"Ah!"
Snapped to attention by Cynthia's cool, faintly exasperated voice, Iono smacked her forehead. Embarrassment flickered across her always-high-energy face.
"Aiya! Right! I almost forgot why we're here—got carried away with the fam!"
She stuck out her tongue, then addressed the camera: "Okay, okay, family—chat time's over! Iono-sama and Miss Cynthia are going to work now! Please watch quietly; don't spam and mess with our ops!"
Streaming was a side gig; the mission mattered.
Iono knew that well.
On the other side, Jason looked like he'd just snapped out of livestream banter, but truthfully—he hadn't forgotten the mission at all.
If anything, it was deliberate.
Don't be fooled by his quips with chat—or him "shooting the breeze" with Champion Iris. His attention had never left the chaotic battlefield.
To him, this was heaven.
He wasn't fighting—but in this huge cavern, there were so many Armarouge, Ceruledge, and Charcadet. Each one was firing moves, showing off their kits.
In his mind, the system prompts only he could see were scrolling non-stop:
[Charcadet brawling…]
[Charcadet Dex +0.5%]
[Armarouge uses Armor Cannon…]
[Charcadet Dex +0.8%]
[Ceruledge uses Bitter Blade…]
[Charcadet Dex +0.8%]
With so many Pokémon on screen, the Charcadet line was climbing fast.
Chatting while power-leveling—too comfy.
If Cynthia stepped in now, how would he farm fast Dex progress?
As he soaked in the exp grind, Gast gently bumped him with her soft gaseous body.
"Jason," she murmured with her usual curiosity, "do you think they'll stop once they get tired?"
He was busy watching an Armarouge fire a move, barely registering it. Gast kept going on her own.
"Look—they're fighting so hard; energy's everywhere. But it feels weird. They've been at it so long, and nobody looks really hurt. Not a single one's gone down. Everyone's still bouncing around."
Her words hit him like a hammer.
He answered reflexively, "Who knows!"
But his attention had left the Dex bar. He looked closely—and saw it too.
The battle looked grand and flashy, energy filling the air—but after all this time, aside from the shredded floor, no one had been knocked out.
In inter-tribal fights, that was very abnormal.
A perpetual 50–50? Yeah, right.
He cleared his throat and turned to Cynthia. "Sis—do you think they'll stop once they're tired?"
He practically repeated Gast's question word for word.
Gast went slack in midair. Her white eyes blinked, caught off guard. Then her gaseous body puffed up a size.
"Jason! You big meanie!"
She huffed right up to him, flailing, then launched into a furious face-licking. "You bully! You stole my line! Taking advantage because I can't speak human! Waaa—"
Cynthia watched the Gastly suddenly glom onto Jason and blinked. Are they always this… affectionate? Even now they have to bit swap?
But the question itself hooked her. She didn't answer right away; the usual faint smile faded from her eyes as she grew very serious. She re-examined the battlefield, keeping Jason's question in mind.
She'd been watching the Armarouge and Ceruledge from the start—something had felt off, but she hadn't been able to pin it down. With Jason's nudge, she found it—the source of the dissonance.
They weren't going all out.
Beautiful, explosive moves—but look closely and most strikes were hitting air or being casually blocked or dodged. It was more like a grand drill than a fight to the death.
A few seconds later, realization flashed in her eyes. She looked solemnly at Jason and nodded. "I think you're right. And together with Orthworm's intel…"
This was likely far more complicated than Geeta had said.
Simply suppressing them? That wouldn't be hard.
But having given Geeta her word, she wanted to do this perfectly. More than stopping the infighting, what intrigued her now was the puppeteer behind it. A Pokémon she'd never seen—how exciting.
"These Pokémon may not be fighting of their own will. They might be threatened by another Pokémon into fighting for territory."
After sharing her hypothesis with Jason and Iono, she turned back to Jason with expectation in her eyes. "Jason, you can talk to them—can you help verify this for me?"
Jason looked back out at the field.
Go talk, huh?
Uh… you're sure I won't get mobbed?
Even if most were throwing a fake fight, he figured if he walked out there, he'd stick out—and trigger a dogpile.
He swept past the hard-casting Armarouge and Ceruledge and settled on two Charcadet "fighting" closest to them.
He quickly weighed it and decided the two little guys were the best test case.
