Meganium Level: 43 Ability: Overgrow Hidden Ability: Leaf Guard
Stats:
Tough Skin — The Pokémon's hide is exceptionally resilient, offering strong resistance against special attacks. Special Defense is raised. Sunny & Jolly — Boosts the power of contact moves. Even if the battle is lost, the user gains experience equal to what a win would have given.
Moves: Razor Leaf, Light Screen, Solar Beam, Leech Seed, Giga Drain, Body Slam…
As expected of the Grass-type Gym Leader's beloved youngest daughter — Thelma had already raised a Meganium with standout potential.
The moment Nova read through Meganium's stats and moveset, a cold feeling settled in his stomach. Something was off.
Sure enough, Thelma's very first command was to seize control of the weather.
"Geranium! Use Sunny Day!"
"Arno, use Poison Sting!"
Meganium let out a deep cry, arching its long neck back. A brilliant sphere of light rose from its vibrant flower petals and floated up above the battlefield, bathing the entire arena in the harsh glow of an artificial sun. The air itself seemed to shimmer with heat.
At the same time, Nidorino bristled, the spines along its back standing rigid. A volley of sharp, venomous needles launched outward like a burst of tiny arrows.
Nidorino's Hustle ability lowered the accuracy of its physical moves, and a few of the needles flew wide. But there were simply too many of them for it to matter. Most of the Poison Sting attack landed squarely on Meganium's broad, flowered chest, the venom soaking into its skin through the punctures.
In terms of raw damage, Poison Sting was not going to turn the tide of any battle on its own. With a base power of only fifteen, it barely left a mark. Nova knew that.
But that was not the point.
Nova had opened with Poison Sting for one reason and one reason only: it was fast, it fired off multiple needles at once, and it gave him the highest chance of inflicting poison before anything else could happen. As far as he could see, this was his only real window to get a status condition on Meganium in this match.
Even so, Thelma did not look worried. If anything, she looked pleased with herself — like she had seen this coming from the moment Nova called his first move.
"Meganium, eat your Berry!"
Under the rules of Pokémon battles, each Pokémon is permitted to hold one item. That item could be a piece of held equipment — like a Charcoal that steadily boosts Fire-type moves — or a Berry with a one-time effect. Held equipment was largely out of Nova's budget for now, and Berries cost money every time you used one. Nidorino had gone into this battle without anything.
Arno was smart enough to handle that.
Nova had reasoned that the power boost from items was often limited anyway — sometimes even weaker than the edge a good type matchup could provide. Berries, meanwhile, were single-use. If Thelma tried to cure poison with a Berry, he could simply reapply the status later.
At least, that had been the plan.
But then Nova saw it — the detail that turned everything upside down.
Meganium's Hidden Ability: Leaf Guard.
In sunny weather, a Pokémon with Leaf Guard cannot be afflicted by any status condition.
The moment Nova had spotted that ability in Meganium's profile, he understood. There would be no second chance. He had one window — right now, before Sunny Day's effects fully kicked in — to land the poison. That was why he had gone straight for Poison Sting: the fastest, most reliable option he had.
And yet, even poisoned and clearly in pain, Meganium lowered its head and plucked a small, round fruit from between its own petals — greenish-blue, about the size of a plum. It swallowed it whole.
The poison cleared instantly.
The Lum Berry. It cured all status conditions in a single use.
Nova's strongest opening play — the carefully timed poison that he had worked to make as potent as possible — had just been completely erased.
It had not been luck, either. Thelma had accounted for everything. She had considered that there was a slim chance Nova might skip the poison attempt and gamble instead on a Confusion status through Nidorino's psychic capabilities — a low-odds play, but not impossible for someone with Nova's habit of surprising people. To cover that possibility, she had given Meganium a Lum Berry rather than a simple Pecha Berry. A Pecha Berry would only cure poison. A Lum Berry wiped out any abnormal status — confusion included.
She had decided not to cut corners. If Nova, with his unpredictable luck, somehow landed the Confusion, all of her preparation would be wasted. Better to spend a little more and make sure it did not matter what he tried.
With the poison neutralised, Thelma moved straight to the next phase.
"Geranium, use Light Screen!"
A shimmering, translucent wall rose up in front of Meganium. Nidorino's Thunderbolt slammed into it a moment later — and the barrier held. The tiny amount of electricity that slipped through barely registered against Meganium, which had a natural resistance to Electric-type moves anyway.
"Meganium! Now use Reflect!"
Nova stared across the arena.
Are you serious right now?
Light Screen to dampen special attacks was already a strong defensive play. But Thelma was layering Reflect on top of it — halving physical damage as well. Once both screens were fully up, Meganium would be sitting behind a near-perfect defensive wall, and Nidorino would be taking hits it could not meaningfully return.
Even with Nidorino's newly developed resistance to Grass-type attacks, standing there passively while Meganium used Razor Leaf would still grind through its health in just a few turns. The screens had to be stopped before they were complete.
Nova made his decision quickly.
"Arno! Horn Drill! Charge in hard!"
A desperate move, by any measure. Horn Drill was a one-hit KO move — but it came with an accuracy rate of only thirty percent under normal conditions, and Nidorino's Vigor ability cut that down even further. Hitting Meganium with it while it was moving freely was next to impossible.
And sure enough, Meganium sidestepped the charging Nidorino without much effort.
But Reflect was interrupted.
That was exactly what Nova had wanted. The charge was never meant to connect. It was meant to stop the second screen from going up and buy him room to work with.
Thelma understood immediately that Nova was not going to give her another clean turn to set up Reflect. She shifted without hesitation, dropping the defensive setup entirely and going on the offensive.
"Geranium! Solar Beam!"
Under normal conditions, Solar Beam needed a full turn to charge. Under the blazing light of the artificial sun still hanging over the field, it did not. The petals framing Meganium's neck lit up with blinding intensity, the gathered light crackling with heat — bright enough that it seemed like it could scorch the earth beneath it clean away.
"Arno! Stomping Tantrum!"
Nidorino had missed with Horn Drill. That failure had not gone anywhere — it had been building into something.
Nidorino stomped both forelegs into the ground with everything it had. A ripple of energy burst outward from the impact, rolling across the arena floor in waves, as if the solid earth had turned liquid for just a moment.
Stomping Tantrum. A Ground-type move. Base power of seventy-five — but when the user's previous move had failed or missed, that power doubled.
Nidorino's Stomping Tantrum right now was hitting with an effective base power of one hundred and fifty.