Ethan wasn't about to make curry rice for breakfast. He cooked half a bucket of porridge instead, then took out the pickled beans and pickled vegetables he'd bought earlier.
He'd figured the Sentret wouldn't like them. Surprise—between the porridge, an entire bottle of pickled beans, and the pickled veg, they cleaned him out.
He could already picture them drinking from the river until they were ready to burst.
After all, those pickles were meant to last ten days if you ate a little each meal. These little gluttons polished them off in one sitting.
When they were done, the six Sentret lined up and lazed in the sun. With nothing else urgent to do, Ethan watched Houndour practice Hidden Power (Grass), chiming in with pointers now and then.
With so many stronger Pokémon pushing out of the deep mountain into the outskirts, Ethan didn't dare go looking for fights today. Yesterday had been too close—if Furret hadn't arrived in time and blocked that Bubble Beam, he and Houndour would've been in the hospital—or worse. This wasn't an anime where nobody dies, and humans here didn't have plot armor.
While Houndour trained, Ethan went to talk to Furret. Since the troupe had no intention of leaving, he might as well make the most of their help.
A little later, on a flat stretch of grass, Houndour and a Sentret faced off.
Houndour's mood soured. His trainer had arranged a "friendly" match behind his back—against a pack of combat-gremlin rabbits. He didn't like them… and he probably couldn't beat them. Worse, their "trainer" was a long rat that could out-coach his trainer by the look of it.
"Cheer up, Houndour," Ethan called. "I talked them into five scrim rounds. Win them all and you get to challenge the boss. Feel the blood pumping yet?"
"Lubi!" (Heh. I feel like puking.)
"Wei-li… wei-li…"
From the back, Furret gave a few crisp orders. The Sentret's eyes sharpened; tiny paws clenched. They were ready.
"Wei-li!"
On the field, the Sentret growled low, coiled its tail like a spring, and blitzed forward. Quick Attack.
"Use Flame Charge and control the ground with fire!" Ethan snapped.
Orange fire wrapped Houndour. Embers pattered to the turf, and Houndour burst forward to meet it head-on.
It was a straight collision—fitness versus fitness—but Quick Attack landed first, and the Sentret vastly out-leveled Houndour. Houndour got bowled over.
The Sentret didn't let up. It leapt, flipped, and chopped down with its tail wreathed in steel—Iron Tail.
Houndour hadn't steadied himself yet; there was no clean dodge.
"Side step—Sucker Punch!"
"Lubi!"
Battle focus clicked in. Houndour lunged sideways, Iron Tail whistled past, and dark energy burst along his foreclaws as he raked the Sentret's back, knocking it tumbling. It skidded, then posted on its big tail to stop.
"Ember!"
Houndour spat a fan of burning shots, a pretty flaming arc that hammered the Sentret first—then the rest streaked in. The Sentret used its tail to pivot and weave; the first few hit, but it slipped the rest by a hair.
"Wei-li!" Furret barked.
Ethan couldn't tell what was said, but the effect was instant. The Sentret's movements smoothed out; it chained Quick Attack again and began ghosting through the incoming Embers with startling ease.
The dodge rate was absurd. Earlier, the Sentret occasionally slipped a surprise shot—now, with that burst of speed, Houndour's Embers couldn't touch it.
"It's their instinct training," Ethan realized. Sentret usually come with Run Away—a near-useless ability in trainer battles—but Furret had turned that flight instinct into elite evasive footwork.
The Sentret closed fast. If it got in tight, Houndour—under-leveled and lighter—would lose this exchange.
"Flash Fire—ignite the field and pin its movement!"
Houndour howled; Flash Fire surged to life. All the scattered sparks flared back, blooming into a chasing wave that herded the Sentret.
Pinned, the Sentret dropped to its belly and started clawing dirt.
"Dig." Ethan's face fell. Wang Lin's favorite headache—and a nightmare to counter without the right tools.
The Sentret slipped underground, dodging the flames entirely.
With Houndour's current kit, once the foe Digs, it's all defense until the strike lands. Ethan's respect for Furret climbed again; as a Pokémon, it was basically coaching like a trainer, and it had trained its timid little Sentret into a fearless brawler.
The ground went still.
"Try feeding fire into the burrow," Ethan said anyway.
Houndour pressed fire down the hole with Flash Fire, but within seconds shook his head. No oxygen, no fuel—nothing for the flames to catch.
"Hold position," Ethan said. "Feel the ground. When it moves, we punish the pop-up."
This tunnel had already been dug; any new approach would shake the dirt. If they were lucky, a section might even settle, telegraphing the line.
