Chapter Forty-Six - Early!

Bright and early the next morning...

Actually, it was mostly just early the next morning, because they woke up to grey skies and a light drizzle. Still, that didn't stop them from going outside, and Marill didn't mind at all.

Changing this much was strange, she'd doubled in height and probably gained even more weight. She still felt bouncy though, and had to keep reminding herself that she couldn't just bounce on her tail all the time. Her legs were longer now, so running was much easier.

And she had arms! With little paws on the end that had grippy finger pads! She could grab things, touch things, lift things, pet things, pat things and even throw stuff, like pillows flung at annoying older buneary.

Marill shook her head, it wasn't time for that, right now was time to focus, because it was training time. Broccoli was finally taking their training seriously enough to teach Marill how to be strong too.

When she eventually made it back home, Momma was going to be very proud of how big and strong Marill had become.

"Okay!" Broccoli said as she stood out in the rain with hands on hips.

Maril bent her arms down and tried to do the same, but she didn't have hips.

Next to her, Choco chuckled and shoved his paws into the fluff around his waist.

Hmph! She'd show him soon enough!

"Hmm, I really want to train both of you, but you both want to go in slightly different directions. I think I'll just have to teach both of you what I can, and if you put more effort into what you want to be best in, you'll improve with that faster, alright?"

Marill bobbed her head and next to her Choco nodded. "Bun!" Got it!

"Ma!" Yeah!

Broccoli grinned. "Okay, let's do an hour and a half of physical training, then an hour and a half of magic training! After that, move training for a little bit. Then it'll be noon and we can have a lunch break and maybe wander around town? It's important to have fun with training, but also between training, and we can find new ways to apply what you've learned!"

Choco nodded at that, and Marill copied him even if she wasn't sure what Broccoli meant by that.

"We're going to start with the basics of the Way of the Mystic Bun! I got that skill by merging three other skills. The first was Jumping, the second was kicking combat proficiency, and the other was Physical Manakinesis." Broccoli bounced on the spot, then jumped.

There were a few trees in the backyard of the Pokemon centre, and Broccoli easily jumped up to one of the lower branches, then skipped from one branch to another with her hands folded at the small of her back. She even did a flip once, and then did a mid-air cartwheel—hands still behind her back—between two branches.

"Maaaa!" Whoooa!

Broccoli smiled as she landed before them. "Being a strong bun fighter mostly means being highly manoeuvrable. I think you both have the potential to figure that out! It might mean combining a few, uh, pokemon moves to get there. I think Quick Attack is one, and I've heard Jazz mention some kicking attacks as well."

Marill bounced on the spot, excited to start.

"The other component is Manakinesis, which is what I've been teaching you a little, Choco." Broccoli punched her arms out ahead of her, notably not in the direction Marill and Choco were standing. Her fists glowed, and when she pulled them back there were glowing after images left in their wake. "By pushing some mana into your attacks, you can use some magical abilities at the same time. It's great against Ghosts since they can't handle it well, and some magical monsters are weak to it too!"

Marill nodded. That made perfect sense... she had no idea where or how to do that, but it looked great.

"So! We're going to start by training our agility, and that means..." Broccoli raced forwards and booped Marill on the nose. "Tag!"

"Marill?" She blinked, then caught on and bounced right at Choco, her tail swinging around. He ducked under it, then Quick Attack'd away. She ran after him, and he did the same, but on the third go he was panting and running low on energy, and she managed to tag him.

Then she was the one running away while laughing a maniacal "Ma ma ma ma!"

Tag lasted for a good long time, but soon enough Choco and Marill were both very tired. Marill was still getting used to her new body. At least, that was her excuse for being the tagged more often than not.

Broccoli got everyone some water, then once they were all a little more rested, she got them started on fighting practice.

Marill expected it to be normal fighting, but instead Broccoli had her and Choco fight in slow motion, using 'taps' instead of actual strikes. Marill didn't get it at first, but once she was caught in a bad position and unable to stop Choco from smugly kicking her on the butt, she realized that she had made a mistake earlier. Moving slower meant she had time to think about her mistake and correct it next time.

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After sparring for a bit, they did what Broccoli called 'boring physical conditioning' which really just involved running back and forth across the yard, then jumping up and down a lot, then practising punches and kicks against the air over and over again. It was a little boring, but didn't last all that long. Broccoli switching things out every time Marill's muscles started to hurt a little.

"I think," Broccoli said as she sat on the wet grass, it hadn't stopped raining, but it was mostly just a drizzle, and it did feel kind of nice. "That pokemon in general grow muscles and such a lot faster than humans do, so you're all going to get stronger faster. It won't be long before you're both way stronger than me!"

Marill wasn't so sure about that.

"Okay! Small break, then magic training time!"

"Bun!" Yeah!

Magic training was a lot less taxing on the body. They sat under the branches of a big tree, the ground here was still mostly dry with the cover being so strong, though there were the occasional drops that snuck past and tapped Marill on the head.

"Okay. I think we're going to start by just practising getting mana moving from one limb to the other. Then we'll see about turning it into Cleaning-type as quickly as possible, okay? I want to get you both at the level where you can use a little bit of Fire magic by the time we're ready for the next gym."

Marill didn't like this practice as much as the last one. Pushing energy around felt hard and weird. It was all slimy until she focused hard enough to grab onto it, and even then it wasn't too easy.

Still, it would make her stronger, so she closed her fists tight-tight and worked hard to keep the energy she felt flowing and moving as Broccoli directed. Eventually some of the water on her forehead was sweat, not just droplets of rainwater.

The practice felt like it went on forever, but in the end of it she did have a teeny-tiny unstable ball of Cleaning magic!

"Buneary bun bun!" Not bad fishy fish!

She used the ball of cleaning magic to wash Choco's mouth out.

Once they were done tussling, Broccoli had them both sit down for a moment. "Choco, I want you to work on two skills. Maybe alternate? The first is your Cleaning Ball attack! I want you to try and do it with other kinds of mana. Maybe Fire-type? It'll be a great step towards Fireballs! And it's good practice to speed up your cast time in any case."

"Bun!"

"After that, or between that, I guess, practice that move that makes you tougher. Defence Curl? It's a strong move, I think. It doesn't hurt, but it's still strong if it means making you harder to take down. Maybe try combining it with different kinds of mana? We might discover another buffing skill, Jazz said that there are a bunch."

Choco nodded seriously, then hopped off to train. Almost immediately there were little balls of light being flung all over.

"Marill," Broccoli said. She tapped her chin. "We've been neglecting your Water-type moves, I think. Remember that video we saw with Bubblebeam? How about we try to figure that one out?"

They did... try to figure it out, that was.

By the time noon came around and all of their tummies had the grumblies, Marill had succeeded in making a bubble. It didn't beam at all, but it was round, and when Choco touched it the pop sent him flying back bum over teakettle.

Marill considered that good progress!

For lunch, they left the centre and wandered into Azalea town. There were lots of human buildings around, including some that sold food. Broccoli held Marill close to her chest while Choco rode on her head for the better view.

Eventually, Broccoli pulled something out of her bag that had Marill perking up. The pokephone! "Ma! Marill?" Oh! Can I?

"You want my phone?" Broccoli asked. "Hmm, well, you'd need to learn how to read first. How about we do some reading practice while we're in town? I'm sure someone as smart as you will pick it up in a few months!"

Months! But Marill wanted the magic box now! There were funny noises in it, and people, and it told Jazz things that Marill wanted to know too.

She pouted, but when Broccoli pointed out some words on signs they passed and showed Maril how to sound them out, she was paying very close attention.

Months! Pft, she'd learn how to read by the end of the hour!