"Contestant Reiji has chosen to switch out Poliwhirl. What a shame. We won't get to see more of that incredible clash," the announcer said with a light sigh.
That one exchange had shaken the whole stadium. Even after the Indigo Plateau Conference ended, people would probably still be talking about how those two had pulled it off.
"He recalled it? Reiji-nii recalled Poliwhirl?" Shun had thought Reiji would keep battling, so the recall caught him off guard. Poliwhirl had performed far too well for him to expect Reiji to pull it back.
Still, he raised his own Poké Ball toward Poliwrath. A beam of red light fell over it.
"Come back, Poliwrath."
"Oh! Contestant Shun has recalled Poliwrath as well. It looks like both tadpoles were at their limit. That kind of burst may only be usable once!"
At the announcer's guess, plenty of Trainers in the audience quietly let out a breath. If that level of power could be used freely, nobody would want to deal with it.
After recalling their Pokémon, Reiji and Shun each took out another Poké Ball and threw it onto the field.
"Go, Electabuzz!"
"Go, Farfetch'd!"
The giant screen showing the contestants' information was still being repaired, and the referee had returned to the battlefield to continue the match.
After the referee fainting incident at the side venue, every referee now had a guard Pokémon nearby, ready to use Protect at any moment. That was why this referee had not been injured in the earlier blast.
Reiji knew he had misread things the moment he saw Electabuzz, but it was fine. Against Shun, there was no need for dirty tricks. He would beat him head-on.
Dirty tricks worked on dirty people. Playing fair was how decent people got buried.
Reiji's moral line was flexible. The method depended on the opponent. Against Shun, his own little brother, there was no need to play that nasty. Otherwise, he would have sent out Forretress from the start.
"This matchup is Electabuzz against Farfetch'd. Type-wise, Farfetch'd is in a rough spot!"
"Farfetch'd, take off and use Focus Energy!"
"Electabuzz, Thunderbolt!"
Dealing with Farfetch'd was simple. Shock it until it dropped. Farfetch'd, on the other hand, had far more to worry about. It had a x2 weakness to Electric.
"Farfetch'd, dodge the lightning and use Air Slash from above!"
Reiji was aiming for Air Slash's flinch chance. Too bad Farfetch'd did not have Serene Grace. If it did, a sixty percent flinch chance would be disgusting. Even without it, Air Slash still had a thirty percent chance to flinch, and that was enough to work with.
Under Shun's commands, Electabuzz either blocked or dodged. Reiji waited until one Air Slash finally landed and made Electabuzz flinch.
"Now. Farfetch'd, Slash!"
Slash was a Normal-type move with seventy power and a high critical-hit rate. With Focus Energy already active, Farfetch'd had a very real chance to land a critical hit while Electabuzz was flinching.
"Electabuzz, dodge!"
"Buzz! Buzz!" Electabuzz could not use a move, so it could only run. But something running on the ground was never going to escape something flying above it, not when Farfetch'd already had it locked down.
Farfetch'd quickly caught up, swung the leek in its wing, and struck Electabuzz across the head.
After landing Slash, Farfetch'd climbed back into the air and avoided Electabuzz's electric counterattack. Electric moves were not that easy to control, and hitting a flying Farfetch'd was no simple matter.
Farfetch'd repeated the same pattern. It forced Electabuzz to flinch again, then swooped down for another critical Slash.
Seeing Electabuzz get hit again, and another critical at that, Shun started to panic. If regular electric attacks could not catch such a nimble Farfetch'd, then he would cover the whole field instead.
"Electabuzz, Thunder!"
Rumble. Rumble.
Thunder burst from Electabuzz and crashed all over the battlefield. Orange arcs of electricity scattered everywhere. It did interfere with Farfetch'd, but not enough to stop it from taking advantage of another flinch and striking Electabuzz again.
This time, though, something went wrong.
After hitting Electabuzz, Farfetch'd had just started to climb when it let out a sharp squawk. Its whole body locked up, and it dropped straight out of the air.