"Wei-li!" Furret called again.
Houndour didn't understand the words, but he understood the intent. He lowered his head, paws splayed, muscles loose, every pad listening for tremors.
There—a faint rumble underfoot.
"Jump—and Fire Spin beneath you!"
Houndour sprang. Fire Spin roared from his jaws, a wide, whirling column. Midair, Flash Fire siphoned every stray flame into the vortex; it swelled and spun faster.
Ethan expected the Sentret to abort. It didn't. It burst up into the Fire Spin.
Houndour's eyes lit—this was it—
"Dodge!" Ethan's shout cracked the air.
Within the flames, the Sentret flared with brilliant light—and then a storm of white starbursts detonated outward, hammering Houndour out of the air. Darkness swallowed him.
"Last Resort." Ethan exhaled. "Three different moves used. Now it can trigger."
Loss was loss—but there was no frustration, no blame. He sprinted to Houndour, spraying medicine over the scorched fur.
Across the way, Furret acted just as fast—its tail hardened like a steel blade, parting the Fire Spin and dragging the Sentret free. Even with fire's natural advantage against steel, Furret's Iron Tail locked the vortex and forced it to a stop.
Ridiculous strength.
Houndour came to quickly. Dizzy, but alert, he pulled the remaining flames inward with Flash Fire, leaving the grass unharmed.
Ethan jogged to the Sentret next and tended to its scrapes. Higher level meant sturdier body; despite eating a few Embers and a whirl of Fire Spin, it was mostly dusty, not burned. Two Oran Berries for energy as a winner's prize did the trick.
(Briefly, Ethan wondered if these Oran berries had been "foraged" from the village orchard.)
"Lubi…" Houndour flopped over, whining. His trainer clearly loved rabbits more.
Ethan hurried back with two Oran berries for Houndour as well. Outside mealtimes, he avoided pellets so as not to unbalance nutrition during growth.
As Houndour munched, shadows fell over him. He looked up—four big Sentret had encircled him, eyes glittering, paws rubbing together, pink tongues licking lips, practically vibrating with anticipation.
"Lubi, lubi, lubi—Lubi! (Gentle-rabbits, dog meat tastes terrible—let me live.)"
"Hah. They've got fight in their eyes," Ethan said, scratching his cheek. He still couldn't square it—Sentret were supposed to be timid. Under Furret, they were built like flat-top bruisers: if they weren't fighting, they were on their way to a fight.
"Perfect. Competitors are raring to go. Rest twenty minutes, then round two!"
"Wei-li! Wei-li!""Wei-li!"
"Lubi?"
(Which eye sees me raring to go? I'm raring to die. Ethan, friendly advice: don't burn bridges. I may be a dog, but you're being the real dog.)
If Ethan could've heard that, he'd probably have booked a spar with Furret next.
He patted Houndour's head and murmured, "This chance is rare. Once in a lifetime. Squeeze every last drop of value out of these tails."
"Lubi!" (Face… meet spit.)
The rest of the day was Sentret school. Dig + Last Resort was brutal: pop up in your face and drop the finisher—almost nobody at Houndour's level could withstand that nuke.
By sundown, Houndour's cheeks were puffy.
Ethan kept puzzling over Dig counters. The cleanest solution is Earthquake—collapse the tunnel or punish the emerge—but Houndour can't learn it. That meant a different path:
Option 1: Seed the field with fire. At the first tremor, yank the flames into an instant Fire Spin. If the foe emerges into the vortex, you get free spin damage and disorientation before they can act.
Option 2: Use Hidden Power (Grass) to sheet the ground with grass-type energy as a sensor net. Subtle surface shifts would register faster than sight alone.
The second was harder right now; Houndour's control over Hidden Power was still behind his fire control. And boosting the raw power of Fire Spin? No shortcut—that would climb with levels, reps, and refinement.
By the next morning, Houndour had gone through all five Sentret one-by-one. The scripts were similar—and he lost them all. Level 6 into Level 13 is exactly what it looks like.
His confidence wobbled at first, but Ethan talked him through it. They treated each bout like a lesson, engaged fully, then sat down after to pick apart mistakes and patch their teamwork.
(The only difference: one of them analyzed from the sideline; the other did it with his face.)
In the afternoon, Furret personally helped Houndour work Fire Spin control—how to angle the pull, where to catch a close-quarters fighter, how to force movement into bad lines.
Exactly what Houndour lacked. Ethan couldn't stop grinning.
On the field, Houndour refused to cry. Teaching was one thing—why did Furret have to go full power? That skinny rat hit like a truck; Houndour was pretty sure one cheekbone had cracked from a tap.