Bab 773: CH153 (767), Set Up The Field
Unfortunately for Trapinch, I was able to sense its fellow Trapinch hiding under the surface. The only reason I was not simply lifting them out of the sand and asking Mothra/Butterfree to send them to sleep was because I wanted to try the civil method first. Once that failed, I would be able to act however I wanted since the Trapinch would have brought it upon themselves. As I had expected, Trapinch decided to disregard my offer out of stubbornness. It seemed that the perfect execution of my side's moves actually ended up being a disadvantage since an excellent execution meant no energy loss/spillover, which meant that Trapinch had no idea what it was dealing with.
Hence, when Trapinch opened its maw and released a cry to mobilize its fellows for a second attack, I told the Nido siblings to let their aura run free, and once the (high) dark gold undulations began to spread, Trapinch's cry turned into a strangled groan as it cut off out of surprise/panic. It hurriedly released another cry, this time to stop the others from emerging to attack, but it could have saved itself the hassle since none of the Trapinch dared to attack or move for that matter after Seb/Nidoking and Gaia/Nidoqueen released their aura/power. Naturally, reality had to slap me in the face once I thought that since a blind Trapinch, who did not know the immensity of heaven, actually dug out from underneath Gaia a moment after I thought that and attempted to Bite her.
I felt the (mid) bronze Trapinch's surprise as well as fear and worry the moment the reckless Trapinch surfaced, which only intensified when Gaia simply plucked the Trapinch from the ground and held its struggling/wriggling body in the air by its big head. She released a snort and gave the Trapinch a glare; Trapinch froze in her hand the moment she did that. Mid Trapinch reacted swiftly and cried out that they agreed to my requests before releasing another cry to call out all grown Trapinch. Seeing Trapinch acting like that Gaia gave a satisfied nod before releasing the Trapinch in her hand, and it scuttled behind its leader as soon as it landed on the ground.
I heard Mothra and Gaia giggle seeing the reckless one scurrying to hide behind its leader, which had me smile while Seb released a disdainful huff. Anyway, we just watched as more Trapinch burrowed out of the ground until the number of Trapinch had grown to 80 if we included the sleeping ones. Still, despite their number none of them dared to make any excessive movement after they had come to the surface, and once no further Trapinch showed up Mid Trapinch proclaimed that all able Trapinch were present and that I could do what I wanted to do. I could sense that it felt rather resigned when it said that, which was not all that surprising considering how the last two to three minutes had gone.
I went up to Mid Trapinch and patted its large head before telling it not to worry. I told it that I still planned to keep my earlier promise which earned me the Mid Trapinch's gratitude. It turned its head and ordered the Trapinch to gather around us to ease whatever I wanted to do. The Trapinch began to congregate around us and they even brought the sleeping ones along. I pat Mid Trapinch's head again and began to check out all of them, starting with her. Mid Trapinch's potential was light yellow, and surprisingly even though all Trapinch present listened to her, she was not the strongest one among the 82 Trapinch I observed.
There were two more (mid) bronze stage Trapinch and even a (high) bronze one. When I mentioned that Mid Trapinch explained that she was the eldest and that the others deferred to her because of that, especially her son, who happened to be the (high) bronze Trapinch. He also happened to have the best potential among all Trapinch present with his Deep Green potential. However, I was not optimistic about being able to recruit him since he was likely slated to take over their group in the near future. Thankfully, there were two more Trapinch that had greenish potential. A (mid) iron stage Trapinch with green potential and a (high) iron one with light green potential.
When I indicated my interest in those two, the Mid-Trapinch told me I could engage them if I wanted and that she did not mind letting them join me. Nonetheless, she added that while she knew that they could not force me to do anything, she would still prefer it if they joined me willingly, which was my plan from the get-go. Hence, I pat her head placatingly before approaching my two targets. I pulled my ultimate move and brought out two small snack bags. One contained food I prepared for pure ground types, and one was from Gaara/Gabite's Gible period.
I allowed them to try the pellets from both bags and the stronger one liked the pure earth pellet more while the weaker one actually preferred the Gible pellets, which was a rather pleasant surprise. I had decided to test it on a whim since both of Trapinch's evolution had the ground/dragon typing, but I had honestly not expected one to actually prefer the Gible pellets since none of the two Trapinch had a dragon affinity in their status sheet. I let them eat the handful of pellets in those two bags before asking them if they wanted more to which the two enthusiastically nodded. I gave them a bright smile while patting their heads before pulling out a second round of pellet bags.
