The third day after returning to his grandparents' house.
Eevee had finally overcome all difficulties and could train with a serious attitude.
However, whenever Eevee thought about being punished by Minato—no dramas for a week—she felt an inexplicable sadness.
Only after losing something do you realize how wonderful it was...
Eevee indicated that she wanted to watch dramas!
Ideally, wrapped in the Silk Scarf, lying comfortably on the bed, holding a phone and binge-watching, even if it was just two hours a day.
Minato had never anticipated... that his plan to cultivate Eevee's battle interest through subtle influence would backfire so quickly.
Although Eevee had indeed been somewhat affected and developed a desire to become stronger, more importantly, it had given her another interest...
Whether movies, anime, TV dramas, or tournament replays, she accepted them all, falling in love with the feeling of watching stories through a screen.
Perhaps because she didn't want to bargain with Minato, on the fourth day, Eevee, unable to watch dramas, almost transformed her grief into motivation and trained even more seriously.
There was perhaps a more important point: Eevee didn't want Minato to skip meals because of her laziness.
Therefore, today's training results were much better than yesterday's. Without using the Tackle move to gain explosive power, Eevee could not only navigate the dense forest with more ease but also reach nearly her normal speed limit.
Another thing: because she had achieved some results in training, Eevee suddenly felt less afraid of it.
At this moment, her gaze toward the dense forest was the same as when she saw that Sandshrew's work on the beach—only the competitive spirit remained.
Having shaken off the influence that the Anticipation Ability had on her personality and mentality, Eevee returned to the familiar Minato. She was still that competitive little Eevee.
That day, they went to the Pokémon Center as usual, finally leaving under the strange gaze of the intern nurse.
The fifth day.
Minato said to Eevee: "Next, we'll start training for Quick Attack."
"Eevee!" Eevee was full of confidence, though she still hadn't quite figured out what Minato meant.
"You've already experienced the Tackle move the day before yesterday, right?"
Eevee nodded.
At that time, Eevee's movements had been hesitant and fearful, afraid to sprint at high speed through the dense forest. So Minato simply had her start with Tackle, then forbade her from slowing down. This way, even if Eevee wanted to stop, it would be very difficult.
Facts proved this was indeed effective. Eevee was battered terribly.
However, after Eevee's mentality shifted, they stopped using this method and returned to the original training content—ordinary sprinting. After all, training must be gradual.
"If Tackle only gives you explosive power at the start, making you quickly speed up and crash into the target, then Quick Attack is about maintaining a very fast speed continuously to strike the target with Tackle," Minato explained plainly.
"Quick Attack has higher requirements for your stamina, body strength, explosive power, and coordination. But once you master this move, you can use it to gain even faster movement speed."
Eevee somewhat understood.
"So next, we'll return to the training content from the day before yesterday—continuously using Tackle to sprint through the dense forest while dodging obstacles. If you can gradually adapt to this, then you're not far from learning Quick Attack," Minato said.
In such a dense place... continuously using Tackle?!
Even though Eevee was mentally prepared, she was startled. Then she looked at Minato with a doubtful gaze.
"Ahem... what kind of look is that!"
Minato blushed. Although the training method for Quick Attack was something he had summarized himself, it was absolutely reliable.
"Eevee." Eevee turned her head, showing an expression of "I'll believe you," and ran to the white line.
During the fourth day's training—yesterday—Eevee had already been able to smoothly shuttle through the dense forest at normal speed. Now she also wanted to try whether she could break through her limits and use faster speeds to complete the course.
At Minato's command, Eevee's body was covered in white light, transforming into a white shadow that sprinted out. About a few seconds later, the white light disappeared—the sign that the energy had dissipated. From this, it could be seen that if this were a battle, Eevee's Tackle could only be used to attack opponents at close range. If the opponent was too far away, the Tackle would dissipate before even touching the target.
After a while, Minato stopped timing.
Eevee had failed.
When the Tackle's energy dissipated, she would gather energy again and use Tackle. This way, Eevee could continuously burst forth with power to sprint. But Eevee clearly couldn't control this sprinting speed well, and it wasn't long before she crashed into a tree—just like on the third day.
However, fortunately, after two days of tempering, Eevee was no longer that crybaby. After climbing up from the ground, Eevee simply shook the dust off her body and started running again. Her body strength had increased considerably from the beginning.
As expected, thick skin is beaten into being...
Because she needed to use the move continuously while running back and forth, Eevee's consumption was extraordinarily high. So this training couldn't be done all day. The process of learning a new move was difficult. Minato wasn't impatient for quick results either. After trying once, he would have Eevee switch to ordinary physical training or rest.
This kind of training continued for about three more days.
On the seventh day of their special training in this dense forest, Eevee finally showed significant changes.
Her control over energy had reached another level. The stamina she had developed was enough to maintain high-speed movement for longer periods. The accumulated experience from crashing into tree trunks hundreds of times also made Eevee more proficient with the Tackle move, no longer finding it so difficult to control the explosive power that Tackle brought.
The only thing somewhat lacking was coordination ability.
However, this could no longer stop Eevee from learning Quick Attack.
Sufficient accumulation allowed Eevee to naturally blend her training results and complete the Quick Attack training. Watching Eevee covered in white light, easily running around the open area, Minato nearly cried.
It was simply not easy. Learning Quick Attack was much harder than learning Sand Attack. The comprehension of Sand Attack might have had elements of coincidence, but Quick Attack was truly earned through Eevee's sweat and hard work step by step.
After Eevee finished demonstrating, Minato immediately picked her up and spoke the words that moved Eevee the most over these past few days.
"Starting tonight, I allow you to watch your phone for two hours..."
Eevee: (´▽｀), that's what I've been waiting for.
Looking at Eevee's expression, Minato always felt something was off, but he couldn't quite say exactly what was wrong. He could only scratch his head in confusion.
"Also, to celebrate, today's training ends here."
Minato laughed heartily. Everything was going smoothly. If this momentum continued, the Little Ho-Oh Cup was within reach!