-The Dragon King-

  -Shock and Awe: Ch 3-

  The battle started more or less the exact same way all the others had.

  Mark walked out into the area with his arms held wide and a big grin on his face. He finger gunned to some of the cheering audience, and threw out some air punches (along with some other stupid shit) while the announcer shouted his name. It was cringy but he didn’t really care and couldn’t help himself, being the center point of attention from such a big crowd was like a drug.

  Er. Rather, the intense adrenaline from it was like a drug, but Mark was not exactly a medical man. Taking it apart and explaining it to him like so, in a scientific manner, would only serve to drain the magic from the moment for him- akin to how explaining a joke sucks the humor from it. So, let's just let him have his fun.

  Across from him his opponent had a much less dramatic entrance.

  Ve, wasn’t really much to look at. If Norvin hadn’t warned him beforehand, Mark would have just thought he was any other 18 year old. Physically his only real distinguishing feature was the fact his hair, a hazel brown, ran most of the way down his back. Mark wasn’t really a fan, but Ve was from “Alolan” or something, which was supposedly an island, and long hair was kind of like an island-surfer-dude thing.

  He was, however, very obviously rich. Like, to the point you’d only see in movies.

  The teenager was wearing one of those designer suits that cost a small fortune, had six Luxury balls on his belt (a thousand poke-dollars each), and a metal watch on his wrist that looked remarkably similar to those stupid Rolex watches, back in his world, that people were brainwashed into slobbering over.

  If that wasn’t enough, he had four fucking bodyguards behind him. Stereotypical sunglasses and all.

  Dude, come on, you’re not that important.

  “The rules are the same as every time before! Three pokemon each, and the fighting only ends when one side surrenders or is completely unable to battle! But you all know that already. Enough stalling! You’re all here to see blood, and blood you will have! THESE ARE THE LAST MEN STANDING! AND SOON ONLY ONE WILL REMAIN! THE STAGE IS SET! AND HERE! WE! GO!”

  The announcer finished his shouting and… uh… nothing.

  Both Mark and Ve were just staring at each other, unimpressed, waiting for the other one to throw out their Pokemon first.

  There wasn’t an official ref to punish you if you didn’t start on time, after all, and this wasn’t an opponent Mark could play around with.

  “Uhm. I said HERE WE GO!... Go! I said go, why are they not fighting?” There were several soft thuds over the speakers. “Hello? Faithful audience? Is this thing on? You can hear old Scully, right?”

  Eventually Ve sighed dramatically, flipped his hair, and lazily tossed out a ball.

  A large blue cat-fox thing materialized on the field. A Glaceon, one of child Mark’s favorite Pokemon, and the first Ice Type he had seen since coming to this world.

  Immediately another piece of the reason this guy was such a danger clicked into pplace.

  The Glaceon had a collar on, and secured on either sides of it were two chunks of Never-Melt-Ice. That item in the games that was infused with TE or something, and boosted Ice moves.

  That was going to be a problem, but it didn’t change the fact that Glaceon was exactly what Mark wanted to see.

  “Bidoof1! Leer barrage!”

  An oversized, and terrified looking, rodent dropped down on Mark’s side of the field and immediately threw out her signature move without any hesitation.

  The hostile Normal TE sank into Glaceon’s frosty hide and weakened her from the inside out.

  Ve’s response was to scowl and return Glaceon to her ball.

  “An immediate swap out from Ve! Can he really afford to let Marcus stack those debuffs for free?”

  Crap. Did status debuffs last past recall? They didn’t in the game, but Mark was sure that his hot teacher had said otherwise. Something about how being de-materialized into pure energy helped get the external TE out of a Pokemon’s system, but that it would take awhile to completely “rinse out”.

  (Who would have thought, trainer school actually was worth something.)

  Ve’s second pokemon came out in a flash of green. A caramel-furred Leafeon, with leafy ears and a grassy tail.

  She dropped directly into the path of a follow up Leer, and actually took a step back, shaking her head in surprise, which gave Bidoof1 an opening for another Leer. Unfortunately, those two Leers were all that Bidoof1 was going to get out.

  “Leafeon, Vines.”

