One Moon

In the same field that they always trained in, a familiar scene was happening. A sweaty but determined child was jogging while a bright green Pokemon happily bounced next to him, paving the way with rapidly growing greenery. If one looked further, one could find an indifferent Pokemon watching from afar, slowly sharpening its appendages.

Nearly a month had passed since Nova decided to focus solely on training him and his Pokemon.

Throughout this time Hoppip had gotten much closer to Nova, opting to cheer him on even when doing mundane tasks. Undeniably, it was adorable.

In complete contrast, Pawniard stayed distant yet ever watchful of Nova's each and every action, seemingly judging him.

At times they would attract spectators with the sheer amount of hard work they put in.

Yet on the surface, you wouldn't be able to tell how hard they truly worked. Nova himself didn't do many missions, opting to do two C-Ranks a day at most. It was now routine for him to return to the base with at least one captured Pokemon for starting members.

He knew that he wouldn't be able to catch up in levels in a month, so he focused solely on technique.

Using the money from copious C-Rank missions, he bought multiple TMs for Pawniard and Hoppip and put all his attention into move mastery.

One would think they wouldn't be able to do many missions with Pawniard being fairly weak and Hoppip being extremely weak, but the reality was different.

Pawniard's close combat specialization with Hoppip's support and Nova's guidance made for a powerful combination.

"Alright, Hoppip. I think that's enough for now."

Pausing for a break, Nova walked over to and sat under the shade of the building, right next to Pawniard.

Hoppip soon followed afterward, stopping its status move seeing that it was unnecessary to keep it up.

Nova had the idea to use Grassy Terrain to make an area of constant healing, allowing him to work out and reap more benefits than he would otherwise. Although, he didn't push himself hard, as he still hadn't started puberty yet.

Either way, he was much stronger than any eight-year-old had any right to be.

He personally attributed it to his constant training, but he knew that being a human in the Pokemon world must've been the main factor.

'So it starts tomorrow,' He thought as he sat back and relaxed, Hoppip softly landing on his head. Taking out his Pokegear, he scanned his two Pokemon to see just how far they came in a month.

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<Pawniard (♂)>

<Type: Dark / Steel>

<Level: 10>

<Potential: D-Rank>

<Ability: Defiant>

<Moves: Iron Head, Scratch, Leer, Fury Cutter, Thunder Wave, Iron Defense, Metal Claw, Sandstorm>

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<Hoppip (♂)>

<Type: Grass / Flying>

<Level: 7>

<Potential: C-Rank>

<Ability Chlorophyll>

<Moves: Splash, Cotton Guard, Seed Bomb, Grassy Terrain, Synthesis, Sunny Day>

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Nova managed to push Pawniard into the Tier 2 of his Iron Head move, allowing him to easily learn other Steel-type moves such as Metal Claw and Iron Defense. Plus, he bought two more Tms, both being weather based to turn the battle in his favor.

Sadly, their 'level' training wasn't as successful.

It was a fact that Pokemon could only gain levels when they overcame an opponent in a harsh battle. Because of this fact, Nova knew that he wouldn't be able to level up very quickly while staying in the city.

The Pokemon in the city were either extremely weak or had a strong leader and worked in groups. He managed to defeat the weak Pokemon with ease, stagnating his training after a week and a half of easily dispatching or catching them.

Unable to level up efficiently anymore, he thought about taking on a group of Pokemon. That was until he saw the leaders of the Pokemon packs were above level 30.

Going beyond the city was much too dangerous. Without going deeper into the heart of the region, welcoming the idea of being harmed by others, the only place available was the forest outside the city.

Sadly, that forest was even more dangerous than the rest of the region. With how harshly the people have fucked up the environment, Pokemon that couldn't survive in the city had to get much stronger or die trying. Thus, there were some truly powerful Pokemon lurking in those woods.

