“Ludi!” Ludicolo saw that Protect had blocked the attack, slipped out from under Rhydon at once, and spat several Leech Seeds at it.

The seeds stuck fast to Rhydon’s body, sprouted almost instantly, and sent vines winding around it from head to toe.

But the moment those vines wrapped around Rhydon, the heat pouring off its body burned them dead. They withered before they could drain any HP, then crumbled into ash.

“How is that even possible?” Tania’s eyes went wide. Magical Leaf hadn’t worked, and even Leech Seed couldn’t get close. Just how hot was Rhydon’s body?

Honestly, that was what Reiji wanted to know too. What exactly had happened to his Rhydon? Why was its body giving off that kind of heat? The only explanation he could think of was Heat Crash.

“Ludicolo, cool it down. Hydro Pump! Then Ice Beam!” Tania refused to believe this could keep going. She would not accept that Rhydon’s surface heat couldn’t be put out.

Otherwise this battle was impossible. Hydro Pump wasn’t working. Grass-type moves weren’t working either. What was her Ludicolo supposed to fight with?

“Ludi!” At the order, Ludicolo fired a white beam from its hands. It struck Rhydon cleanly and froze it solid.

That finally made Ludicolo breathe easier. At least it could freeze the thing. If even that failed, there was no point fighting at all.

But the relief didn’t last. The ice around Rhydon started melting almost at once. In the blink of an eye, it turned to water, as if Rhydon had never been frozen in the first place. The melting started from the inside.

“Roar!” Rhydon was getting fed up with this annoying kappa. It slammed one foot down, and the soil around it melted into lava. The molten flow climbed over its body, coating it completely until it looked like it had been swallowed by black-red magma.

“What is that?” Tania couldn’t tell what Rhydon was doing, but she didn’t change her plan. “Ludicolo, Hydro Pump! Keep using Hydro Pump!”

“Ludi!” Ludicolo fired one Hydro Pump blast after another from its mouth. Its aim was solid. Every shot struck Rhydon, but the moment the water hit that flowing lava, steam exploded upward with a violent hiss.

Steam shrieked through the battlefield like water thrown onto red-hot iron. By the time the sound died away and Ludicolo stopped firing, the vapor had begun to clear.

Then Rhydon came back into view.

“Holy—” Reiji blurted it out before he could stop himself. He almost hadn’t recognized it.

Rhydon’s shape hadn’t changed much, but the black-red lava flowing across its body was gone. In its place was a suit of black armor wrapped tightly around it from head to toe. Its body had swelled again, bigger and bulkier than before, and its weight had clearly gone up with it.

“What is that? Why does it have armor now?” Tania cried out in shock. Why had Rhydon turned into this?

“Yeah… what is that?” Reiji had nothing useful to say either. He was just as lost. He had never imagined Rhydon could do something like this.

Rhydon’s natural hide already looked like armor, but now another layer had formed over it—a brutal black shell that looked hard enough to shrug off almost anything. Just one glance told you ordinary attacks were not getting through.

Seeing both of them standing there dumbfounded, Agatha tapped her cane, rose from her seat, and walked to the railing. After clearing her throat, she called down to them, “Ahem. That’s Blaine’s signature technique—Rock Armor.”

“Rock Armor?” x2

The two of them were still staring blankly, though Reiji had already guessed part of it. It felt a lot like lava cooling after a volcanic eruption.

“There are actually two layers to it,” Agatha explained. “The first is Flame Armor. That layer superheats the user’s surface, like invisible molten rock flowing over the body. It acts as a passive defense. Fire-, Grass-, Ice-, Bug-, and Steel-type attacks all lose power when they hit it. Some won’t work at all.”

“The second layer is Rock Armor. When that flowing magma meets water or ice, it cools and hardens over Rhydon’s body, forming another layer of armor. It costs some speed, but Rhydon’s defense shoots even higher.”

“If you want to hit Rhydon properly, you have to break through that Rock Armor first. Heating it back up can remove it—but once the Rock Armor is gone, you still have to deal with the Flame Armor underneath.”

“So that’s how it works.” Reiji finally understood. “No wonder Heat Crash has such insane proficiency. So that’s what it was really for—building Flame Armor, or turning it into Rock Armor afterward. Not bad for a man who lives in a volcano.”

“You’ve studied my tactics pretty thoroughly, Agatha,” Blaine said with a helpless smile. He didn’t sound annoyed. They had been battling each other since they were young. Of course his old friends knew how he fought.