  Four grassy vines, each as thick as a wrist, emerged from the greens foliage-like tufts on Leafeon’s fur, and shot forward at Bidoof1.

  The poor hamster tried to dodge, but well…

  “OH! A clean hit! You could hear that slap from all the way up here! Oooh! That’s gotta hurt! A left hook, a right hook, another from the top, and two more from the sides again, there’s no break in this barrage! Bidoof is going in for a Tackle, but she’s not gonna make it! Cross’ first Pokemon is OUT!”

  Damn.

  Mark whistled as he withdrew Bidoof1. It was a fully expected result, and he got the Leers he wanted, but it was still impressive just how fast Bidoof1 had been dismantled.

  Like the Glaceon, this Leafeon had a collar on her neck with a Type item attached to it. Two golden Miracle Seeds, set to boost Grass attacks. Poor Bidoof was getting hit with the equivalent of a fucking truck.

  Luckily he already had a proven strategy for Grass types, and he had no reason to change it up.

  “Noibat, go!”

  Over the tournament Mark had started to get more in tune with his flyer, and was getting the hang of taking advantage of her speed. Noibat, in turn, was getting in tune with Mark, and how he liked to fight.

  And nothing showed that more than how she immediately let loose a blast of Air Cutters the moment she was fully formed enough to do so, even without a command.

  The Leafeon yelped and jumped to the side, managing to avoid the attack, but took her eyes off Noibat, which was a critical mistake.

  “Quick Attack into Wing Attack! Right into that green fuck’s face!”

  Noibat was already moving before the words fully left Mark’s mouth, and blitzed downwards at a speed that still seemed crazy to Mark after only having Shelgon’s slow ass for so long. She slammed into the Lefeon at what felt like (to Mark) mach-fuck, but was realistically not that fast, then kept riding her speed to jet off again.

  “Don’t let that bat escape!” Ve shouted.

  The Miracle Seeds attached to Leafeon’s collar let off a soft glow and a vine shot out like a cannon to wrap around Noibat’s leg just before she managed to get out of reach.

  “Good, you caught it, now Bul-”

  “Supersonic!”

  SKREEEEE!!

  Lafeon staggered and was pushed back slightly by the waves of pressurized sound that came out like a slightly visible waterhose from Noibat’s speaker-like ears.

  Leafeon’s eyes went cross as her bones rattled in her body, and the poor thing looked like she might vomit any second, but impressively she kept her grip, leaned her head back, and let out a spew of golden-green seeds at Noibat.

  Marcus cursed as he watched his flyer take the hit dead on. She wasn’t a walking chunk of concrete like Shelgon, she couldn’t take many of those. Just that one hit and she already was wobbling, another one and shed be out.

  He had to play keep away when using her, and take advantage of her strong attacking power without getting hit- which meant it was time to be more creative.

  “Quick Attack upwards!” He shouted and pointed into the air.

  Noibat complied, and with quite a bit of effort on her wings, she pushed upwards and dragged the bewildered Leafeon with her.

  “Why I’ve never seen anything like this! It’s a Leafeon air brigade.”

  The crowd cheered as Noibat began flying in wobbly circles in the air, pulling the already nauseous Leafeon behind her, spinning in circles on the end of her rope.

  “Leafeon, what are you doing? Shoot it!”

  “The walls! The cage walls!” Mark laughed. “Full speed! Paddeboard that fucker into the wall!”

  “NOI!”

  With another flap of her wings, and another Quick Attack, Noibat accelerated as fast as she could at the far wall, only turning away at the last second and slamming Leafeon directly into it like a bug hitting a windshield.

  The thick steel bars rattled, denting slightly, and the audience directly behind the spot of impact flinched back. But it wasn’t over, because Noibat was still moving, and Leafeon, in a bid to please her trainer, still hadn’t let go. The leaf fox/cat yelped as she was yanked to the side, dragged roughly along the metal cage, as Noibat flew circles around the arena, occasionally bouncing off only to slam back into it again with more force thanks to the centripetal force.

  “Bullet Seed! Stop floundering like an idiot and shoot the bat!” Ve screamed, looking like he was about to pull out his hair.

  And to Leafeon’s credit, she did try, firing off a spray that went completely wide, with only a few seeds managing to graze Noibat.

