....
Julian was not only watching Patch train.
What he was really watching was everyone else.
From the moment the rising sun painted the eastern clouds red until the heat of late morning settled over the clearing, not a single Rattata came out of its burrow.
Judging by the sun's position, Julian estimated it was around ten in the morning.
At that point, he decided he had waited long enough.
He got up, returned to his den, and came back carrying a sturdy piece of bark. He had filled it with water from the nearby creek and set it down beside Patch.
The setup was crude, but there was no helping that.
Rattata were not human. They were not even primates. Most human-style tools, including items such as cups, were completely impractical for them.
Given what the forest offered, this slab of bark was the best container Julian could manage.
At least it beat trying to use a leaf.
Patch stopped training.
His body was already covered in bruises.
He looked first at Julian, then at the bark filled with water.
Finally, he sat down heavily on the ground.
"I'm sorry. I let you down."
"No, you didn't," Julian said, giving him a quick glance before turning back toward the entrance of his own den. His tone stayed calm. "You let yourself down."
"Think back to the big dreams you had when you first joined this training. Then think about what you felt after yesterday's loss. The disappointment. The hopelessness."
"Maybe I am disappointed. But not just in you. I'm disappointed in the whole colony. You, though, are disappointed in yourself. Because deep down, you know you still are not close to the strength you wanted to reach."
Julian had not meant to say quite that much.
But because he saw real potential in Patch, the words came out anyway.
And if Patch took them to heart, then maybe that was not such a bad thing.
It was the same idea that teachers always tried to drill into their students. Your work is for you. Your progress is for you. It is not something you do just to show off for someone else.
This was no different.
Julian did not want Patch to train hard just so it would look good in front of him.
That would be useless.
If Patch was not doing it for himself, then no amount of effort on the surface would amount to anything.
Patch stared at him in silence for a long time.
Then, at last, he picked up the bark, drained the water in one go, and went right back to training.
The reason he kept pushing himself was actually very simple.
One of the three Rattata who had died the day before had been his younger brother.
Patch had watched that living, breathing piece of his own bloodline disappear into Ekans's gaping jaws right in front of him.
What bothered him most about yesterday was not the younger Rattata who had rushed in recklessly.
It was not even the rest of the group who had fumbled the fight.
It was himself.
If he had been stronger, if he had reacted faster, he might have saved his brother.
At the time, the two of them had been close enough.
So all night long, that moment kept replaying in Patch's mind.
He could not forgive himself.
That was why he had picked up that tension again, pulled it tight, and refused to let go.
It was not really that he had moved on from the grief.
It was more than he was trying to do with it.
Trying to get stronger.
Trying to earn the forgiveness of the brother he could no longer reach.
...
Because Rattata reproduced quickly, their colonies did not treat family ties with the same weight as humans did.
But that did not mean those ties were meaningless.
That quiet bond, that emotional burden, was still there.
And it probably weighed on them more than Julian realized.
The colony had lost members.
Most of the Rattata needed a few days to steady themselves after that.
Patch was the exception, not the rule.
Julian, however, did not know the details behind that. So when the others stayed hidden in their burrows, he could not help measuring them against Patch and feeling disappointed.
Still, over the next few days, the elite trainees began returning one by one.
Maybe Patch had set the tone.
Whatever the reason, they started catching back up with their training. Sometimes they even pushed beyond the targets Julian had assigned.
Ekans never stopped hunting, not for a single day.
At first, while the colony was still regrouping and not everyone was ready to fight, they played it safe and retreated into the burrows.
The tunnels were too small for Ekans to follow.
Julian himself took a minor injury from one of Ekans's Poison Sting attacks, but it was nothing serious. He had already learned Refresh, so once he cleared the poison from his body, he recovered without much trouble.
A few days later, once the full group was back in shape, things changed.
Following Julian's commands, the Rattata launched clean, coordinated counterattacks, and victory started swinging back their way.
This time, Julian broke down Ekans's tactics on the spot and adjusted the colony's responses as the battles unfolded.
The difference now was not just that they were winning again.
It was that none of them got careless afterward.
No one relaxed because of a victory.
No one slacked off after a good day.
Whatever training they were supposed to do, they still did it in full.
Some Rattata even added extra reps, determined never to repeat the same mistake again.
In one week, they accomplished more than they had in the previous three.
By now, every one of the ten elite trainees had almost completely mastered Hyper Fang.
And Patch, along with one other standout, had already started practicing Pursuit.
Julian guessed it would not be long before the colony saw the rise of a new Raticate.
And judging from the pace of things, there might be more than one.
For the first time in a while, Julian felt real excitement stirring again.
There was hope.
And the moment every elite trainee cleared the first stage of special training, he immediately moved them on to new moves.
The first was Zen Headbutt.
It was the only Psychic-type move Rattata could realistically learn here.
To be honest, the amount of Psychic energy in a Rattata's body was tiny, almost negligible.
But when Julian looked at the colony's three major predators, this move still gave the best return for the effort.
Against Poison-type Ekans and Fighting-type Mankey, Psychic-type attacks offered a real advantage.
As for Rufflet, the Normal- and Flying-type threat from above, Julian had prepared something else.
Shock Wave.
Electric-type moves checked Flying-types, and Shock Wave also gave them a ranged special attack.
Even in matchups without a direct type advantage, that kind of move could still create useful tactical openings depending on how it was used.
Its efficiency was a bit lower than Zen Headbutt, but from an overall utility standpoint, it was still solid.
Julian taught both moves at the same time.
That was because the ten Rattata did not all lean the same way. Some had slightly better Psychic aptitude. Others showed a stronger feel for Electric-type energy.
In the wild, without proper equipment, there was no easy way to test elemental talent precisely.
So the simplest answer was to teach both and see which one each Rattata picked up faster.
As it turned out, most of them adapted to Zen Headbutt much more quickly.
After about a week of practice, they had already reached the beginner stage with it.
Shock Wave, on the other hand, was still rough.
Nine attempts out of ten ended in failure.
But when Julian thought it through, that made perfect sense.
Rattata simply had a much bigger gap between their physical Attack and their Special Attack.
Special attacks were never going to hit them especially hard.
As a tool for survival, Shock Wave still had value.
As a reliable finisher, though, it was going to be much harder to count on.
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~Support with 200 PowerStones = 1 Bonus Chapter
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