Fang Yuan, Lin Jing, and Liu Le were lectured on team battle concepts for three whole hours and watched some team battle videos before Zhuang Xin said:
"Alright, that's it for this morning's class."
"This afternoon's class will include a comprehensive analysis based on your performances during last week's field combat training, so remember to bring a pen and notebook."
Before leaving, she glanced at the three of them and added, "I'll tell you in advance that tomorrow is a rest day, but you need to think carefully about how the three of you can work together to be considered a qualified team based on the notes from today. By next Friday, each of you must submit a summary of no less than a thousand words. Don't take it lightly, as the thoroughness of your summaries will determine the fate of your second field combat training next week... That's all... Go have lunch."
After Zhuang Xin left, briskly as she went... the three participants of the New Star Plan were left staring blankly at each other.
"What! Another field combat training next week?!" Liu Le suddenly stood up, on the verge of tears.
"Shouldn't you be worried about how to write this thousand-word summary instead?"
Lin Jing was initially happy to hear there wouldn't be class on Sunday, but her cheer quickly turned to worry upon hearing about the thousand-word summary.
Teachers around the world indeed never make things easy.
How should one begin with such a thing...?
"Fang Yuan, what do you think?" Lin Jing turned her head and asked.
"Let me think..."
"Isn't the afternoon session going to involve a comprehensive analysis based on our performances in last week's field combat training? I think we can start from there," Fang Yuan said.
At their current stage, they shouldn't even dream of grand tactics; they're not yet at that level.
Rather than aiming for unattainable tactics, the most important thing for now is to shore up everyone's weaknesses.
All of them are new trainers, and it's unrealistic to think about running when they haven't even mastered walking yet.
If a team can compensate for each other's shortcomings through cooperation, that should meet the most basic requirements of what a team should be, right?
"Alright," Lin Jing sighed.
Fang Yuan scratched his head. Team battles were troublesome, but this experience was essential for becoming a professional trainer.
For a professional trainer with limited personal power, having a reliable team can indeed maximize the chances of survival.
This was proven with countless lives and bloodshed.
...
After the morning class ended, Fang Yuan and the others started heading downstairs for lunch.
Throughout, Liu Le continued to complain:
"It's not that I'm averse to field combat training, but the food they give me is just too little!!"
"Can you guys be fair, can my Little Kabigon compare with Eevee and Growlithe?"
"I gave all my own food to Little Kabigon, and it still wasn't enough. In short, if it's the same old amount of food, one of us is definitely going to be left hungry."
As Liu Le spoke, Fang Yuan and Lin Jing couldn't help but laugh.
No choice, Little Kabigon's appetite was simply astonishing.
"I remember Little Kabigon also eats vegetation, right? Why not forage for food on the mountain?" Lin Jing suggested.
"If that's the case... I guess Little Kabigon would be even less willing to fight," Fang Yuan was very clear about Liu Le's situation.
Fang Yuan said, "Liu Le's Little Kabigon is quite peculiar because it's picky..."
"It has been pampered with good food by Liu Le since birth, and unless it's extremely hungry, Little Kabigon definitely wouldn't deign to eat the wild plants everywhere."
"Yes, my Little Kabigon is usually quite particular about the taste of its food... If it eats something it finds unappetizing, it tends to get negative," Liu Le said with a headache, fearing he might actually be raising a fake Little Kabigon.
Pokemon are indeed like people; you can't spoil them too much, or they'll develop all sorts of problems.
"Moreover, I'm also worried that Little Kabigon will find those thorns unsanitary... Never mind, I'll go and ask Sister Zhuang for some compressed biscuits. Although Little Kabigon doesn't like them very much, at least the fat content and calories can satisfy its needs," Liu Le said.
Lin Jing pursed her lips upon hearing this and said, "Compressed biscuits, good idea..."
Compressed biscuits?
Fang Yuan was also taken aback and suddenly stopped in his tracks.
"What's the matter?"
Faced with Lin Jing and Liu Le's puzzled looks, Fang Yuan shook his head and said, "It's nothing, let's keep going."
Compressed biscuits, huh...
Fang Yuan fell into thought; just now, something very important had occurred to him.
In the anime, one of the lead female characters, Little Yao, also has a Little Kabigon.
It was as gluttonous as the other Little Kabigons, often gobbling up all the Pokemon food of Xiaozhi's group, causing trouble for their journey.
It was not until Little Yao saw the food Dr. Oak developed for Xiaozhi's Kabigon, which could satisfy its hunger with just one bite, that this problem was resolved, because Little Yao also tried to develop this kind of food and succeeded.
This food was naturally Energy Blocks.
Energy Blocks not only have an extremely high nutritional value, but depending on the formula, they can also provide various benefits to Pokemon.
The Energy Blocks that Little Yao developed for her Little Kabigon were similar to the "Senzu Beans" in Dragon Ball, where eating just one could fully sate Little Kabigon.
"There don't seem to be Energy Blocks like these on Earth..."
Currently, on Earth, the use of Tree Fruit is still limited to direct consumption and making nutrient supplements, but those supplements are almost all made in the form of juice. The concept of Energy Blocks like Fang Yuan remembered, had not yet appeared on the market.
Is the process of making Energy Blocks difficult?
In the source material, all you have to do is cut various Tree Fruits into small pieces and throw them into the Tree Fruit Mixer to produce Energy Blocks.
Under the stirring of the machine's rotation, not only would the flavors of the Tree Fruits cancel each other out, but they would also form an energy crystal resembling a block.
This crystal was the Energy Block.
"Although the Tree Fruit Mixer looks just like a juicer, the two are definitely not the same; there must be additional steps. If it were as simple as juicing, it wouldn't have remained undiscovered for decades."
"Generally speaking, after the fruit is crushed, it turns into juice and sediment; it's not possible to directly form energy crystals shaped like blocks."
"Does this mean that after the high-speed stirring, the machine has another step where it compresses and solidifies the mixture into blocks?"
"This step is key to purifying the energy into crystals."
At that moment, Fang Yuan lost all appetite for food, only wanting to rapidly test his conclusion.
Apart from some precious Tree Fruits, common Tree Fruits like the Orange Fruit were not rare and had been planted on a large scale to be sold to Trainers, making them much cheaper than expensive nutrient supplements.
If Fang Yuan could master the production of Energy Blocks, he could produce his own nutrient supplements, turning the relatively cheap Tree Fruits into nutritionally valuable Energy Blocks!
"The process of rotating and stirring the Tree Fruit chunks is easy to resolve... But the compression and solidification stage is not so simple," Fang Yuan contemplated.
"Perhaps, the Superpower of a Magnemite could be used to compress the mixture into a block shape?"
"And after that, what conditions are needed for solidification? Temperature?"