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Thud… thud…
Hitmonlee's broken body tumbled across the dirt, limbs twisted at unnatural angles.
He couldn't move, couldn't breathe. The crushing force from Nidoking's strike had turned his insides to liquid.
He no longer felt pain—
only a numb, sinking cold…
An empty void was swallowing him whole.
He understood.
He was dying.
With the last fragment of consciousness he had left, Hitmonlee forced his fading eyes toward the clearing.
There—
Hariyama's puppet body finally collapsed, lifeless once again now that Leavanny's threads had withdrawn.
"…together… that's fine too…"
And the darkness took him.
---
Leavanny pouted, voice dripping with annoyance.
"You hit too hard. I wasn't finished playing yet."
Thump… thump…
Heavy footsteps approached as a massive purple figure ripped through the brush.
Thick armor plated its body like living stone.
A huge, toxic horn jutted from its skull, glowing with venomous purple light.
Rows of sharp teeth filled its jaws, and bulging muscles wrapped its entire frame.
Its arms were thicker than tree trunks, and its legs looked sturdy enough to crush boulders.
The walking fortress.
The drill-king of the wilds.
Nidoking.
Leavanny strode toward Hitmonlee's corpse, stepping gracefully like a lady inspecting merchandise in a boutique.
She crouched beside the body, using the sharp tip of her leaf-blade to flip it over careful not to get blood on her perfectly woven leaf-and-silk dress.
Elegant.
Delicate.
Cruel.
"Tsk, tsk…"
Her voice grew impatient.
"Look at this. You smashed the muscles into paste. How am I supposed to use a body like this?"
She didn't look back as she continued scolding.
"You owe me a replacement. I'm not taking this one."
Behind her, Nidoking remained silent.
Head lowered.
A mute giant carved from stone.
Leavanny sighed dramatically.
"Forget it. Talking to you is pointless."
Then suddenly—
"Wait!"
Her crimson eyes brightened with realization.
She remembered:
When she first arrived at this clearing, before Hitmonlee and Hariyama died, there was one more Pokémon.
That little one who ran.
Croagunk.
"Oh, that will do nicely…"
A hungry gleam flickered in her eyes.
She licked her lips.
"So that's the direction it ran, hm…?"
Her expression shifted into confidence—
as though she already knew her prey couldn't escape.
And indeed—
The bushes on the far side trembled violently.
Two figures drifted out from the shadows.
The lower one was a small purple silhouette—
Croagunk.
But it was frozen mid-air, limbs stiff, held in place by an invisible force.
Only its golden eyes flickered, proving it was still alive.
Above it, sitting cross-legged as though floating on invisible furniture, was a black-and-purple Psychic-type.
Black pearls embedded in its forehead and chest pulsed with psychic light.
The air between it and Croagunk warped with unseen pressure.
Grumpig.
The final member of Leavanny's nightmare squad.
The strategist.
The controller.
It didn't even look up as it flung Croagunk forward with a flick of raw psychic energy.
Thud.
Croagunk hit the dirt at Leavanny's feet.
"Eek~" Leavanny chirped with excitement.
She had never puppeteered a Croagunk before. The novelty thrilled her.
Freed from psychic hold, Croagunk collapsed like a wet cloth.
It didn't try to run.
Didn't move at all.
Danger Sense screamed loudly inside it—
a primal warning:
Any attempt to resist equals torture.
Equals death.
The warning was so intense that Croagunk's body refused to act.
"Haah…"
Croagunk exhaled shakily.
It had escaped Leavanny before barely.
But in fleeing, it stumbled straight into Grumpig, who was guarding the rear.
Escaping one hunter only to fall into another.
Ridiculous.
Hopeless.
Now it had been dragged back to be turned into another puppet.
"…Is this… fate?" Croagunk thought, eyes heavy with despair.
"Is this how I die?"
What should have been an ordinary summer camp… had become its funeral.
Leavanny stepped toward the trembling Croagunk with graceful, dancing steps.
Leaf blades extended slowly.
Silver threads swirled around her arms like a living storm glittering, twisting, slithering like metallic serpents.
Her eyes were filled with hunger.
She lifted her blades ready to claim her next marionette.
But then—
Something shifted.
A wave of killing intent cold as a glacier,
violent as a tidal wave exploded out of the forest.
It wasn't directed at anyone.
It simply was.
And it froze everything.
Leaves stopped falling.
Blood drops hung suspended in mid-air.
Even the puppet strings seemed to stop vibrating.
Time didn't slow.
It stopped.
Alongside that murderous pressure came a voice not spoken aloud, but echoing inside the mind of every Pokémon present.
Calm.
Emotionless.
Deadly.
"What… do you think you're doing?"
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