  But the split in attention and all the movement was finally too much for Lefeon to keep her grip. Her vine slipped from Noibat’s leg, and she fell to the ground with a dense sounding thud.

  “You stupid dog, you let it go! Get back to your feet and use Vine Whip to pull it out of the air!”

  Leafeon struggled to her feet, but had a hard time managing her balance. Her eyes were spinning in her head, and her cheeks were abnormally green, even for a grass type.

  “Take the opening, Noibat!”

  “NOI!”

  The aerial menace cried out as she shot by overhead, and hit Leafeon with a volley of Air Cutters as she passed.

  Seeing weakness, Noibat’s hunting instincts kicked in and she went for the kill. With a flap of her wings she rose to the highest point in the arena and then shot down like a dive bomber, her wings glowing with a Wing Attack, and her body leaving a trail from Quick Attack.

  “Leafeon, jump straight up and meet it head on with Double Edge!”

  “Double Edge!?” Mark’s eyes ballooned. “Shit, pull up! Pull Up!”

  But it was too late, Noibat had far too much momentum to turn on a dime.

  A flash of orange and white light enveloped Leafeon’s body and, listening to her trainer, she jumped directly up.

  The impact wasn’t particularly nice to either party. Noibat got hit by one of the highest physical power moves in the game, Leafeon got hit by the recoil of one of the highest physical power moves in the game, and took a Quick Attack boosted Wing Attack directly to the face.

  There was an explosion as the two pools of TE collided, and both Pokemon limply tumbled to the ground.

  Leafeon finally gave into her nausea and pulled herself up to vomit away from her own feet.

  Noibat did not.

  “Noibat is unable to battle! Leafeon wins! Cross is down 2-0!”

  Mark cursed under his breath as he recalled Noibat. He had hoped that would have gone better, but he supposed it hadn’t gone terribly. Leafeon wasn’t in any state to fight Shelgon without getting bodied, and it wasn’t like his opponent was happy about the outcome either.

  “Stupid fucking dog.” Ve hissed as he withdrew Leafeon. “Two Miracle Seeds! Two! And you could barely even take down an unevolved cave bat.”

  Leafeon’s pokeball was returned to Ve’s belt, and the original ball he used came back off.

  “Glaceon!” The Ice type shouted as she popped back out.

  “Go on, throw out your Shelgon so I can pummel it into the ground and get this over with.”

  “Eh.” Mark shrugged and made a show of slowly raising an arm to stretch. “I mean, if you're that confident you can handle him, then uh, sure.”

  Mark took a step forward, his arm still in the air behind him, and an evil grin on his face. He clenched his abs, turned his hips, and brought his arm down all at the same time to put his entire upper body into a nasty fastball straight down center lane.

  The metal ball flew through the air with a spin to it, and pelted Glaceon in the face hard enough to chip a tooth and flake off some of the red paint.

  She reared back clutching her snout with a dainty paw, as Shelgon materialized on top of her, and let loose a point blank Ember.

  “OHHH! WHAT A DISGUSTING OPENING! THAT’S EXACTLY THE KIND OF THING THAT WE’RE HERE FOR!”

  Having diligently been trained to never let an opening go unexploited, Shellgon slammed into Glaceon with a full bulk Headbut, and when she went tumbling he gave chase with a Take Down.

  If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  “YES! YES! GET HER! DON’T LET HER GET AWAY! ATTACK! ATTACK! STAY ON TOP OF HER! YES!” Mark screamed from his trainer spot, getting swept up in the adrenaline of battling and giving, uh- “RAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!” Motivational instructions.

  “Glaceon get on your feet, and use Ice Beam!”

  Ve barked his order, but that was a bit difficult to do when Shelgon had a Bite on Glaceon’s neck and was performing The Classic~? of slamming his opponent into the ground like a ragdoll.

  “YES! DEATH ROLL! DEATH ROLL! DO A DEATH ROLL!”

  Sadly, Mark’s dreams of seeing a death roll in a Pokemon battle were dashed when Glaceon, probably panicking at whatever the Hell a “death roll” was, let out a strangled cry, and erupted into a miniature snowstorm.

