Tetsu remained silent. It turned out that some time after passing the selection, those two individuals from before had come to challenge him. Tetsu didn't refuse and stepped up to battle one of them. Unfortunately, he was no match at all. Ordinarily, with Tetsu's personality, he wouldn't have minded losing, but the other two were different.
After defeating Tetsu, they weren't satisfied; they proceeded to humiliate him. They claimed his strength was so pathetic that he shouldn't have bothered looking for them, stating that any random trainer found outside would be stronger than him. Hearing this, the usually good-tempered Tetsu instantly snapped, but he knew his strength was insufficient.
While humiliating Tetsu, they didn't forget to mock the others. This triggered a public outcry, and everyone took turns going onto the stage to battle them. However, despite their arrogance, their strength was undeniably formidable. Every classmate who went up to challenge them lost; Kelly and Hirota also stepped up, but they both suffered defeat.
For the first time, Tetsu felt a desperate need for power, which led to the hardworking Tetsu seen today. Sato remarked, "The strength of those two guys is decent—though 'decent' is all it is. If you work hard during this period and find them again later, you shouldn't lose."
"Thanks, Sato," Tetsu replied.
"No problem. By the way, I wanted to ask you, when will Eichi be back?" Sato asked.
Tetsu missed Eichi as well. After a moment of silence, he said, "Based on his schedule, he might not return until next semester."
"Is that so?" Sato mused.
Tetsu then added, "Those two guys have almost defeated all the stronger students in our grade. Next, they'll likely come looking for you and Konan."
Sato said with a face full of confidence, "Then let them come. I'm looking forward to it."
Time flew by. During the following days, Eichi had Scizor focus on training Cross Slash, while Beedrill and Heracross trained on other content. Compared to Heracross, Scizor was undoubtedly more diligent. Combined with its high talent, its progress with Cross Slash was very rapid.
Scizor vibrated its wings and flew in front of the waterfall. It closed its eyes to enter the Perception state. The energy within its body began to surge, and one could clearly feel an invisible ripple transmitting from its head to its dual claws.
The brewing process began as energy merged and compressed. Five minutes later, Scizor snapped its eyes open, stared at the waterfall, and swung its claws. A large cross-shaped wind blade formed out of thin air and slashed toward the waterfall.
The wind blade collided with the waterfall, causing water to splash violently with a thunderous roar. A small cross briefly appeared within the curtain of the waterfall before being washed away by the rushing water.
Eichi was very satisfied with this result. Now, the charging time for the Air Slash component only took five minutes to form a Cross Slash with decent power. While it could continue to charge for even greater power, it would require more time.
Furthermore, continuing to charge was no longer feasible; this was roughly Scizor's limit. Given its physical condition, a five-minute charge was the maximum it could handle without harm. Charging any longer would cause significant damage to the Pokémon's body.
The goal now was to produce the same power in a shorter amount of time. However, Scizor's Cross Slash currently had a flaw: it couldn't control the direction. Scizor could only release the Cross Slash in a straight line toward the waterfall.
Scizor flew back to Eichi's side. Using Cross Slash several times in a row had taken a significant toll on its physical strength.
A few days later, Eichi woke up early and stayed in the yard watching the others train while he sat to one side. Last night, Mr. Muramasa had told Eichi to wait for him at the training field at noon today. Today was the day for the final training session, and Eichi was quite curious.
He vaguely suspected that since they had already done move training and Perception training, the next step would surely be actual combat training. After waiting for a while, Mr. Muramasa finally walked out from the attic.
However, Mr. Muramasa didn't come out empty-handed today; he was carrying a small bag. Muramasa said to Eichi, "Follow me."
Eichi obediently followed Teacher Muramasa. Halfway there, Muramasa suddenly said, "Keep up," and then started running. His speed was incredibly fast, and Masamune vanished instantly as well.
Eichi didn't know why, but he started running to keep up. Fortunately, his physical fitness was excellent; in just these few dozen days, his physique had improved significantly again.
He caught up quickly. Entering the forest, Mr. Muramasa was extremely agile. He seemed familiar with everything around him, as if the complex forest was nothing to him. The two of them gradually went deeper. Even powerful Pokémon that saw Mr. Muramasa ignored them and continued with their own business.
Passing through, Eichi felt a bit of fear. He activated his Eye of the Bug Emperor. In his sight, the energy density of the clusters of Pokémon was terrifyingly high. Excellent-grade Pokémon were common as dirt, Elite-ranks were everywhere, and there were quite a few Elite Four-ranks as well. He had already spotted over a dozen Elite Four-rank Pokémon.
Whenever Muramasa and Eichi passed by them, they would open their eyes and glance over. Those gazes were filled with immense prestige. It was heart-wrenching; if Masamune hadn't been by their side, Eichi suspected they might have lunged and attacked.
They had now completely entered the depths of the forest, where the jungle was dense. Eichi had never entered such deep areas before. In Viridian Forest, he had only been on the outskirts of the core area, which, while technically deep, was essentially still the periphery.
This time was truly different; a mysterious atmosphere lingered here. Countless treasures were hidden away, but Eichi knew his purpose for this trip and followed Muramasa closely.
After running for about half an hour, Mr. Muramasa slowed down and gradually came to a halt. They had arrived. Not far from Muramasa were several Scyther. Feeling someone approaching, they were very alert, but they relaxed upon seeing it was Muramasa.
However, they became wary again when they saw Eichi behind him. Seeing this, Eichi began to release his Bug Force.
Muramasa looked at Masamune, who immediately understood and flew in front of them to begin communicating. Only then did they drop their guard against Eichi. Furthermore, for some reason, the two Pokémon now felt quite a bit of goodwill toward Eichi.
Eichi released Scizor. As soon as it came out, it saw the two Scyther. This was its first time seeing members of its own kin, and it could sense that there were many Scyther nearby. The two Pokémon led the group further inside, where they were surrounded by numerous towering ancient trees and various unknown trees intertwining with one another.