CH125 (489), Covert Mission (7)

"What chance?" Nate inquired distrustfully, justifiably wary of anything I said.

Yet, that was exactly what I wanted and I did not forget to stoke his apprehension along with the hope that he could somehow still get out of the situation he currently found himself in.

"Nothing complicated, really," I returned with a shrug while giving him a mental suggestion to keep his mouth shut and listen to my explanation until I was done.

Well, unless he had something relevant to say. In that case, he was free to speak up. Due to his heightened emotional state and his wariness, which had somewhat of an effect on a mental level, I had to use quite a bit more than usual for the mental manipulation to stick. Regardless, once I felt it work, I resumed my explanation.

"You'll simply have to fight for your freedom. I will allow you to use your Pokemon to fight against one of mine, and as long as you manage to beat my Pokemon I'll let you escape. Simple, right?"

I made sure to keep slightly fanning the hope he felt while I was talking to ensure that he would take the bait, but let him do the mental gymnastic on his own.

"Yeah, right. What's keeping you from simply breaking your word if I manage to win? Besides, what am I supposed to do if you simply pull out some dark gold Pokemon to toy with me or even some of those platinum freaks of nature?

For all I know you're one of those old monsters of that sh*tty order that enjoys messing with people like me," he raised some valid questions, proving that he actually had a brain inside that criminal head of his and that he was capable of using it if necessary.

"Well, first of all, that's quite rude of you to insult the respected elders of our order like that," I mockingly chided Nate while doing some low-key flattering on the side. "Aside from that, I am as young as they get, so I don't think calling me an old monster is appropriate."

I knew he wanted to say something insulting when I said that, but my mental suggestion kicked in and made him acutely aware of his situation. That made him keep quiet and he chose to wait for the rest of my answer instead. "What's keeping me from catching you anyway, you ask? Nothing really," I said with a shrug.

"You have no choice but to go along with it if you don't want me to simply knock you out. All you can do is try your best and hope that I keep my promise to preserve my reputation and that of the order," I made sure to give his frustration a bit of a boost when I said that, not that he needed all that much help in that regard.

Still, with a bit of motivation from my side, he began to accept that I might be serious about my offer. "As for my Pokemon, sadly I don't have any dark gold or platinum stage Pokemon, so even if I wanted to use them I couldn't," I said with a shrug.

"Besides, calling them freaks of nature is a bit disrespectful, don't you think so?" I immediately followed up. Just as I planned, the embers of hope inside of Nate began growing a bit along with my "confession", and I made sure to fan those embers a bit, letting them grow into a small flame of hope.

Nate began to genuinely see a small chance of escaping and that belief along with the accompanying emotions was what I wanted to evoke and stir before crushing them to teach him a painful lesson.

Truly bad criminal or not, I would definitely get some bad karma for this, but I honestly did not care all that much. I had to release the feelings as well as frustrations I had accumulated and bottled up during this mission, lest those emotions festered into something no one wanted to see.

Besides, I was pretty confident that the good karma I would get for capturing the other bad criminals, hence keeping a lot of people and Pokemon safe, along with helping the rather decent ones would somewhat balance out the bad karma I would get for directly tormenting Nate like this.

I was not worried about the nightmare suggestion I had implanted into the mind of Bob, Nate, and the other truly vile criminals since that was simply having them confront their bad deeds. That one would result in neither good nor bad karma.

I was also pretty sure that even if they ended up fully repenting, and turned into decent human beings in the end, I would only get a smidgen of good karma at most due to the methods I employed. However, I did not mind that as well since I simply did what felt was right.

Anyway, all Nate did was snort at my rhetorical question before I continued. I still had to let his hope and confidence in his chances grow a bit stronger after all.

"Now, unlike some people, I'm not so cruel as to present others with an impossible challenge, so you'll only have to beat my Lucario to earn your freedom. He's only at the (high) silver stage, so I don't believe it counts as an impossible challenge," I declared, knowing full well what kind of Pokemon he had, and just as I expected the small flame of hope he had just moments ago turned into a roaring fire.

Nate's confidence which had fallen into the abyss shot back up just like a bungee rope that contracted after being stretched taut. What Nate did not know, was that just like said bungee rope, he would soon plunge back down again as well.

His confidence was based on his (low) gold-stage Primeape and the four silver-stage Pokemon he had. Though, considering that those four were a Graveler, Arbok, Raticate, and Fearow his main reliance was still his Primeape. At least it was after I shot down the two other plans that began brewing in his mind.

"Also, just so you don't get any stupid ideas, I'll be keeping my gold stage Raichu by my side, and my gold stage Pidgeot in the air. Nonetheless, I swear on my honor as an Aura Guardian that they won't interfere in the challenge as long as you don't try to attack me or flee with the help of one of your Pokemon."

