Sinnoh Journey

Chapter 12 - A Floral Gift

As Gardenia sent out her Cherrim, Kyra was very much surprised as to how her appearance had changed since she battled Nate and Willow.

Rather than the two dark purple petals that protected Cherrim's body, she now had pink petals like cherry blossoms surrounding her yellow head.

"Cherrim looks so different now. I take it she too likes the sun," Kyra said, guessing the reason behind Cherrim's change.

Gardenia nodded, "Yeah, she really loves the sun. You see, Cherrim's ability is Flower Gift, it activates when there is strong sunlight and here she is once her ability has activated. I only let her use this form against a single or the final challenger since it always comes as a surprise to challengers," she explained, hoping that having Cherrim's sunshine form out would help her win.

Kyra was already beginning to feel the pressure, despite still being tied at a two on two, she by no means had the advantage. Luxio had caught onto Kyra's concerns, she knew that to try and give Kyra some confidence, she would have to win and fast.

"Alright Cherrim, we'll take the first move here. Use Magical Leaf," Gardenia called, hoping to throw Luxio off guard right away. Normally she would make a call for Attract at first, but since Luxio was also a female, her strategy wouldn't work.

Cherrim sent her attack towards Luxio. It was much quicker than Kyra remembered and Luxio was hit with the barage of attacks.

Luxio shook herself off and looked back towards Kyra, nodding to show Kyra she was ok.

"We'll have to be careful of that. Cherrim's attacks are much faster in this form. We'll just attack ourselves then, use Spark," Kyra said, making her move.

Luxio let off her attack, the shock wave from her attack sending Cherrim skidding backwards before Luxio ran into her to cause even more damage.

"Nice one Luxio, now come back here. It's too risky to battle close range for long," Kyra said, Luxio nodded and ran back to Kyra, waiting to see what Cherrim would do next.

Gardenia was impressed by Luxio's Spark doing so much damage, taking advantage of both it's far and close range variations.

"Your Luxio is very skilled to be able to take advantage of Spark's long and short range abilities in one move. But let's see how you handle with this, use Leech Seed Cherrim," Gardenia said, wondering how Kyra and Luxio would handle being stuck in one spot.

Cherrim sent her attack towards Luxio, but this time Luxio tried to jump out of the way. But jumping out of the way was a very bad decision.

The seeds from Leech Seed planted themselves in the ground below where Luxio had jumped, the vines sprouted up and pulling Luxio down to the floor. Luxio tried to stand back up, but the Leech Seed tightened further and the more the struggled, the less she could move.

"Luxio, stop struggling. It'll only make this worse!" Kyra warned, hoping that Luxio would hear her.

Luxio heard Kyra's warning and she tried to stay calm. The vines were still just as tight, but now that Luxio had stopped struggling, she was able to focus slightly.

"Alright Cherrim, use Magical Leaf again," Gardenia said, now that Luxio was stuck in place, there was no way she could avoid an attack.

Cherrim sent her attack once again, hitting Luxio hard once more.

Kyra knew that Luxio would only be able to take so much damage, sooner or later, Magical Leaf would leave her unable to battle. But there was seemingly no way out of the Leech Seed's hold. Substitution wasn't an option. But maybe using Magical Leaf to hers and Luxio's advantage might be an option.