Crafting Pokéblock
Allowing Murkrow to rest on the side, Larry began contemplating his plan for the next period.
Firstly, he decided to continue feeding Murkrow with Sitrus Berry Pokéblocks since the results from the past few days had been quite promising.
Merely from appearances, in these four days, Murkrow had grown from a visibly malnourished state to a size typical of a regular Murkrow Pokémon, standing at almost fifty centimeters tall.
However, in Larry's eyes, the changes in Murkrow went beyond mere physical growth. The most apparent change was in its size, but daily scans with precise chips revealed that the Pokémon's strength, speed, and even innate abilities had all improved to varying degrees.
Even its pontial, while still in the green category, had noticeably deepened in color compared to a few days ago, indicating that Murkrow's innate potential was already top-tier even among green potential Pokémon.
Especially after this afternoon's consecutive battles, Murkrow's efficiency in absorbing the effects of Sitrus Berry Pokéblocks had increased even more.
With three days remaining, Larry believed that after continuing to use these Pokéblocks, Murkrow's original potential would fully recover. It would be a period of rapid growth.
So, the training over these past days couldn't afford to stop. Ideally, he should seek out different Pokémon for battles, getting accustomed to the rhythm of combat while making better use of the Pokéblock's effects for recovery.
As for Murkrow's upcoming training direction, speed remained a priority. The duration of the Tailwind ability needed to be consistently improved.
Furthermore, Murkrow needed to acquire some essential moves. Mastering the skills it had already learned required time to become proficient in efficiently executing them during battles.
Being a dual-type Pokémon of Dark and Flying, Murkrow had good resistance overall. It wouldn't be severely countered by any single type, considering it wouldn't face any 4x damage vulnerabilities.
Even moves that dealt 2x damage, such as Electric, Ice, and Fairy types, were quite rare on this trial island, if not entirely absent. Therefore, the main concern in battles on this island was Rock-type moves.
With its Prankster ability, Murkrow often held an advantage when it came to executing moves during battles, especially when combined with the Tailwind ability.
Now, the focus was on more battles, improving the synergy between Trainer and Pokémon, and mastering existing combat techniques.
Once the Sitrus Berry Pokéblocks were used up, Murkrow would need another type of Pokéblock to accelerate its growth and enhance its effects.
Larry had already thought of this new Pokéblock before the first ranking assessment.
BlackSwift Pokéblocks, an Intermediate Pokéblock with black and white patterns, mainly consisted of Dark Berry and Quick Berry, with over a dozen different types of Berry-related herbs and materials as additives.
It was a type of Pokéblock specifically designed for Dark and Flying-type Pokémon, making it ideal for Murkrow's typing.
Hence, Larry had used his points from the first ranking to exchange for these Berrys.
Both Dark Berry and Quick Berry were the most frequently exchanged items by Larry, essentially depleting the Rocket Team's inventory on the island.
Once these cubes were crafted, he believed that Murkrow would enter a period of rapid improvement.
After pondering for a while, Larry, who had spent a busy day, felt a wave of fatigue.
He rested his hand behind his head, glanced at the moonlight filtering through the crack in the cave, and closed his eyes, gradually falling asleep to the steady breathing of Murkrow.
The next day, the sun slowly rose from the eastern horizon.
As the night receded, the forest gradually returned to silence. The chirping of insects faded away, and the traces of wild animals disappeared.
A beam of sunlight filtered through a crack in the cave, falling on Larry's face. The rising temperature woke him from his slumber.
It was summer, and the sun rose relatively early. Perhaps due to the successful development of recent events, a burden that had been weighing on him was finally lifted, allowing Larry to sleep in longer than usual.
Stretching lazily, Larry smiled as he saw Murkrow wake up with him.
Since starting this journey, today was the first time that Larry had truly enjoyed a restful night's sleep.
"Murkrow, your task today is quite simple. Stay here and flap your wings continuously until all the scents in the cave have dissipated," Larry instructed Murkrow.
In previous battles, Murkrow almost used the Gust move with the help of the Tailwind ability. Larry believed that with a bit more practice, it could master this move. If it continued to advance, it might even learn high-level damaging moves like Hurricane.
While honing its abilities, Murkrow could also help clean up the cave, eliminating any foul odors. It was a win-win situation.
"Murkrow!" Murkrow nodded vigorously, always diligently following Larry's commands.
Since its birth, Murkrow had never seen its parents, had no nurturing environment, no delicious food, no training, and was often bullied by other Pokémon.
Until it met Larry, who was not only the first but also the only person to treat it well.
So, in addition to the typical loyalty of Pokémon toward their trainers, Murkrow had developed a deep reliance on Larry, almost like a child to its parents.
It couldn't bear to let Larry down; that was its sole thought.
Seeing Murkrow's enthusiastic demeanor, Larry's lips involuntarily curled upwards. He retrieved today's portion of Sitrus Berry Pokéblocks from his storage space.
With hopeful eyes from Murkrow, he threw them one by one into the air, which Murkrow promptly devoured.
"Burp…" Satisfied, Murkrow flew back into the cave and continued flapping its wings, creating a howling wind inside.
As Larry stood behind Murkrow, the raging wind inside the cave didn't affect him at all.
After a quick freshening up and a simple meal of dried food, Larry took out various Berrys and herbs from his storage space.
He placed them on a rock in a specific order. Larry then retrieved a relatively clean piece of cloth from his bag and carefully wiped each Berry before placing them back in their positions.
He washed the tools used for crushing the Berrys with clean water.
Perhaps due to the cave's proximity to the lake or because there were underground springs in this area, the previous owner of the cave had likely dug it here.
In any case, Larry and Murkrow benefited from it. Compared to the lake water that every Pokémon would drink, the underground spring water here was even clearer and sweeter.
Due to the limitations of his current conditions, Larry used rather primitive tools – wooden bowls and pestles, a manually operated impurity separator, a hand-cranked compressor, and a manual coagulator.
All these tools were rudimentary, which made the Pokéblock production process quite elaborate and slow, but they still produced quality cubes that yielded results.
As for crafting higher level Pokéblocks, these simple tools weren't sufficient.
Larry carefully peeled and removed the pits from each Berry with a small knife, then meticulously cut them into uniform sizes on a cutting board, ensuring that the excess portions of herbs were removed. He then crushed the herbs and removed any impurities.
Starting with the flesh of Dark Berry and Quick Berry, he used a rocking stirrer to crush them before sequentially adding other Berrys and herbs, strictly following the chip's instructions.
Each ingredient required precise measurement, stirring for a specific time, and reaching the correct consistency, and the order in which ingredients were added was crucial.
Thanks to the chip's assistance in controlling everything, Larry could easily follow the formula. After placing the prepared liquid into containers and compressing it, all that was left was to store it in a cool place and wait for some time for the cubes to solidify.
Once he finished crafting a portion of Pokéblocks, Larry set the container aside and retrieved an equal amount of materials to continue making the next batch.