>>54939236And the counterpart, Seviper, would also recieve the same 97 bst boost, and keeping it's original stat identity as a mixed attacker, +20 to both attack stats and the rest into it's HP to help it survive hits
As Seviper is already a poison type, it's most fitting to add dark I think, and give it a variety of attacking options like knock off to buff it's movepool, as it already has access to crunch/dark pulse
Lore wise, it could be the reason Zangoose gets a toxic chain as well by manipulating it, pulling biblical inspirations from the serpent of eden
As for it's ability, toxic chain would be fine, and it's old abilities shed skin/infiltrator kinda suck, so giving it merciless to lean into the poison theme would be cool and let it do heavy damage to poisoned enemies and pick which defensive stat to hit with it's strong stab moves