  The very unrefined Blizzard engulfed a third of the arena, and the equivalent of a solid wall of snow shoved Shelgon backwards hard enough to send him rolling towards Mark like an oversized bowling ball.

  Thankfully the dragon managed to stop himself before Mark had to dive out of the way, and got back to his feet. He was a bit battered, scuffed up, shivering, and had frost coating the front of his shell, but he was still in prime fighting condition.

  “Good, you finally got him off you, now Ice Beam, like I told you to before.”

  “Shit, Dragon Breath!” Mark shouted.

  There was a lull in the battle for a moment as both Pokemon reared back, and took a deep breath.

  Then the lull ended in a blaze of fire and ice.

  A wave of blue fire shot across the arena, only for the Ice Beam to slice through it like a knife through butter, and it was a marvelous sight.

  When Fairy TE interacts with Dragon TE, it's like a corrosive tarnish, it seeps into it and rots it from the inside out.

  Ice was completely different, it met Dragon like water to a grease fire. The crowd got a show as the flames splashed in all directions, and froze into thousands of tiny glowing crystals that popped in tiny explosions one after another in a show of light.

  The Ice Beam continued through, and carved a gash into Shelgon’s shell. He howled in pain, but shook off the frost.

  Shelgon was battered and weary, but made up for it by being royally pissed off to the point that the ice that clung to him was slowly melting away from how hot the Dragon’s inner fire was burning.

  “And another clean hit! Oooh! That’s gotta hurt! Shelgon may be a tanky beast, but I don’t know how many more of those he can just shrug off!”

  Down on the ground, Mark stared out at the half frozen battlefield in front of him with a surprised Pikachu face.

  “Cross down two Pokemon, and down to his final battler, meanwhile Ve’s team is still fully available and we haven’t even seen his third Pokemon! Can Cross pull this back, or is this the end of The Breaker!?”

  “Well… Shit.”

  He knew that an Ice move would probably beat a Dragon move, but he had kinda been hoping that the blue fire part of Dragon Breath would help a little.

  Evidently it didn’t, and now he had a huge range disadvantage against a super effective ranged attacker. Bull rushing in would just get him cut down before he made it, which only left-

  “Ember!”

  “Snuff it out with Icy Wind.”

  A hailstorm of fiery pellets met a blast of frigid wind, and while they fared much better than the Dragon Breath, it still wasn’t great. The small flames were battered by the fierce gale, causing them to lose speed, and slowly wither into smaller and smaller sparks.

  The ones that finally did manage to make it all the way across the area and hit Glaceon, only did minor damage, meanwhile Shelgon was pelted by the full force of the Icy Wind.

  He held his ground, refusing to give even an inch as he fired off volley after volley of Ember into the wind. But it was obvious even to something as stubborn as a dragon, as ice slowly froze over his shell, that this wasn’t tenable.

  So Shelgon held his next shot of Ember, and the next one after that as well, building the Fire TE in his mouth as he had a dozen times before in training, but unlike in training, where he had been aiming at a rock, right now he was aiming at an annoying piece of trash that was really starting to piss him off.

  And unlike in training, where it kept blowing up in his mouth, Shelgon let out a roar as he released a Flamethrower down the gullet of the tempest.

  The Icy Wind parted like the Red Sea and Glaceon let out a yelp in surprise as Shelgon’s new move hit her head on.

  “LET’S FUCKING GO!” Mark hollered. “Great job! That practice really paid off! Hit ‘em with it again!”

  And Shelgon eagerly obliged, firing off two more torrents of flame that Glaceon frantically tried to avoid. But on the third shot, Shelgon messed up his still unperfected Flamethrower move, and let it loose just a second too early, before the Fire had fully mixed, and just let out a burst of condensed Ember pellets all at once.

  It was less powerful than Flamethrower, but the volume of pellets all at the same time, and the spread, made it impossible for Glaceon to dodge all of it.

  “DO THAT AGAIN!” Mark immediately shouted, his eyes gleaming with excitement. “SHOTGUN! SHOTGUN! BUCKSHOT THAT ASSHOLE!”

  “Glaceon, what are you doing!? Stop running around like a Skitty and hit him with an Ice move!”

  “Nah, don’t let her even think about it! Dragon Breath again! Phalanx style, and make it spicy!”

