May didn't hesitate to give me a list of the moves that I nodded after hearing. "Lets start by having you use headbutt , tail whip and mudslap so I can get a feel for your proficiency in them." I said sternly to Sly. The pokemon eagerly but awkwardly performed the three requested moves and I sighed loudly. "Is it really that bad?" May asked not understanding why I seemed disappointed. "It's not exactly a secret but when pokemon use moves the move itself differs in strength and speed. This is because of the species innate abilities as well as how familiar they are with the move." I explained calmly.-
May nodded along understanding what I was saying "I know what the familiarity of moves looks like after having fought many battles at the mountain and THAT was about as unfamiliar as you can get." I said motioning at Sly. "Is there really that big of a difference in a new move and one trained a lot?" she asked curiously. "Of course there is , watch. Vulcan use a novice level stomp on that spot over there." I said while pointing at a spot a few meters away. Vulcan jumped up and glowed weakly on it's paws before crashing into the stone ground that cracked slightly.-
"Now do it again at your current best!" I called out and the legendary followed the order flawlessly as it jumped up and glowed brightly on it's paws before falling much harder causing the stone to shatter and crater slightly. "That's the difference between an untrained and a highly trained move , speed , power and utility are all qualitatively better in the trained version. The good news is that I can definitely train this ones moves to an acceptable level before I leave in a couple weeks." I said calmly.-
"Gaia , Vulcan while I am busy whipping this pokemon into shape I want both of you to turn this hard stone into sand before mixing it all up with the soil underneath it. Leave the cave and pond alone though." I ordered and after getting confirmation from my mons they went to work. Birch returned from the lab at this point eager to watch me train Sly. May explained what he had missed in the short time he was gone but he didn't write it down since he already knew this information.-
He also confirmed what I said about it not really being a secret since pretty much every trainer learns it if they train their pokemon enough. "That said I am unsure how one goes about training a move other than constantly using it." Birch said and looked at me eager to see if there was something specific I would do. I didn't disappoint either as I had Sly use the moves but change the way it did so slightly. Basically all I was doing was pointing out the parts it needed to work on and having it do so.-
It was boring monotonous work that exhausted Sly rapidly causing the training to switch over from move training to movement training. Zigzagoon as a whole were quick footed and fast moving things and I had Sly using push that innate trait as hard as it could. It tripped more than a few times faceplanting hard but I didn't care and had it stand back up and run again. "You are pushing it too hard aren't you?" Birch asked worriedly seeing how wretched Slys condition was as it was panting hard and had scabs on it's nose from the dried blood of it's face plantings.-
I shook my head "Pokemon are different from humans in that unlike us they thrive under pressure of this sort. If a human did something like this they might injure themselves horribly but a pokemon only needed a good meal and some sleep to not only recover fully but even grow more powerful , they are simply built differently and so can train much more strenuously." I explained and he nodded serious and wrote that down. "That said they do have limits and he has reached his , watch." I said and both the professor and May saw the Zigzagoon stop and sit down to recover.-
I walked over to the tired creature and gave it some water as well as an oran berry. "Good work , we are done for today so you can head back to the professor for now." I told the tired creature with an approving smile before returning it to it's ball. I then walked back to the father and daughter pair and handed the ball over. "When you feed it later give it some extra meat and vitamin supplements so it's body has the fuel it needs to grow stronger." I said seriously.-
"You really do seem to have training pokemon pretty figured out." Birch commented appreciatively. I shook my head "I've got the way to train WEAK pokemon pretty figured out but anything after that is still guess work to me at the moment." I corrected seriously. "Is there really that big of a difference in how they need to be trained?" May asked and Birch nodded also curious. "Yes" I say seriously. "For weak pokemon it's mostly training their moves as well as the strength of their bodies and combat experience. But what do you do when the pokemon has a strong body , firm mastery of it's moves and ample battle experience? I haven't figured it out yet." I explain helplessly.-
I myself hadn't quite reached that point yet since both of my pokemon were species that naturally sat higher up on the food chain and thus needed far more training to really hit the "strong" threshold for their species. Gaia for example wasn't even in her final evolutionary stage yet and thus had a LOT of room to grow. At the moment she couldn't really do physical training besides giving her lungs a serious workout but control and move training was still totally viable for her.-
After my explanation the two of them fell silent as they pondered what exactly the next step beyond the type of training that weak pokemon underwent was. After that I relaxed a bit as I watched my own pokemon compete about which of them could powderize the stone fastest. The little girl on Vulcans back was having a blast as Vulcan and Gaia destroyed every piece of stone they could. 'That girls going to grow up into a terrorist if she enjoys destruction so much.' I thought with a chuckle while eating a pecha berry.-
The berry was super sweet and soft with an overabundance of juice that made it great on a hot day like this. The clouds gathering in the distance told me that rain was coming and I needed to cook dinner early. We still had a few hours until it got dark but I would like to avoid setting a fire in the cave if I could. While it was fine in the mountain cave since there was grass and forest nearby but now that I was in town and there was plenty of places to set it up outside the cave safely I did so.