C034 - The battle for the meadow begins

It took a lot of convincing on Pete's part to postpone Herbert and Isabelle visiting this place right before sundown. Jasmine had called them for a video chat and they were screaming into the phone with excitement for several minutes before Pete got the first word in.

What Pete didn't know was that once they hung up, Herbert rushed to his warehouse to prepare more compensation for the young researcher and almost emptied his current stock of saplings in the process. If nothing changes, he would bring them over the next day with Exeggutor's help.

The Vileplumes and Bellossoms, once done, looked at the tree with fanatic eyes. Pete wondered why that was because it was mostly their grass magic that made it grow into this majestic, colorful treasure of a tree. He'd have to find out why at a later date.

"Okay, the sun's almost gone, so I'll leave the two of you alone. Good luck in the night," Sophie said with a suggestive smirk and a wink towards her sister as she stood up.

Jasmine turned red but decided to play it cool, "Yeah thanks. I guess we'll need some luck for the coming fight with the Ariados."

Sophie only wiggled her brows in response and giggled as she walked over to Exeggutor to get back to the hotel. As protection, the grass/psychic pokemon would stay the night with her because Sophie didn't have a pokemon of her own.

"Okay then, guess we'll get on up to the cliff again?"

"Y-yes!" Jasmine answered with a high-pitched voice and quickly cleared her throat, "yes!"

Pete only smiled warmly and shook his head as he gathered his pokemon once more to get up the cliff. Jasmine and Pete didn't talk this time and only enjoyed this peaceful time with content smiles. If Sophie was here, she might have quipped that this was just a romantic walk on the almost-beach.

"Once we're in position, I want you guys to relax. The Ariados are attacking once they know they have an advantage and will come well rested. Rapidash, I want you to hang back a bit and save up for the ideal situation to hit 'em with a Hyper Beam. So you'll likely start the fight with a bang and then stay back. Nidoking, you're best suited as the vanguard of this battle. Not only is their poison gonna do the least against you, you are much more durable than our other young team members," Pete began to explain his battle strategy once they came close to the stairs at the cliff wall.

"Golett, I know you learned fire type energy only recently, so that's what I want you to focus on this fight. I hope by the end of it you'll be able to use Fire Punch to its full potential. And keep a look out for Nidoking and Onix. I think you three could combine your control over ground type energy into a devastating area of effect attack like Earthquake. Just make sure that if you, you hit only enemies," Pete continued as they started climbing the stairs.

"And finally, this is for everyone. At the slightest suspicion that you are poisoned, I want you to come to me. I invested a whole bunch of money into Antidotes and bought a small mountain of Pecha berries in preparation. Don't let my efforts be in vain," Pete advised with a serious expression once they reached the river that fed the waterfall. Since this fork of the Evergreen River was unnamed, Pete decided to give it the name Everfall River to distinguish it from the fork of the river that was running next to his future home.

"You got anything to add, Jasmine? Or maybe you'd like for your pokemon to fight on their own?"

Pete turned to Jasmine, who kept quiet during his explanation. Seeing as he expected her to give out some form of strategy on her own, her pride kicked in. She was the one who wanted to become a gym leader, while Pete wanted to be a 'simple' farmer. There was no way she could let herself be bested in battle preparations in front of a 'rookie trainer' with no aspiration.

"Okay, Gligar, Onix. You two heard Pete's words, and they all make proper sense. The two of you have the typing advantage over the Ariados through flying and rock, so use that as best you can. Onix, I want you to coordinate with Nidoking as best as possible. While at the front, use Stealth Rock on as many passages that you see the enemies arrive from as you can. They won't come running in a single line, so spread them out," Jasmine started.

"Gligar, Ariados are known to be exceptionally agile and quick. But I think you will have them beat while you stay in the air. We haven't known each other for long, but I would like for you to stay a little out of the fight and focus on baiting the enemies to either group up or run into the stealth rocks," Jasmine suggested with a cunning glint.