While those two enjoyed the new round of snacks, I brought out Gaara so that he could tell them how great their lives would be if they joined me. He said that the personal territory they would be living in had dedicated areas for both pure ground types, desert dwellers or not, and also for ground/dragon types like him as well as their future forms. This pitch coming from a fellow ground (dragon) type was more convincing than if it came from me alone, so I let Gaara do the talking before I gave an aura-laced "That's right" to corroborate his words.
The reason I was going out of my way to do the whole "bells and whistle" recruitment approach for "just" two greenish Trapinch was that I was planning to use those two to make my future recruitments of Trapinch easier. Hearing that joining me was truly the best decision they could make from fellow members of their species was even more persuasive than me just using aura to confirm that I was speaking the truth. Anyway, after the two Trapinch once again finished their snacks they agreed to join me provided they got to eat these tasty snacks daily. I just laughed and once again patted their big round smooth heads before promising them that they would have enough to eat.
With their consent, I captured the two and moved their balls to Utopia together with Gaara. After that was handled, I happily turned my attention to the Mid Trapinch who had quietly watched the whole exchange with the rest of the Trapinch. Due to my good mood, I decided to offer her two options to reward them for the two Trapinch that joined me. The first option was entirely riskless but provided short-term benefits while the second one harbored a certain level of risk but provided long-term benefits for their group. I told Mid Trapinch that if she chose the 1st option, I would give their group a few large bags of the pellets I had given my new recruits. The bags would last a group of their size for 2 to 3 months depending on how they managed/rationed things.
Meanwhile, option 2 would have me set up a small area that would be fertile enough to grow a handful of Oran Berry trees. I told her that I estimated that my arrangement would allow the trees to thrive for at least a decade and survive for close to two decades. The problem with this option was that a piece of fertile land with growing Oran Berry trees would likely attract the attention of other desert dwellers and there was a risk that the Trapinch would be driven out of the area by those that would want the place for themselves.
Nonetheless, after sharing the pros and cons with her, I brought out an oran berry as well as a handful of earth pellets and let her taste both so that she could make an informed decision. We waited patiently as Mid Trapinch considered the options, and when she eventually spoke up she did not give me an answer but chose to ask me a surprisingly thoughtful question instead. I had not expected her to be so considerate so I truly entertained her question. It was not as if it was impossible for me to set up the little cove under the sand if I truly wanted to, but honestly, the investment was too high since I would have to compensate for the lack of sunlight, which was not as easy as dealing with the lack of water and the sandy ground, or rather those two were already costly so doing the whole thing underground would make it even costlier.
Due to that, I told her that I couldn't do it the way she wanted, but I offered something of a compromise. I told them that we could dig down and open up an open pit that was deep enough to ensure that the Oran trees did not stand out without actually looking down the hole, while still allowing the sun in. Mid Trapinch accepted my suggestion right away, so I had Seb as well as Gaia create a 4-meter deep, 5-meter long, and 4-meter wide opening in the ground. They made sure that the walls were hard/solid to prevent the sand from filling the hole but left the bottom partially soft for my next step.
I first filled the bottom with regular earth from Utopia, so probably not that regular after all. After I had a roughly half-a-meter thick layer of premium earth, I began to add in my self-made mulch, made using the help of Utopians and Utopia-grown stuff. Once the mulch layer was complete as well, I threw in quite a few water chips, as in pieces of water stones I had gathered until now. I made sure to spread them evenly. The water chips would ensure that the mulch would stay moist until the energy in them ran out, which would take years. Following the mulch layer, I added another premium earth layer and to this one, I added a mix of leaf stone chips and dust as I poured in the earth.
Once I had this 1.5-meter-thick earth-mulch sandwich, I pulled out 10 relatively young Oran Berry trees and transplanted them there. I could have transplanted more but 10 was the max this "room" could comfortably support without the trees or rather their roots getting in each other's way. Once the trees had been planted, I spread out more mulch, though this new layer was only 10 cm thick and just covered the base of the trees. While spreading that mulch I made sure to mix in some more water stone dust and leaf stone dust and once I was done with that I deemed the Oran berry farming room complete.
The top of the trees were roughly 30 centimeters below the surface, which ensured they wouldn't get noticed unless someone actually approached the hole and looked down from the side. Honestly, while the whole thing cost me nothing, the material worth itself was not low, though it was still more than worth the exchange. Unfortunately, this would only work for a decade or two before the desert reclaimed the area.
Creating a permanently fertile area was not impossible but would necessitate me to work on a much bigger area and would require a much higher investment, so turning the Hoenn Desert green was impossible, at least for now. Besides, it would mess with the Pokemon that were living here, so the idea itself would probably meet quite a bit of resistance. Creating an oasis on the other hand while possible was not worth the effort, at least not to me.
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