Nate deflated a bit when I cut off the ideas he got just as they surfaced, but he did marginally relax when I swore on my honor as an Aura Guardian since stuff like that was taken really seriously in our world and for a good reason.

He was especially happy since he believed that I forgot to mention that he had to challenge my Lucario one-on-one when in truth I did that on purpose. Anubis was about to complete his limit-breaking and I wanted to use the pressure of facing so many Pokemon in a truly important battle to stimulate him so that he could finish the LB and if he truly ended up in a pinch, he could break through in one breath.

Anyway, I called out Thor/Raichu, Hera/Pidgeot, as well as Anubis/Lucario, and since I had been streaming the confrontation for Utopia, they knew what they had to do. Thor took his place by my side, Hera took off into the air, and Anubis walked a few steps in front of me before taking a ready position.

Meanwhile, Nate tensed when he saw that the Raichu and Pidgeot I mentioned were releasing (mid) and (high) gold-stage undulations respectively. Still, he felt relief when he saw that the two only did what I told him they would do.

"Well, aren't you going to call out your Pokemon," I asked him after fully releasing him from the pressure I exerted on him up until now. Nate's confidence rose along with the vanishing pressure and he even had the guts to give me a retort.

"Oh, I'll call them out alright," he began. "You'll regret giving me this chance when my Pokemon beat down your precious Lucario," he finished before he began releasing all of his Pokemon.

He actually dared give me a provoking look once all 5 of his Pokemon stood in front of him and I could practically feel his smugness at the thought that I had, in his mind, not expected him to call out all of them at once.

Yet, his face fell pretty quickly when he noticed that I did not seem fazed at all, as if I had been expecting his action, which to be fair I had been expecting. Still, he tried to keep his confidence, and he even tried to be a bit provocative to keep his spirit up.

"You certainly don't mind me using all my Pokemon for the fight, do you?" He tried to sound smug even though he did not feel as confident as he tried to portray.

"Not at all," I said with a shrug. "I actually expected you to since I am pretty sure that you don't stand a chance if you don't, being a weakling and all that," I taunted him, showing just how little I thought of him.

"Attack that blue bloke," Nate yelled in anger, and all of his Pokemon rushed toward Lucario. Well, Fearow took off into the air first and glared at Hera for a moment before following the order and flying at Anubis. Primeape was the first one to make it to Anubis, followed by the Raticate and Fearow.

Meanwhile, Graveler, who had chosen to Rollout over, and Arbok were lagging slightly behind. That was probably better for them anyway since there was not much space left around Lucario for them to act anyway.

To me, it seemed that Nate's Pokemon were not all that used to fighting together with his Primeape since I noticed a few occasions where Raticate and/or Fearow had to readjust their attacks to avoid being either hit by Primeape or hitting it. "Come one, get your shit together," Nate roared seeing the problem.

"Fearow, stay in the air, and only attack when you see an opening. Raticate, the same is true for you too. Circle them and only attack when you get a free shot," he ordered, causing those two to retreat for a bit before they began to circle Anubis and Primeape. One in the air and one on the ground.

"Graveler, Arbok, keep your distance and bombard that f*cker whenever you can with rocks and mud. Make sure you don't hit Primeape by mistake," he commanded his last two Pokemon before turning to his trump card who had been busy attacking Anubis all this while.

"Primeape, you're doing great. Keep trying to bash that face in, and don't forget to bust his nuts," he praised Primeape, who bellowed in acceptance.

Anyhow, after Nate's chain of orders, his Pokemon took their positions, and their battle formation took some form of order. The battle stopped being as chaotic and disorderly, showing that Nate was not a totally shit trainer even if he was a shit human being.

I, on the other hand, chose to keep quiet since Anubis knew what he had to do. I was only going to speak up if I felt the need to do so whenever I thought Anubis had missed a danger or a golden opportunity, or rather when he was about to do so. Our bond and telepathic link ensured that I knew whenever such a situation was about to truly occur.

Still, for the moment I felt content enough to simply keep watching. Anubis was matching Primeape blow for blow without falling into a disadvantage despite keeping an eye on the others and dodging any attacks that would pose a risk.

It was still the start of the fight and Anubis was still full of energy, thus having no real problem with keeping up for now. That would probably start to change once he began to tire, and that was what I was waiting for.

"Keep it up, you guys. Having to face all of you, it's bound to get tired fast," Nate encouraged his group while keeping an eye on me to see my reaction.

He once again showed that he was not dumb, but I ignored that and kept watching the battle without saying anything, so he relaxed a bit and focused back on the battle.

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