[It's actually a Blunder Policy! That's such an obscure item, I almost forgot it existed.]
[Wait, is Kricketune really that tanky? Aerodactyl's super-effective Aerial Ace didn't even one-shot it. I thought it was holding a Focus Sash...]
[But that doesn't seem all that useful. Isn't being almost dead basically the same as being dead?]
The Blunder Policy was a remarkable item used in battle.
When a Pokémon holding it missed with a move, its Speed would rise sharply.
"Take it up with my insurance!"
Although it was an obscure item, it could be bought in the real world, too, and its price was reasonably affordable for Trainers.
The artisans of this world really could make anything.
As for why a piece of paper could have such a miraculous effect...
You had a point, but those were simply the rules of the Pokémon world.
The creator god Arceus held the final say on how this thing worked. Your humble writer had no idea what the actual mechanism was, either.
The strategy Qingyu had designed for Kricketune was simple.
It would open with Sing. Holding a Blunder Policy meant that firing off a sleep move without any setup would pay off whether it landed or not.
Landing it was obviously better: force the opponent to switch, boost its stats on the spot, then use Baton Pass.
Missing was acceptable, too. Once the Blunder Policy boosted its Speed, even Kricketune could leave the battlefield safely and hand its power over to the next teammate.
Still, facing a super-effective attack, Kricketune had nearly dropped dead on the spot despite having its bulk maxed out...
It was the best of a bad set of options. Kricketune's base stats were what they were, after all, and it really struggled to contribute in a normal battle.
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