He'd been watching them. One Charcadet flickered a tiny flame to life, then charged on stubby legs, "fierce" as could be. It raised its little hand like a heavy chop—and then moved like a slow-mo movie, every step crystal clear. The other Charcadet arched back in an exaggerated sway, as if blown by an unseen gust, narrowly dodging—though the "chop" was a full half-meter short.
Then the dodger countered—puffed a tiny Spark that drifted lazily. The "target" hopped a symbolic half-step aside and let it plop onto bare floor with a "pff" and fizzle out.
Watching that third-rate acting and those pantomime moves, Jason fully accepted Cynthia's hypothesis.
A simple, crude, effective plan formed.
He turned to Cynthia. "Sis—let's just grab those two little ones and ask them what's going on."
"Good idea." Cynthia nodded crisply and glanced at her ace. "Garchomp—bring them here."
"Wait!"
Garchomp had already stepped forward to blitz the field when Jason shouted it down.
Both Cynthia and Iono looked at him, puzzled.
Jason chose his words. "Garchomp's too big—aura too strong. If it heads out, every Pokémon will zero in on us. We still don't know the situation—especially with Iron Boulder possibly watching from the dark. Better not startle the snake."
Cynthia's eyes warmed with a touch more appreciation. This Ditto didn't just clown and talk—he had tactical sense not inferior to a veteran Trainer. Smarter than certain head-down rushers.
"Jason's right!" Iono bobbed her twin tails in agreement. "Low key, low key!"
With both women onboard, Jason puffed up a bit. "Gimme a sec—I'll be right back!"
Before the words finished, he flashed—into a four-white-mouse Maushold family.
Two larger, two smaller—the "family of four" form.
The transformation drew gasps from Iono and the stream—the no-reference morph again!
Before the surprise had time to land, the four mice streaked out like white lightning. The two Charcadet in their "heated duel" never noticed.
One was at a "critical moment": "hit" by a Spark, staggering theatrically, looking ready to fall.
Jason arrived.
The Maushold split—one big mouse and one small appeared at the left Charcadet's side; the other pair flanked the right one, poised to "press the advantage." Before either Charcadet could register the white blur, each felt a solid thump and went down. In the next instant, forces they couldn't resist pinned their arms out, and they were dragged—faster than Jason had blitzed in—back into the shadows.
The snatch took two, maybe three seconds. So fast no one on the field noticed two of their own vanish.
Jason hauled the pair back, then popped back to Ditto form. The two Charcadet looked from the blob to the two impossibly beautiful humans behind him and the land dragon whose mere presence made it hard to breathe.
For a heartbeat they were blank. Instinct kicked in and they tried to posture. Flames atop their lids flared higher as they glared.
"Who are you! What are you doing in our territory?!" one blurted, bluff and bluster.
"Leave now! Or I'll call everyone to beat you up!" the other added—voice trembling.
They'd meant to be bold, to leverage their clan's numbers and scare the intruders off—but Jason and company gave no verbal reply.
Garchomp took a single step forward.
No roar, no move. It just stepped out from behind Cynthia and stood before the two tiny Charcadet.
Its bulk blocked all light, throwing a shadow of despair over them. It lowered its head slowly and fixed those cold golden slits on the two runts.
Pressure drenched them. Their puffed-up bravado popped like a balloon; the flames atop their heads drooped; their bodies shook uncontrollably. Feet together, backs straight, they stood petrified, barely daring to breathe.
This Garchomp—by far the strongest thing they'd ever seen. Don't move. Don't move.
With the two finally docile, Jason stepped in, voice as gentle as he could make it. "You two seem pretty close—so why are you 'attacking' each other?"
They jolted. One, the quicker, instinctively wanted to snap "None of your business."
It glanced up—and met Garchomp's gaze. Survival flipped the switch; it swallowed the words and U-turned its attitude.
"We don't want to fight!" it stammered, on the verge of tears. "But the boss told us to—we can't refuse!"
The other seized on the opening. "Yeah! If the boss hadn't told us to, I'd never fight my friends—we're super close!"
That was clear enough. Cynthia's guess had been right. But who was their boss?
Iron Boulder?
Jason pressed, "Which one's your boss?"
Terrified, the two didn't hesitate. They raised their tiny arms and, trembling, pointed to the exact same spot in the center of the battlefield.
Everyone followed their fingers—through the swarm and to the heart of the fight.
There, at the dead center, were the two going at it the hardest—
One Armarouge and one Ceruledge.
~~~
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