Coelacanth Grass

"Venomous, huh..."

Dian murmured to himself.

He wondered whether he could combine Fury Attack with Twineedle, and immediately put the idea into practice.

"Beedrill, keep Twineedle active, then use Fury Attack!"

Bzzz...

Beedrill concentrated and gave it a try, alternating its left and right stingers for two strikes before launching into another frantic flurry.

"No good."

When Dian saw that no blue light flashed on Beedrill's white stingers as they swung wildly, he knew the attempt had failed.

Still, weaving Twineedle into Fury Attack could achieve the effect he wanted.

Beedrill swung its two white stingers at tremendous speed, striking the white cloth hanging from a tree in front of it.

Yes, Dian had hung a piece of white cloth from the tree and drawn several tiny dots on it in red pen, each surrounded by concentric red circles.

He had also coated Beedrill's white stingers in fluorescent powder.

Dian required it to touch the designated centers of the circles without tearing the cloth.

And it had to keep Focus Energy active the entire time.

"Very good!"

Dian nodded as he watched Beedrill gradually get the hang of it. "That's it."

At first, Beedrill would either forget Focus Energy, puncture the cloth, or miss the designated areas with its white stingers.

But after some practice, perhaps thanks to its training as a Weedle, it gradually began meeting Dian's initial requirements.

"Mis..."

Just then, Misdreavus gave a bored cry nearby. Although the little lady was still doing what Dian had asked, she was clearly growing tired of it.

"Think it's too easy?"

Dian walked over and crouched down, stroking Misdreavus's hair.

Misdreavus nodded, then looked at him expectantly, as if asking him to let her stop because it was far too boring.

"Can you do this, then?"

Dian picked up the little scissors from the ground and quickly whittled one end of a branch into a sharp point, then gouged a circular hollow into the other end.

He set his finished work in front of Misdreavus and deliberately said loudly, "This might be a bit too hard for you."

"Mis!!"

Hearing that, Misdreavus looked at the finished piece on the ground, shook her head rapidly, and immediately threw herself into the task.

"Phew..."

Dian sighed inwardly in relief. Luckily, his handiwork had not gotten rusty. Embarrassing himself would have been a minor issue; failing to pique Misdreavus's curiosity would have been the real problem.

Although he had countless other ways to train her in mind, this method killed two birds with one stone: it trained Misdreavus while freeing Dian up to do other things.

"This should be coelacanth grass."

After searching for quite some time, Dian finally found a needle-shaped blade of grass with fine white lines growing among the weeds.

This grass usually grew in areas frequented by Beedrill and was particularly effective at neutralizing their venom.

He carefully put on a pair of black gloves made from a special material and plucked the void thorn without damaging its roots.

Beedrill alternated Fury Attack and Twineedle, its strikes slicing through the air toward the red dots. Meanwhile, after ruining several branches, Misdreavus finally finished one.

"Mis!"

Delighted, Misdreavus lifted the two finished pieces with her shadow.

"Mis..."

Her smiling face suddenly turned frightening, because her work was clearly less refined than the one on the right.

Snap!

Her shadow snapped the one on the left in two.

She carefully picked up the finished piece on the right, examined it, and began studying it all over again.

"This should be enough."

Dian breathed a sigh of relief, wiped the sweat from his forehead with his arm, and thumped his lower back.

Apparently, making a living selling medicinal herbs was no easy task in this world, either.

He picked up the basket on the ground and headed back to begin grinding.

Drip.

A drop of milky-white liquid fell into the glass bottle, followed by a second and a third, until the entire bottle was full.

One bottle, then another.

The void thorn Dian had spent so long gathering yielded only a bottle and a half of milky-white liquid.

He carefully picked up an extremely thin blade of long grass and lightly touched it to some of the white liquid spilled nearby.

Hiss.

The long blade of grass immediately corroded and turned black, giving off a foul smell.

"Just as I thought!"

Coelacanth grass really was poisonous, which explained why he had found it without too much trouble. Dian knew of another medicinal herb that looked very similar to coelacanth grass but was an essential ingredient in Potions.

Just now, for instance, he had only found coelacanth grass, not that other herb, void thorn.

That was why he had guessed coelacanth grass was poisonous and had been left alone, unlike void thorn, which had already been harvested clean.

But why had nobody mentioned that coelacanth grass was poisonous? Perhaps no one had ever tried testing it.

Or perhaps even those who knew had seen no need to mention it.

After all, Trainers generally carried some League-made Antidotes when traveling. Who would bother searching nearby for herbs to treat themselves? Besides, as long as Trainers did not go looking for trouble, Beedrill generally would not attack them. They had more important duties to attend to, busy guarding their companions that were still Kakuna.

But if someone dared provoke Beedrill without the strength to back it up, they would probably end up in a terrible state even if they survived.

Of course, Dian carried Antidotes himself. He had collected this milky-white liquid not for his own sake, but for Beedrill.

Since coelacanth grass could neutralize Beedrill's venom, there was a good chance it could also stimulate the venom into becoming more potent.

It might even help Beedrill learn Toxic!

Dian suspected that possibility was vanishingly small, but if he kept stimulating Beedrill's venom, it would become more potent than ordinary venom even if it never developed into Toxic.

It might even affect Beedrill's physical constitution.

Dian had been thinking about how to train Beedrill for some time, and had finally decided to start by experimenting with its venom.

He glanced at Misdreavus, still absorbed in carving, and smiled.

Walking over to Beedrill, he carefully took down the white cloth in front of it and said, "Beedrill, go to the river and use Fury Attack on the water next. Remember, don't use Twineedle. Don't get any venom in the water."

Beedrill nodded silently, then gently fluttered its transparent wings, patterned with distinctive markings, and flew toward the river.

Dian went over to the tent, spread the white cloth over a clean slab of bluestone, then took a leaf from the bucket beside him and lightly dabbed it against a red mark.

Hiss...

A wisp of white smoke rose. The leaf quickly blackened and began to corrode.

Dian quickly placed it in a container of water he had prepared and examined it closely.

The leaf's outer skin had corroded away, while the flesh had only partially corroded. Its veins remained completely intact.