  “Glaceon, Ice Beam.” Ve said with a douchy air of amusement, countering it the exact same way he had before.

  Unfortunately Ve was from Alolah, and had migrated to Sinnoh. Alolah and Sinnoh were not from Earth, which meant it didn’t have Greece, which meant no one here had any flying fuck what a “Phalanx” was.

  This is why Ve was caught off guard when Shelgon charged his move in his mouth but held it, and instead slammed down a Protect to shield himself from the Ice Beam.

  Then came the spear of the Phalanx, the attack, as well as the second part of the command.

  “Make it spicy” AKA… just use a fire move.

  A river of red hot fire shot forward as the shield flickered out of existence, punching through the dwindling back end of Ice Beam, and catching the icy cat/fox thing in the face.

  “A misdirect into a center mass Super Effective hit that’s turned the fight around! I almost can’t believe it! Ve has to watch out! Cross has a brain behind those bullrushing Tauros horns!”

  “I know I’m not the brightest box in the shed, but people never seem to believe me when I say I can be clever when I want to.” Mark said smugly.

  Especially when trainers, like that guy with the grass cat, just gave him ideas to copy, like hiding one Move behind the name of another. It didn’t take a genius to learn from others.

  “Glaceon!” Ve cried in dismay at watching his best hope at taking down Shelgon rapidly fall apart. “Quickly, use Ice Beam to make a wall and run back to me!”

  “Oi! Don’t run away, we were just getting to the good part!”

  Ve ignored Marcus’ blabbering, as he crouched down to his Glaceon as she came over to the edge of the trainer box. From his belt he pulled a very expensive looking bottle and sprayed it over her.

  The effect was immediate, her burns disappeared and the bruises all over her body began to rapidly heal.

  “Oh? What’s wrong?” Ve asked in a mocking tone, as he sent Glaceon back onto the field. “Did you forget that this is a no rules tournament? Out of ring items are fully allowed, and I have the money to use as many Full Restores as I could possibly need, unlike someone like you.”

  Mark sneered, and balled his hands into fists. “Oh I’ll show you a fucking out of ring item. Shelgon, charge that fucker!”

  Glaceon gracefully leapt up and over Shelgon’s Take Down, and pivoted for a follow up. She opened her mouth, collecting Ice TE for an Ice Beam-

  -Only for Mark to bury his boot in her side, and punt her like a football.

  Now, Glaceon was a lot sturdier, heavier, and less aerodynamic than a football, so she only went a few feet before hitting the ground. It also didn’t do a whole lot to hurt her, but the stagger and the complete confusion on her face when she looked up at him, bought more than enough time for Shelgon to plow into her at full speed.

  Glaceon shrieked as Shelgon tore into her again, and desperately started changing up a point blank ice move-

  THWACK

  -Only for her mouth to be forced shut and all that TE to POP in her throat as she got bashed over the head with a dented metal baseball bat.

  “Hey! Stop him! That’s cheating!” Ve shouted, only to be met with howling laughter from Mark.

  “What’s the matter, Vicky boy? Did you forget that this is a no rules tournament? Out of ring items are fully allowed!” Mark laughed as he brought his bat down again on Glaceon’s head.

  “Stop!” Ve rushed into the arena and pushed Mark off his Pokemon. “That’s not how this goes!”

  “I’m Marcus fucking Cross, I survived the end of the world, this will go however the fuck I want it to!”

  THWACK

  A lazy swing of the bat sent Ve to the ground with a broken nose.

  Glaceon let out a cry as she saw her trainer fall, but she couldn’t fire an attack without risking hitting him, and Shelgon was still on top of her, making her life incredibly difficult.

  The crowd was erupting, some cheering, others screaming, while the announcer shouted something overhead. But it all went in one of Mark’s ears, and out the other. His entire attention was focused on the guy in front of him, as he slowly walked up, spinning his bat in his hand.

  “Now we can do this the easy way, or the hard way.”

  “G-GUARDS!”

  “Hard way it is.” Mark clicked his tongue as he watched four men in suits rush from the entry way on Ve’s side of the arena. “Fucking rich people.”