"What happened?" Reiji saw Farfetch'd twitching on the ground, unable to move, and immediately thought of Electabuzz's Static.
Static had a thirty percent chance to paralyze a Pokémon that hit the user with a contact move.
Slash was a contact move. Farfetch'd had gotten lucky twice, but on the third hit, the paralysis finally triggered.
"Farfetch'd is done." Reiji knew a paralyzed Farfetch'd would never be as nimble as before. Getting hit by an Electric-type move was only a matter of time.
He could give up on Farfetch'd now. If he did, it would only be paralyzed and hurt from the fall, and it could still take part in later matches.
If he forced it to keep fighting and it got hit by an Electric-type move, then Farfetch'd would miss the rest of the tournament and have to recover.
There was a third option, though, and that was the one Reiji chose.
"Farfetch'd, use Rest."
Farfetch'd managed to use Rest, and the paralysis started to fade. Reiji immediately recalled it into its Poké Ball and let it sleep inside.
Rest restored HP and cured all status conditions. It was exactly what Farfetch'd needed right now.
"Contestant Reiji's Farfetch'd was paralyzed, and he has chosen to recall it. As always, Reiji is playing cautiously and giving his opponent no easy openings."
"He recalled another one?" Shun watched Reiji take Farfetch'd back, then called Electabuzz closer. Farfetch'd had left the field, so Electabuzz had barely come out ahead in that exchange.
"Go, Forretress."
Reiji did not have a clean answer for Electabuzz.
Poliwhirl's earlier showing was already enough. From here on out, nobody would dare underestimate him. What he needed now was to make the match look close, not make every eye in the stadium lock onto him.
He wanted his future opponents to think Poliwhirl was his one scary Pokémon and that the rest of his team was nothing special. Give them a little hope that they could beat him.
"Forretress?" Shun had seen that Forretress before. It had lost its Fire weakness, which meant it basically had no weaknesses left. All he could do was try to wear it down.
"Forretress, Autotomize. Defense Curl, then Rollout."
"Electabuzz, dodge!" Shun had no intention of taking that head-on. He also had to stop Forretress from building momentum.
If Rollout kept going, its power would increase every time it hit. With Defense Curl doubling that, Electabuzz could not survive that.
Forretress became a huge black ball and started rolling. Electabuzz had no choice but to run, because Forretress was too fast. It was even faster than Electabuzz, and Electabuzz could not shake it.
Thunderbolt did nothing to Forretress's black shell, so Electabuzz could only keep running for its life.
Forretress was normally much slower than Electabuzz, but Autotomize changed that. With its weight cut down and Rollout building speed, the giant black ball quickly closed the gap.
A two-meter steel ball was rolling after it. Electabuzz was falling apart inside. Even if it wanted to stop and fight back, its electricity did nothing to Forretress, and Shun could not think of a good answer either.
By the time Electabuzz was knocked over, Shun still had no plan. Every option either failed to break through, failed to matter, or failed to stop it. Forretress kept rolling without any sign of slowing down.
After several turns of Rollout, the third hit smashed into Electabuzz and knocked it out.
The first Pokémon eliminated in this knockout match was Electabuzz.
"Electabuzz, you did well. Rest up." Shun recalled Electabuzz, comforted it, then threw out a new Poké Ball. "It's your turn, Infernape!"
He had figured it out. No matter what, he still needed Fire to fight Forretress. Even if this Forretress had mutated and was no longer weak to Fire, its steel shell had to have a limit. He wanted to see where that limit was.
"Infernape? Perfect. Let's see where Forretress's limit is." Reiji waved a hand and had Forretress start with Iron Defense, raising its Defense all the way to the cap. He ignored Infernape's Flamethrower.
Forretress used Iron Defense three times in place. By the time Infernape's Flamethrower finally died down, only a bit of white steam rose from Forretress's body. Its shell clicked as it turned, and its eyes appeared again.
"There it is! Forretress isn't afraid of fire! Flamethrower didn't seem to hurt it at all!"