“Old man, if it weren’t for that shell of yours, nobody would’ve started calling you Old Turtle back then. And then you went and hid yourself away on Cinnabar Island. Honestly, it suits you.”

Blaine chuckled. “That was a long time ago. I’d almost forgotten. Old Turtle really isn’t a bad fit.”

“Oh?” Agatha clicked her tongue. “You hated that nickname when you were young. Now you sound pleased with yourself.”

“It’s all in the past, Agatha.” Blaine let out a quiet sigh and looked toward the distance. “Flowers bloom again. People don’t get to be young twice. I spent half my life studying Pokémon, and all I got out of it was a bald head…”

That finally broke Agatha. She saw the shiny scalp hidden under Blaine’s wig and burst out laughing, missing teeth and all.

When the laughter faded, she gave a soft sigh of her own. She stood there in silence, hands hanging loosely over her cane, gazing at the forest far away.

After finishing her explanation of Blaine’s famous turtle-shell tactic, Agatha headed back inside. The laughter from the two old trainers drifted down from the loft, leaving Reiji and Tania below completely baffled.

Still, their battle wasn’t over yet, and this decided whether Reiji would walk away with the Ghost Badge.

“Rhydon, Rock Blast!”

“Roar!” With Rock Armor weighing it down, Rhydon wasn’t fast enough to chase Ludicolo, especially not in rain while Swift Swim was in play. Bombarding it from range was the better option.

“Ludicolo, Giga Drain!” Tania had listened carefully to Agatha’s explanation. She knew now that the armor’s weakness was its loss of speed and flexibility.

Trying to overpower it head-on was pointless. If she wanted to win, she had to wear Rhydon down.

“Ludi!” Ludicolo fired a beam at Rhydon, trying to drain away its HP.

The attack hit the armor and did nothing.

“Rhy…” Rhydon scratched at the Rock Armor on its body. It could feel the beam, sort of, but that was it. Nothing happened. It looked almost confused, like it couldn’t figure out what Ludicolo was even trying to do.

“Ludi…” Ludicolo looked back at its trainer, awkward now. It hadn’t drained a thing.

At the sight of that, Reiji blanked for a moment, then understood. Ludicolo probably had to reach the actual body to drain HP. The armor had blocked the move completely, so there was nothing for Giga Drain to latch onto.

“Roar!” Rhydon saw Ludicolo’s attack fail and decided it was its turn now.

Dozens of rock projectiles rained down like a barrage. Ludicolo could only twist and weave through the mud, dodging Rock Blast again and again.

“Rhy!” Rhydon was getting irritated. The little thing was too slippery.

Then it stomped hard enough to shake the ground. Sharp stone spikes burst upward beneath Ludicolo while Rhydon kept hurling rocks from above, each one like a solid cannon shot exploding around it.

Nobody keeps dodging forever.

No matter how fast Ludicolo was, no matter how sharp its footwork, that kind of bombardment was too dense to escape cleanly. One spike caught it from below. A rock slammed into it right after. Ludicolo tumbled across the ground and blacked out for good.

“Haa… I won.” Reiji let out a long breath. This Gym battle had been even rougher than the one against Blaine.

But he had still won.

Tania hadn’t held back even a little. Venusaur, Gengar, Ludicolo—those had all been her best fighters, and more than once she had pushed him right to the edge. That Gengar in particular had fought so dirty it had nearly flipped the whole match on him.

He definitely couldn’t underestimate her next time. If he got careless around this girl, she would not return the favor. She might even pull something sneaky behind his back. Better to stay on guard.

“I lost…” Tania sank weakly to the ground and recalled Ludicolo.

She had really given it everything this time. Venusaur, Gengar, Ludicolo—those were her strongest Pokémon, and she had still come up short.

Her disadvantage in this Gym battle had been obvious. She couldn’t switch, and she didn’t have the opening-move advantage either. Venusaur had been hard-countered and taken out by Scyther, and Scyther had gone on to badly wound Gengar before it fell.

If that last slash had landed one more time, Gengar probably would’ve gone down in the second round too. The damage from that blow had been explosive. Gengar simply couldn’t have taken a second one.

She knew Gengar well. If it hadn’t hurt badly, it never would’ve rolled around on the floor like that. And once Perish Song failed, Gengar was finished off by Rhydon’s attack.