  1v4

  About to be outnumbered four to one, Mark did the sensible thing, he rushed at them at full speed, barreling towards the largest of the men. His aggression caught them off guard, clearly having expected him to send out a Pokemon, causing them to hesitate.

  He hit the biggest guy in the middle at full speed, only to break off of the feint at the last second, using his momentum to ram with his shoulder and “roll” off Mr Big like a quarterback avoiding a tackle, to hit the scrawny guy to his left instead.

  Mr Scrawny folded in half from a bat swing to his gut, and then went to the floor from a knuckle sandwich to the teeth.

  1v3

  Mark didn’t stop moving, as soon as Mr Scrawny was falling he hit the next one that looked the fastest to take down. When outnumbered you needed to even the odds as fast as you possibly can.

  Mr, uh, let’s go with Mr Dumbfuck. Yeah, Mr Dumbfuck quickly proved worthy of his name, because instead of trying to get out of the way of the very telegraphed swing, he froze up, closed his eyes, and held his arms up in front of his face.

  Mr Dumbfuck did manage to block the bat, but going from the crunch and the scream, he likely fractured his arm. Mark reached through the arms, grabbed Mr Dumbfuck by the hair, and yanked his head forward to meet the handle of the bat.

  He got a really satisfying hit right to Mr Dumbfuck’s face, and reared back for a second one, but before he could confirm a 1v2, a large meaty hard grabbed his wrist.

  “Shit.”

  Too slow.

  Mark turned just in time to see Mr Big’s fat fist speeding towards his face.

  It slammed into his jaw like a brick wall, snapping his head to the side.

  “Yeah! Get him! Make him bleed” Ve shouted from somewhere in the back.

  Mark stumbled, tasting blood on his tongue, but his instincts took over before his brain caught up. He twisted his body with the hit, using the momentum to bring the bat around with the same full body strength he had used to throw Shelgon’s Pokeball, and crack it against Mr Big’s ribs.

  The crowd gasped as the impact echoed, a deep, wet thud that should’ve dropped most men.

  Mr Big grunted, grabbed the bat, and yanked it out of Mark’s grip.

  “Cute.” He grumbled as he turned it over, before tossing it over his shoulder. “But I train with my Fighting Types.”

  Before Mark could pull back, two sets of arms hooked around him, one hugged his right arm, forced it outstretched, and held it tight, the other grabbed the left and locked it tight to his side.

  Mark snarled, elbowing backward, but the bastards were too close and had too good of a grip.

  Mr Skinny slammed into his back, and wrapped his forearm around his throat, dragging him off balance. Mark thrashed, kicking wildly with his boots, but anytime he almost seemed to get away from one, the others would pick up the slack long enough for the other to recover.

  This was why he had wanted to get the small fry out first.

  “Let go!” Mark rasped, voice low and deadly. “I’ll fucking kill you!”

  Mr Big didn’t seem too terribly concerned with his threat though, and just frowned down at him, unsure of where to go from here.

  “Hit him!” Ve cheered, walking over while clutching his broken nose. “You have him strung up and wide open! Hit him!”

  Mr Big looked hesitant for a second before shugging, and stepped forward, cracking his knuckles one by one.

  Mark tried to drive a knee forward, but the choke yanked him backwards right as he tried. His muscles strained, veins bulging, every instinct screaming fight through, but the grip held.

  “I hope you're tough, guy.” Mr Big said as he wound up his arm.

  The first punch drove straight into Mark’s ribs- a heavy blow that cracked something, and knocked the wind out of him.

  Mr Big winced and looked back at Ve.

  “Keep going! Make him bleed or I’ll have my dad FIRE you!”

  Mr Big reared back, and sent another punch. Then another hit. And another.

  Mark’s head lolled forward, blood dripping from his lip.

  There was a sound of struggle as Shelgon tried to do something, but Glaceon was proving just as adept at tying him up as he was her.

  “Oh! How do you like that, huh?” Ve cheered. “Do you like pain? Tell me! Do you like pain!?”

  Mark’s response was to struggle again, but there just wasn’t an opening.

  Well, there wasn’t an opening until Hellena tackled Mr Skinny off his back.