"Good. Forretress, Defense Curl and Rollout again."
Reiji quietly relaxed. This was exactly what he wanted. If one move worked, keep using it.
A move didn't need to be fancy. It just needed to work.
If the opponent couldn't break it, why stop?
"Again?" Shun had already tested Flamethrower once, and it had done nothing. Then he would use it again. "Infernape, Flamethrower!"
"Fer!" Infernape drew in a deep breath and unleashed another stream of blazing fire straight at the rolling Forretress.
Forretress did not dodge. It charged straight into the flames, sparks flying around its shell as it tore through Infernape's fire and slammed into its face, sending it flying.
"Body Slam." Reiji saw the opening. Infernape could not get up right away, so he had Forretress drop onto it.
"Infernape, Dig!"
"Fer!" Infernape saw the huge black shadow falling from above and hurriedly dug underground. If it stayed there, it might really have been flattened.
Against an Infernape hiding underground, Reiji opened Forretress's panel and thought for a moment. Aside from setting Spikes, he did not have a good way to force it out, and he did not want to set Spikes here.
"Come back, Forretress."
Reiji recalled Forretress and threw out Kingler's Poké Ball instead. He still did not use Rhydon.
"Kook! Kook!" Kingler came out into the messy battlefield and quietly waited for Reiji's order.
Kingler was enough for Infernape. Reiji had plenty of Water-types, and it was time to let Kingler show its face.
"Kingler, Stomping Tantrum."
Stomping Tantrum was a Ground-type move, and it worked well against Pokémon hiding underground.
"Infernape, get out of there!" Shun gritted his teeth. Reiji-nii really was holding back. Infernape had been hiding underground after using Dig, which was the perfect chance to set Spikes.
But Reiji had not set Spikes. He had even switched Pokémon instead. Shun could not keep Infernape underground forever either. If it refused to come out, the referee would call it passive stalling and rule it defeated.
"Fine. Come back, Infernape."
Shun knew Infernape could not beat Forretress. With Forretress's fire resistance, Infernape would be knocked out long before it managed to break through.
Against Kingler, Electabuzz was already gone. That left him with only one choice.
"Breloom, it's your turn!"
Breloom had already recovered from yesterday's battle. An Elite Four medical team was no joke.
As Bruno's student, Shun only needed a little help from that level of medical support to get Breloom healed up quickly and ready for today's match.
"It's Breloom! After Contestant Reiji switched Pokémon, Contestant Shun has switched as well. Breloom has the type advantage against Kingler. What will Reiji do?"
"Breloom, huh?" Reiji found this match more and more interesting. Most of Shun's Pokémon were Advanced tier, so this battle was going to be fun.
By now, more than half of both teams had been revealed. After the big screen came back online, the current lineup appeared there, with only two unknown Pokémon still hidden.
Reiji — Shun
Poliwhirl [Recalled] — Poliwrath [Recalled]
Farfetch'd [Recalled] — Electabuzz [Out]
Forretress [Recalled] — Infernape [Recalled]
Kingler [Battling] — Breloom [Battling]
Looking at the match as a whole, Shun was clearly behind. He had lost Electabuzz, while Reiji had not lost a single Pokémon. Once Farfetch'd woke up inside its Poké Ball, it could still return to battle.
As for Poliwhirl and Poliwrath, both frogs were basically out of the fight by default. They could be forced back in, but at that point they would only be free knockouts.
On the field, though, Kingler facing Breloom put Reiji at a disadvantage again. This match really was getting interesting.
Even so, Reiji had no intention of recalling Kingler. Breloom's Grass typing gave it a x2 advantage against Kingler, but Kingler's Ice-type moves also hit Breloom for x2 damage. It wasn't unwinnable.
If only Farfetch'd were facing Breloom instead. Breloom had a x4 weakness to Flying. Unfortunately, Reiji did not have a proper bird. He only had Pokémon like Farfetch'd and Pelipper to make do with.
[End of chapter]
[100 Power Stones = Extra Chapter]
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