Night had fallen.
Cain had spent the entire day refining tactics alongside Drake.
Drake was deeply impressed by the composition of Cain's team and by his dual-core battle formation.
However, they still needed more practice — more time to build coordination and synergy.
It's often said that real battles are the best way to test results.
Indeed, during his match against Drake, Cain discovered many shortcomings, but through battle experience, his Pokémon also learned to coordinate better and perform more smoothly.
After an entire day of combat, Cain stayed overnight aboard Drake's ship.
He took out the manual that Drake had given him earlier that day.
The book recorded primarily Drake's experiences in training Dragon-type Pokémon — especially Bagon, Shelgon, and Salamence — and detailed unique methods of nurturing them.
In particular, there was an especially unusual training method for the Shelgon stage, before it evolved into Salamence.
According to Drake's notes, this method only worked for Shelgon of high quality — and the greater their talent, the stronger the effect.
For example, Drake's current Salamence possessed Purple quality — Champion-level quality — yet when it was still a Shelgon, its quality had only reached Light Purple.
It was precisely because of this special training method that, at the moment of evolution, its quality had risen to full Purple.
One had to understand: Drake did not have access to the quality-enhancement potion that Cain possessed. The fact that his Pokémon could improve by an entire tier upon evolution was already extraordinary — especially at such a high level as Purple quality.
According to Drake's writing, not every Shelgon was suitable for this procedure. Based on his repeated experiments, a Shelgon needed to at least reach Dark Blue quality — what he called "supreme quality." Only then could such a transformative effect be achieved upon evolution.
The higher the Shelgon's innate talent, the greater the improvement that could be gained after evolving.
This special training method, in fact, was not discovered by Drake himself. It had been revealed to him by an old companion.
That's right — that old companion was another Salamence.
The Salamence that Drake currently used was actually a descendant of that veteran Salamence.
When Drake was young, during his travels, he once fell into grave danger and was saved by that Salamence. From that moment on, a bond was formed between man and Pokémon, and with time, it grew into a deep and lasting connection.
Drake never revealed too many details about that elder Salamence.
He only said that, for its lineage, evolving into Salamence was a true coming-of-age ritual — and that during this rite, the Shelgon had to drink an enormous barrel of dragon-type Pokémon blood to awaken the latent draconic power within.
Through this, its body would become stronger upon evolution, its wings more powerful, and its Dragon-type moves far more deadly.
At first, Drake thought this was just a symbolic tradition of the Salamence bloodline — like how humans eat cake on birthdays, a ritual for good fortune.
So he never forced his old partner to make his offspring — the current Salamence — undergo the same process.
But the dragon blood that Shelgon drank back then came directly from its father — pure, untainted dragon blood.
The effect was astonishing. After drinking it, Shelgon remained motionless on the ground for an entire week. When it finally rose again, it instantly completed its evolution, spreading at last the wings it had dreamed of night and day.
Only then did Drake understand the true meaning of this ritual, and through deeper research, he derived the conclusions now written in this manual.
Just as Kommo-o demand that their offspring complete a training journey before returning after evolution, Salamence too have their own hereditary method of cultivation.
But this secret was known only among large Salamence clans. The few wild specimens found in nature rarely knew of such methods.
Once they evolved into Salamence, there was no longer any opportunity for inner renewal.
Cain and his current Shelgon, however, still had that chance.
As he read this information, Cain once again felt the immense benefit of having a mentor. Even his system — with all the vast data it had gathered — had no record of this special breeding technique.
The second half of the book was more general, recounting Drake's life story — from his beginnings as a trainer to his rise as Hoenn's first recognized Dragon-type Elite Four member.
What was most valuable to Cain were the notes describing Drake's past battles against other Elite Four–level and Champion–level trainers: which Pokémon they used, what strategies they employed, how they coordinated teammates in combat, and the various peculiar ways they managed to unleash their full potential.
There were records covering every stage, from Elite level to Champion level.
In early and mid-tier Elite Four–level battles, the key usually lay in brute strength — whoever possessed greater direct power was stronger.
But upon reaching the Advanced Elite Four level, two schools of thought emerged.
Some believed, "If everything so far has been determined by sheer power, then as long as I keep increasing it, I'll maintain the advantage."
Others, aware that talent and growth speed differed among individuals, believed that once one reached that point, brute force growth slowed down. Thus, it became necessary to develop special tactics to compensate for those gaps.
In truth, neither approach was wrong.
Those capable of continually improving their raw strength could leap to the Pseudo-Champion or even Champion level. Meanwhile, those who couldn't focused on deepening their combat tactics — giving birth to the first single-core strategies, such as typical Sandstorm or Rain teams.
And when those became common at that level, someone invented multi-core teams — formations where multiple strategic centers complemented and reinforced each other, achieving far greater overall power.
A Pseudo-Champion-level trainer relying solely on brute strength might not be able to win in full-team battles against someone who mastered a double-core or multi-core strategy.
Conversely, those relying purely on multi-core tactics also couldn't stand against a true Champion-level trainer — or someone beyond.
In the end, the conclusion was clear: both brute strength and multi-core strategy were indispensable.
Only when pure power could no longer grow quickly should one rely on strategy.
Ideally, part of those tactics should be conceived in advance — before reaching one's limit in brute force — so as not to waste excessive time later training one or several Pokémon exclusively for it.
Of course, that was extremely demanding — it required profound knowledge of Pokémon themselves to make it work.
But the truth was that from the Advanced Elite Four level onward, a trainer's combat ability was no longer judged merely by the strength of one or two of their Pokémon.
Some might seem unimpressive in one-on-one or two-on-two battles, yet in full-team or life-and-death fights, the difference became vast.
That's why, after reaching the Advanced Elite Four level, one should never underestimate anyone — especially the older trainers. Their Pokémon might not excel in individual power, but over the years, they had accumulated versatile strategies and formidable tactical instincts.
(End of chapter)