Lazarus watches as Kamish flies through moving rings while dogging a barrage of ball-like projectiles, inside a huge training room.
'Nice, faster than last time.' Lazarus thinks while looking at a speedometer.
On the other side of the room, Aurora uses the moisture from a mist-making machine to make more balls of ice and hurls them towards Kamish.
So far, she hasn't been able to hit Kamish a single time, but she is getting better at making things out of ice.
"Aurora. Don't attack Kamish's current position. Think where he will be in a few seconds and attack that place." Lazarus advises.
Aurora nods, forming another ball of ice and then hurling it forward.
Kamish dodges the ice yet again, though this time it's only by a few inches.
"Yes, just like that." Lazarus nods, "We'll keep doing this until you two run out of energy, and then we'll go and have some food."
Kamish and Aurora both nod.
"Also, Aurora try to change the shape of the projectile every time. It will help you make more complex things eventually."
—
Hours later, Lazarus makes his way over to the cafeteria.
He is carrying Aurora on his arms, and Kamish is coiled around his neck, both unable to walk or fly on their own after having spent their entire energy reserve in their training session.
They exit the hallway that leads to the cafeteria and are greeted by the sight of tables filled with an impressive variety of food, and many different pokémon with a similar signs tiredness are devouring copious amounts of food.
Lazarus sees a Bulbasaur eating from a basket of lotus and rose petals.
Next to the Bulbasaur is a monkey pokémon that is holding a fruit in each hand and alternatively takes a bite from each while dancing on top of the table.
There is instrumental music playing in the background but it is mostly overshadowed by the sound of trainer chatting and pokémon making noises.
Kamish and Aurora smell the food and look around the room, intrigued.
Kamish half-opens his eyes and sees a pokémon with a rocky exoskeleton with two arms and no legs, munching on limestone rocks, and decides he wants nothing to do with a pokémon that eats rocks for dinner.
Aurora also takes one glance at the Geodude and immediately turns her head away to look at things that are a little more aesthetically pleasing.
Like an Evee being fed small pieces of meat by its trainer. The small brown furred pokémon with huge pointy ears eats the last piece of meat as its juices drip down its chin.
Lazarus takes a seat at one of the empty tables and puts Aurora and Kamish on top of the table.
Kamish lies on the table like a wet noodle, while Aurora is still looking at the Evee, whose trainer is now brushing its fur.
"I'll quickly order something for you guys, then I'll take you to our room to rest," Lazarus says.
Kamish doesn't even have the energy to nod.
Lazarus picks up the ordering tablet and orders a bunch of dishes for himself and his pokémon.
As he is doing that, Aurora shakes his arms, demanding his attention.
Lazarus looks at Aurora, who points at the Evee.
"What?" Lazarus asks, but then sees the Evee's training brushing her fur and understands what Aurora wants. "Sure, I'll order a brush for you after we head back to our room."
Aurora gives him a toothy smile, feeling pleased.
"So, are you nervous about your fighting debut tomorrow?" Lazarus asks.
Aurora is indeed feeling a little nervous but she doesn't want Lazarus to know that.
So she shakes her head. She wants to show him that she is just as capable as her lil bro, who is sprawled next to her right now, staring at the ceiling with great fascination.
"I know you are looking forward to fighting, but I feel like I have to say that it's okay even if you lose. I will love you all the same." Lazarus smiles and pats her head.
He looks into her adorable eyes and continues, "You don't have to win a single match here. We are only here to learn, and not just you and Kamish, but me too. Making sure we work well together is more important to me than winning a match. We can worry winning when we get to the tournament, so until then, let's just focus on our teamwork."
Aurora feels the last of the nervousness inside her vanish. She wants to hug Lazarus but doesn't have the energy to do that, so she settles for just licking his finger.
Lazarus chuckles and sees a robotic cart bringing their order to their table.
The scent of food brings life back into Kamish, who lifts himself a little to look at the food.
Kamish watches as Lazarus places plates of food on their table. Pasta made with Moomoo cream, Magikarp fillets with garlic sauce, six different types of sandwiches, breads, and three plates of smoked Tauros ribs drenched in BBQ sauce.
Lazarus tells Kamish and Aurora stories about the places they will visit in the future while they eat their food, after which they return to their room.
Kamish and Aurora embrace sleep the moment their body hit the sheets, while Lazarus finishes the book he was reading before he too goes to sleep next to his pokémon.
—
The dome environment changes, and the previous bamboo jungle floor is replaced with a dry desert filled with sand and a sparse few cactuses here and there.
'This might be a little tricky,' Lazarus thinks as Aurora and a flying bird pokémon are released inside the dome.
Kamish floats above Lazarus, and the moment he can, he psychically reaches out to Aurora.
"Aurora, can you hear me?" Lazarus speaks into the mic and sees Aurora nod inside the dome.
"Alright, so listen up. The environment is not in our favor, but don't worry, I have a plan. But you will have to take a couple of hits. Tell me to quit anytime you feel like not fighting."
Aurora nods again but he knows that she has no intention of quitting.
"Starly will make sure to lower your visibility with the sand before it attacks you. I want you to burrow under the sand whenever you can't see, but make sure to come out to breathe from time to time."
The two-minute grace period before the match expires, and with a chime, the match begins.
Inside the dome, Starly takes to the skies and uses its aerokinetic abilities to generate a whirlwind with its wings.
The wind is nowhere near enough to displace the entire sand bed but is more than enough that soon the entire dome is filled with sand particle flying around.
Aurora closes her eyes to protect them from the sand flying around and uses her small paws to dig into the sand to burrow herself inside just like Lazarus told her.
The sand dirties her snow white fur which annoys her greatly but her appearance is a lesser priority right now.
Starly dashes through the sky and arrives at the place it's trainer told Aurora would come out of.
Starly drops to the ground and waits for the moment Aurora will come out of the sand and attack her.
But unbeknown to Starly and it's trainer Aurora is moving through the sand like a worm, Lazarus gave her direction that takes her far enough from the Starly.
Starly prepares to attack Aurora, it hardens it's beak in order to carry out a pecking attack, when suddenly Aurora burrows out of the sand and sprints towards Starly.
Starly is startled and turns to looks back but is a second too late when Aurora tackles the bird with her body.
Starly slams into a cactus, shattering it, cacti spines fail to pierce Starly's body but to Lazarus it doesn't matter because everything is going according to his plan.
Aurora uses her paws to throw the sand around, making the visibility even more difficult than it already was.
Even Lazarus and Starly's trainer can't see their pokémon in all that dust.
Starly's trainer plays it safe and tells it's pokémon to fly towards a place with better visibility.
Starly recovers and takes to the skies.
While Starly waits for the dust to settle Aurora makes her way over to the remains of the cactus and siphons all the moisture out of it, which is barely enough to make a single shard of ice.
Soon the dust settles down enough for Starly to make out Aurora's silhouette and dashes towards her.
Aurora watches Starly dashing towards her with a Quick Attack which if hits, Aurora will lose the fight, and yet she doesn't try to get out of the way.
She is told to wait for Starly to get close enough to her, and seconds later Starly arrives, and with barely any distance between them is when Aurora hurls the ice shard towards the bird.
The ice shard tears through the air and threatens to burrow straight into Starly's eyes.
Luckily for Starly, the algorithms overseeing the match declare Aurora victorious before the shard could penetrate the bird's eyes.