"Observe the battlefield and lure groups of enemies to where our heavy hitters are. Onix, please coordinate in that effort by staying under the radar at the start and then take out a bigger number in one go with Gligar's help. Objections?"

Onix shook his head, and while Gligar took a while to think it through, it eventually agreed, too.

Solosis was in charge of relaying their tactics to the tribe once they were done hashing it out, and the grass pokemon all agreed to not let their efforts be in vain. They would stay back at the start of the fight and only jump in once Pete and Jasmine's pokemon were done with their initial tactics. Some of them would even circle behind and cut off the path of retreat for their enemies.

It took several hours before they noticed the first movements in the trees. Around midnight, when most of Pete's younger pokemon were sleeping already, branches were shaking, leaves were rustling.

Under Pete's astonished gaze, a red bodied spider with yellow and purple legs and feelers the size of a go-kart jumped out of the tree and landed on its roots. The Ariados' eyes roamed over Pete's and Jasmine's team before it excitedly clicked its fangs.

When it was done doing that, around eighty more spiders jumped down, followed by a good forty or more Spinarak hanging back midway down the tree trunks. The forest line now housed over a hundred spiders greedily looking at Pete's group like they hit the jackpot, over twenty pokemon that could serve as food just waiting for them.

Raiding the meadow at night when the Vileplume were at their weakest made the spider pokemon cocky, so they started to attack the group right away as an uncoordinated mob.

A few fangs lit up in bug-green energies, a few in purple energies, some started firing the move Pin Missile at the nearest pokemon, Nidoking. But the most uncoordinated attack was all the Spinarak using the move String shot from the trees.

When they webs were all in the air, Pete turned to Jasmine with a smirk, and she just rolled her eyes.

"Fine, you win the bet," Jasmine said with a tired sigh.

"Hehe, show them how out of their element they are, Rapidash," Pete ordered, and the flaming unicorn pokemon swiftly released a Flash Fire empowered Flamethrower into the air, catching the String Shots descending on them on fire.

The flames quickly followed along the webs toward their origin, the Spinarak and forty something pre-evolution spider pokemon dropped from the trees in droves while screeching in pain.

"I get they rarely fight pokemon that can fight back, but they must have seen the flaming giant of a horse at the back... what were they thinking," Jasmine muttered with a shake of her head.

Pete wanted to answer with a good-natured taunting remark, but the Ariados heard the cries of pain from the back and sped up their attack.

Just as planned, Nidoking went to the front and started the fight off with the move Sandstorm. The super effective rock type energy immediately peppered the Ariados at the front line, but they barely slowed down. Once the first spider pokemon attacked him with a Bug Bite, Nidoking retaliated with the move Fire Punch.

As Nidorino, Pete had given him the chance to learn both the TMs Sandstorm and Fire Blast and together with his spars against Golett, who was given the same opportunities, they had both figured out the move Fire Punch.

Just as Onix started leaving Stealth Rocks everywhere, Growlithe and Ponyta suddenly joined the fight as ranged attackers and started shooting the move Fire Spin that they had both learend from Rapidash over the last week.

Their attacks left a lot of room for improvement as the Ariados they targeted could quickly leave the move, but they still left big marks on the enemies' bodies.

Not wanting to be outdone, Blitzle released a Charge Beam at an Ariados that Golett had just punched away, leaving the pokemon dizzy. Gligar capitalized on it and used Wing Attack to take out the first Ariados of the battle. Seeing the decapitated ally, the Ariados at the back started screeching at the Gligar and charge in its direction. Even some Venom Drenches were immediately spit in its direction, but none hit.

Taking her roll as bait seriously, Gligar flew a wide circle around the enemies, getting them to get closer to one another in their efforts to chase, but that was their first big mistake in this fight.

Onix saw a group of eight Ariados practically running with no space between them and unleashed an attack it had prepared beforehand. It was hard for Pete to know which one it was, but it had to be either Rock Slide sent out with an astonishing control over rock type energy, or Rock Tomb, because that was what Onix devastating blow resulted in. An early grave as a giant boulder squashed five of the eight spider pokemon he had targeted.