As a result, he only defeated a few dumpster Pokemon a day. Some he would catch and turn in for mission money, others he would feed to his Pokemon or leave them be.

He still didn't know if it was beneficial or not, as he observed no differences between them before and after eating tens of Pokemon, but he still let them do it nonetheless. On that topic, he did find out that Pokemon had one other stipulation about eating each other.

For some reason, they could only eat the same typing or a typing that is weak to them.

That fact alone brought multiple questions regarding the difference between Pokemon and humans. So he tested the most prominent one.

After his last experiment feeding a Pokemon to a human, he was curious if the same thing would happen if a Pokemon ate the wrong typing. And the answer was… kinda?

Upon forcefully feeding a particularly feisty Rattata to a piece of an Ekans, it sort of… exploded.

Instead of the glowing veins thing that happened after the human ate a Pokemon, the Rattata simply glowed a bit before everything except its bones disappeared in a flash of light.

If Pokemon were manifestations of Aura, then that'd mean that consuming an Aura that didn't 'align' with their own would result in the complete loss of their own Aura.

In other words, they'd pop.

Nova still didn't know what exactly Aura was, as the only thing he knew was that it was called the essence of life, but the implications weren't good.

The only issue with all of this was that he was stumped by a single question. If eating Pokemon resulted in your Aura disappearing, how the hell did he eat any food? Did something other than Pokemon exist solely for food?

It was a question that plagued him for… all of five minutes. He just asked someone where the food came from instead of trying to figure out all of life's mysteries himself.

As it turns out, apparently normal animals used to exist. As people noticed they needed them for food, they took them into captivity and used most of them for livestock. Pokemon were too powerful for regular animals to handle in the wild, and they were close to extinction.

Accidentally, they bred with Pokemon, resulting in… hybrids. Pokemon that have normal bodies and can be eaten but have significantly lowered intelligence and a lack of magic powers. That was what he, and the rest of society, ate.

With that issue out of the way, he decided to focus solely on his training. He wouldn't get much more out of his research without a method to measure Aura. Without that, everything would just be guesswork.

Pausing his rest, he picked up Hoppip from his head and placed the sleepy Pokemon in front of him. Both Pokemon looked at him curiously, as he hadn't done this before during their routine.

"Listen, Hoppip, I need to explain something to you before tomorrow. So listen closely, okay?"

Hoppip looked mildly confused but nodded anyway.

"Although I've accepted that you want to become stronger with me, you need to understand that you are NOT a frontline Pokemon," Nova emphasized.

Still, Hoppip didn't understand. Despite its looks, it wasn't a stupid Pokemon. It just didn't understand why Nova was telling him this now of all times.

Noticing its still confused face Nova continued, "To put it simply, you are a support Pokemon. In the future, I'll have multiple Pokemon working for me, but you'll never be one of the Pokemon who battles a lot."

Hoppip had a look of understanding, the gears in its head visibly clicking into place.

"I just don't want you to be distraught that you aren't strong enough in the future. That's not your job, your job is to help out. Fighting comes second." He explained gently.

Nova feared that Hoppip would be insecure about its lack of strength in the future. While he wouldn't usually tolerate inherent weakness, Hoppip wasn't a fighter in the first place.

In response to his needless worrying, Hoppip rolled its eyes at Nova before going back into the Pokeball. Once again, it didn't seem to care.

In reality, he understood what Nova was getting at from the beginning. Hoppip just didn't understand why Nova thought he needed to explain every little thing to it.

'…Man, I will never understand that Pokemon.' Nova shook his head, gesturing for Pawniard to follow him.

Going inside, he fed his Pokemon and himself before heading to bed early. Usually, he would do even more training after eating but it was a special day for him.

After all, the tournament began tomorrow.

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A/N: I cut down the amount of Pokemon he'll have from 15 to 11. That sounds like alot but its really not that crazy when 5 of them won't really be focused on. Two are extremely simple in nature and one is... 'yikes'.