  Mark took the gift for all it was worth. He dug his feet into the ground and forced his right arm forward, hauling Mr Dumbfuck right into Mr Big’s fist. That freed up his right arm, and let him turn around to personally free his left arm himself.

  The numbers rapidly swung in the other direction as other members of Ironclad Solutions charged onto the field, led by Terra, with plenty more on their way.

  His beautiful ex-Magma grunt ran up behind Mr Big and kicked him in the back of the knee as hard as she could, bringing him low and letting Marcus land the cleanest haymaker of his entire life directly into the man’s jaw.

  “I’ve brought the men to help, Comander!” Terra said, instinctively snapping a magma salute with her elbow up, without even realizing it. That would have to be fixed if he wanted to keep her around long-term, but Mark didn’t fucking care right now.

  “Amazing work, Private! No- Sergeant! You are promoted, you are my Sergeant! You will keep the men in line, keep the bullshit off my plate, and you will be paid damn well for it!”

  “EEK! I did it! I’m an Admin! I’m an Admin!” Terra squealed, jumping for joy, despite the fact that there was no such position in Ironclad Solutions, since they were not a “Team”.

  “And YOU!” Mark grinned like a madman as he grabbed the purple blob at his feet and lifted her into the air. “You BRILLIANT woman!”

  “Mnnngh.” Hellena groaned, her eyes spinning in their sockets, and foam leaking from the corner of her mouth. She had taken one (1) hit from Mr Scrawny before going down, and her usually unkept appearance was even more messy than before, but Mark didn’t even register any of that.

  There was nothing hotter than a woman getting her face bloody, and her hands dirty, to help him kick someone else’s ass!

  “Haha! I knew I was right to recruit you! You're super promoted! My new second in command! I would kiss you right now, if you wouldn’t stab me later for it!”

  “P-Please don’t.” She managed to squawk out, before Mark put her down on her feet.

  Then something happened.

  There was the sound of a pokeball opening, and a Pokemon being reformed.

  Everyone paused for a second and blinked.

  Then, with the taboo of not using a Pokemon directly against another human broken, all Hell broke loose.

  “Shinx, go!”

  “Machop!”

  “H-Haunter!”

  “Mightyena!”

  “Shinx!”

  “Bidoof!”

  “Shinx!”

  “Zubat!”

  “Shinx!”

  “Shinx!”

  “Shinx!”

  “Shinx!”

  Mark took a moment to process that. Right. He had given, like, everyone a Shinx, hadn’t he?

  Deeming it not his problem, he shrugged, and started walking towards a cowering Ve.

  At the edges of his vision he could see other trainers from the crowd making their way into the ring to join the massive free for all, along security guards who were rushing in blowing whistles to try to end everything, but Mark ignored them and kept his focus straight ahead.

  “Sorry for that distraction, I believe you asked me a question. You asked if I like pain, well, let me tell ya, I love it!”

  “EEK! Stay back!”

  “I love Pain!” Mark laughed as he cracked his knuckles. “It keeps you awake! It keeps you alert! Even if the man made horrors of the world have made you grow numb to every single damn emotion that the good Lord gifted you, you can still feel pain! It lets me know that I’m still ALIVE!”

  Ve yelped as Mark grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and lifted him up, forcing him to stare directly into Mark’s blood red eyes.

  “Now. Do you like pain? Cuz we’re gonna find out.”

  -End Chapter-

  Mark’s Basic Team Notes:

  Shelgon: Bruiser/Vanguard fighter. He LOVES getting up in your face and beating you into a pulp. Walking brick. Needs better physical moves, something Dragon or something Fang, preferably both- that HAS to exist, this can’t be a Mandela Effect

  Dragon Breath. Ember, Flamethrower (YOOOO!), Dragon Pulse, Bite, Headbut, Tackle, Takedown, Protect, Leer

  Noibat: THE fast fucker, would make Speedy Gonzales sweat for a race. Fragile but has a lot of tools to play creatively with- Flight, Speed, and Sound. (Need better earmuffs before stress testing sound volume again)

  Shadow Ball, Air Cutter, Supersonic, Screech, Quick Attack, Wing Attack

  Bidoof1: Lol. Lmao, even.

  Leer, uh, tackle I think.

  Purple's Team For Reference: