first exercise is called Last Stand. You will be given a tree at random in the field and you must stay within 5 feet of the tree. It will be 2 vs 1 and it will be difficult because the attackers will be coming from everywhere and could send long range attack out. The tree you are protecting can be considered your trainer, aka me. In this exercise i am the tree and the tree just fell from a great height and is heavily injured so it cannot move. If the tree is successfully hit 5 times by anything, be it a fist, or an attack from on of your teammates that will be round over and we will switch who is guardian and which tree we are guarding.
'Not only will this battlefield teach you to move in easily in harsh training, this exercise added to it will make your defensive capabilities unrivaled in battle! Every fight is the luck of the draw after all and you don't know when you might be in a tight spot!,'Steven said as he kept looking at the field with admiration. Truly he had made something truly unique. 'The second exercise is as follows. You will spend 30 minutes in either of the boxes when you start, this will be what i refer to as a training pod, and you will, well, train in these boxes. After 30 minutes you will play a game I call 'Predator'. Predator goes as follows, both parties will run out of their training boxes and try to get the first hit, whoever does get the first hit, which will be told you by me, will run focus purely on evasion. What i mean is, the one who gets hit first CANNOT attack at all during that round of the game, you must try to last as long as possible with only evasion, stealth, and skill. Of course the attacker must attack and try to win but heres the twist, both parties will be receiving the punishment! Afterwords, both will go back to their training boxes, the winner gets to train as hard as they can for next 30 minutes and the loser is told exactly what they need to improve on for the next round, how to exploit a weakness or strength and how they could win the next round by me as well as getting berated for the loss. You are to try your absolute hardest not to lose!'
Steven turned in the direction of two after what had felt like a long time. He nearly busted out laughing when he saw their faces twisted in confusion, fear and even pride! He thought that maybe he should end his speech hear with the last thing they will need to work on. 'Prince,' steven said to a startled prince,' I mean no disrespect by this but i cannot rely 24/7 on your telepathy. As such there is a need for other forms of communication. When we get home everyday we will working on hand signals for different moves and words so i can communicate with you all even better when things go south for us, if the time ever arises.' He said, confident in at least that last exercise, thanking his dad once again for his obsession with his old countries army signals and troop management strategies.
Prince spoke up first,'I understand now my lord! This is great there are many ways we can use this area now! I thought the training before was starting to get easy and now it feels like im back at square one! This is an amazing achievement for my lord!'
Steven chuckled slightly,' Yes, It's pretty amazing, and it will be the next chapter for us. This! This is the start of our war Strategies!
–3 Months Later–
All three of them huddled closer, not wanting to miss a moment of what was to come.
The egg cracks a little more