Sieg didn't bother responding to Kikuta's suicidal command. He simply had all his Pokémon use Protect to defend.
White light gradually surged across Magnezone's body surface, enormous energy building up. When it reached its critical threshold...
"BANG~BOOM!!!!"
The explosion echoed across several kilometers.
The entire power plant trembled. Even Pokémon outside in the forest detected the violent energy fluctuation and scattered in all directions.
The power plant's walls warped slightly, steel becoming pliable. At ground zero in the arena's center, a massive crater had been blasted into existence. Thick steel plating proved as fragile as paper before Magnezone's Explosion.
Sieg hid within jade-green protective barriers, silently observing.
As time passed, the smoke permeating the air gradually dissipated. Sieg cautiously gripped his dagger and slowly approached the crater formed by the explosion.
When he reached the crater's edge, his gaze locked onto what lay inside, a woman with tattered, ragged clothing lying motionless.
It was Kikuta.
Her physical condition looked terrible. Her breathing was so weak it was barely perceptible. Wounds covered her body, all injuries from the explosion.
Sieg rushed forward to restrain her, using Poké Balls to capture and secure her unconscious Pokémon.
Only then did he interrogate Kikuta.
"Cough, cough..."
She coughed weakly twice. Kikuta's throat suddenly tasted sweetness, she spat out a mouthful of blood.
Her once-delicate skin had been rendered unrecognizable by searing flames. Some areas were even charred black.
Sieg demanded harshly: "Speak! Why did you attack me?"
Kikuta's previously closed eyes slowly opened. The gaze she directed at Sieg brimmed with thick contempt.
"Heh~ Why should I tell you? I'll let you guess... guess for the rest of your life. Having murdered a Mauville Gym apprentice, you'll spend every day living in constant fear!"
Kikuta's explosion-scarred, grotesque face twisted again. She even tried raising her hand to attack Sieg.
Unfortunately, in her current powerless state, even lifting her hand seemed as feeble as a child's attack.
Sieg's eyes turned cold. He instantly drew his dagger and drove it through her palm.
"AHHHHHHH~~~~~"
Kikuta released a piercing shriek, but still didn't forget to mock him. She cursed furiously: "Madman! How could someone like you, born into privilege, a Legacy trainer raised in luxury, possibly understand the hardships of commoners like us clawing our way up from nothing?"
"You have no idea what I've endured, so naturally you can't understand what price I'm willing to pay to become strong!"
Kikuta ignored her nearly destroyed hand, cursing at Sieg. Flying spittle revealed her violently fluctuating emotions.
Since joining the gym, she'd encountered countless League-affiliated trainers.
In Kikuta's eyes, these people occupied the best resources yet didn't know how to cherish them, didn't understand hard work, arrogant, utterly self-absorbed.
They completely didn't understand combat. Every single one was useless, greenhorns who only knew how to win through level advantage. Could they truly become qualified trainers?
Tactical coordination, Pokémon rotation, choice of moves and items, even trainer commands
Did these second-rate elites who understood nothing truly deserve to be called trainers?
This was a question Kikuta often contemplated late at night.
Actually, she wasn't named Kikuta. Her real name was Tian'er. She'd been born in a small village in southern Hoenn, an orphan from birth, hence no surname. Raised on charity from various households, she'd experienced the full spectrum of human nature from childhood. Therefore, she'd vowed to become a trainer.
Just like the village chief with his Poochyena, whose word was absolute law in the village. She wanted to become that kind of "person above others."
Unfortunately, as she grew, reality dealt her a harsh blow.
With absolutely no means of obtaining a Pokémon, she could only venture into the wild to catch one herself, the so-called Bug Catcher route.
Her luck wasn't bad. She successfully caught a Wurmple and through her own step-by-step efforts, gradually became a trainer.
Unfortunately, misfortune struck without warning. As she journeyed and grew stronger, she encountered a League trainer. The opponent's Combusken defeated her Dustox with a single strike.
Moreover, due to excessive force at the time, by the time she brought her Pokémon to a Pokémon Center, it was on death's door.
Originally, there was a chance for treatment.
But then, those damned Leeague trainers again!
That Combusken owner, directly exercised queue-jumping privileges, cutting ahead of her!
The Combusken hadn't been injured at all. Yet this slight delay meant her Dustox couldn't be saved in time and ultimately died.
At that moment, she felt the sky collapsing.
"A lowborn commoner like you should live in the mud forever. Did you actually think you could transform into a butterfly?"
"A bug is a bug. Even if it evolves into a butterfly, it can't change its inferior genes."
Facing that trainer's mockery, she couldn't hear anything, only Dustox's death cries echoing in her ears.
She buried Dustox in a wild pit, surviving in a daze on the outskirts, living like a wild person.
Until one day, a flower suddenly bloomed on the earth covering Dustox's grave, a chrysanthemum.
She laughed. Her laughter carried madness.
"Hehehehe~~ Hahahahahaha!!!!"
"From this day forward, I'm not Tian'er, I'm Kikuta!"
Kikuta refused to accept such a life. She wouldn't let that Combusken trainer, the murderer, go unpunished.
She'd tried reporting it to the police, but before she could even describe the case, Officer Jenny dismissed it due to the difference between League trainers and common citizens.
She could only seek revenge herself.
She dug Dustox from the pit, extracted her beloved Pokémon's poison sac, collected the toxin, and finally, when that Combusken's trainer wasn't paying attention, poisoned their food.
She successfully took revenge.
For safety, Kikuta fled far from home.
This also represented a fresh start. She discovered her fascination with Electric-type Pokémon and began working toward that goal step by step.
Eventually, through sheer ruthless determination, she successfully became an ordinary gym apprentice.
Kikuta spent a long time learning systematically to make up the gap between herself and apprentices from wealthy backgrounds.
Two years after joining the gym, she finally understood just how exceptional her talent was. If the League had invested resources in training her, she believed without doubt she could have become an Elite or even quasi-Master-level trainer.
But there was no helping it. She was just a common citizen with no background, no connections, no backing.
Perhaps after working for the League for decades, her descendants might become League trainers.
But Kikuta couldn't accept that. Then, during outdoor training, she stumbled upon this power plant and discovered a secret that could enable her rise...
"Do you know what creature is most ruthless to itself?... It's the butterfly."
"During metamorphosis, the butterfly performs self-destruction."
"It melts itself down, using digestive fluids it secretes, personally dissolving itself."
"Then, it grows completely new... head... body... antennae... wings."
Kikuta lay on the ground in tattered clothing, blood blurring her vision. Through the haze, the young man's figure before her overlapped with that Combusken trainer from back then. She seemed to transform back into that fragile girl cradling Dustox while sobbing.
"In life's metamorphosis, the insect offers its own life as sacrifice, dedicating itself to a magnificent rebirth... and destruction!"
"Breaking from the cocoon... into a butterfly."