Then it came down to Ludicolo against Rhydon…

Honestly, she had already done everything she could. Ludicolo’s Water-, Grass-, and Ice-type moves had done absolutely nothing to Rhydon in its Rock Armor state.

She truly didn’t know how Ludicolo was supposed to beat that Rhydon. Even if she tried the Grass- and Ice-type moves again, she still couldn’t break through. And that Rock Armor could be removed at will anyway, only for the ice to melt instantly and Leech Seed to burn away the moment it did.

With Fire-, Grass-, Ice-, Bug-, and Steel-type attacks all useless, Ludicolo was running out of options.

Water-type moves?

It had already tried. Against Rock Armor, they did nothing. Against Flame Armor, at best they only cooled Rhydon down a little.

Faced with a shell like that, the fight really was miserable. In that situation, there were only two real answers: kite Rhydon until it dropped, or meet it with something just as heavy and smash straight through.

She had thought about kiting too. Everyone had seen how that went. The constant spikes from below and Rock Blast from above had sealed off Ludicolo’s movement more and more. Losing had only been a matter of time.

“It’s only one loss. Just win it back at the Indigo Plateau…”

The rain had stopped. Reiji recalled Rhydon and handed the Poké Ball to a maid to take for treatment, then walked over to Tania. Seeing her still sitting there in the mud, he offered her a hand to help her up.

“Huh?” Tania snapped out of it.

A hand was right in front of her.

Raindrops slid from his dark, messy hair. Beneath that fringe, his black eyes were so deep she couldn’t read a thing from them. And that faint crooked smile at the corner of his mouth only made it worse. The longer she looked, the more flustered she got.

At some point the rain had stopped completely. The clouds were gone. Sunlight spilled down across the battlefield, and a rainbow hung at the edge of the sky.

She didn’t dare keep looking. Tania lowered her head at once, unable to meet Reiji’s eyes. Her heart was pounding so hard she couldn’t calm it down.

“You’ll catch a cold if you stay soaked like that.” Reiji scratched his head, baffled. What was this girl thinking? He had been holding his hand out forever. Was she getting up or not?

“Hmph! None of your business. You’re so annoying!” Tania slapped his hand away, scrambled to her feet, and ran off through the muddy ground.

She looked calm enough from behind, but the moment she reached the wooden corridor and vanished around the corner, she leaned against the wall there, her heart still hammering in her chest.

“Tania, seriously… what are you getting shy for? Why couldn’t you even look that jerk in the eye? He’s just a brute who doesn’t know how to go easy on girls… though I guess… he does have a gentle side too.”

That thought lightened her steps a little as she headed off for a bath. The jerk had been right about one thing—staying in the rain was the easiest way to catch a cold. Her Pokémon were already being treated at the Gym anyway, so they would recover soon enough.

“What…?” Reiji was left standing there alone, completely lost.

What had just happened?

He had only meant to help her up and then ask for the Ghost Badge. That was all. Really. He hadn’t even gotten the chance to say it.

“Damn it, what about my badge?” Reiji was so depressed he could scream. There was no way he was going to Agatha personally to ask for it.

Those old monsters were way too sharp. He was afraid they would notice something if he said the wrong thing. He truly did not want to deal with people like that.

For all he knew, every word they said and every casual question they asked was just them fishing for information. Talking to those veterans was exhausting.

“Heh heh. Those two might be onto something,” Blaine said from the second floor. He had seen everything clearly and let out a strange little laugh, glancing sideways at Agatha now and then.

He never said it out loud, but he was certain Agatha knew exactly what he meant.

“Leave young people’s business alone, Blaine,” Agatha said with a quiet sigh. She told him not to meddle, but she wasn’t innocent herself.

That scene had dragged her straight back to her own youth.

Back to that bastard Oak.

When she was young, Agatha, Professor Oak, and Kurt had all been close friends. Oak had been a powerful trainer in those days, and he was always helping Agatha despite her prickly personality.

She tried to drive him away every time, but she could never beat him in battle.

Somewhere along the way, she had fallen for him.

But as the years passed, Oak retired from battling and threw himself into Pokémon research instead.

Agatha had hated it. To her, studying Pokémon meant his battle strength would only decline. She thought he had grown soft. It felt like a betrayal, and she had been furious. Little by little, she drifted away from him.

Even now, there was still a photo in her house of the three of them together—herself, Professor Oak, and Kurt.

She only hoped Tania would not walk the same road she had.

What she had just seen below looked far too much like the past.

[End of chapter]

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