January 16th.
The fourth day of the Horizon League.
Today would host both the Round of Sixteen and the Quarterfinals.
The semifinals and finals would be held tomorrow morning.
As time passed, the popularity of the Horizon League continued to rise.
Without question, this year's Horizon League had been an enormous success in terms of staffing, expanded venues, and all the new reforms that had been introduced.
Whether it was viewership ratings or the number of live spectators, everything had reached the highest peak since the Horizon League first began.
As the Champion of the Donghua League, this was exactly the outcome Feng Yang had hoped for most.
Because it would greatly strengthen the courage and determination of young trainers to begin their journeys and meet more Pokémon. It would also make it much easier for him to implement the policies he planned to introduce next.
Especially after hearing the report from the news department.
"A quarter of the current trending searches are related to Lin Feng. The most searched topics are: 'Speedrun,' 'Lin Feng's Pokémon,' 'Gardevoir,' 'Serperior,' 'Alolan Ninetales,' 'Looks-First Fans,' 'Latios,' and 'Champion'..."
Although Feng Yang didn't fully understand some of the internet slang, that didn't stop him from becoming more and more satisfied.
He truly had chosen the right contestant.
Bringing Lin Feng into this Horizon League had been an excellent decision.
Otherwise, relying on a legendary Pokémon like Latios alone would never have been enough to maintain this level of popularity.
Now, the internet had already exploded with debates about who would ultimately win the Horizon League Championship.
Some believed it would be Tobias, because the young man always wore a confident smile no matter who his opponent was, and because he possessed legendary Pokémon.
Some even speculated that the Pokémon he had not yet revealed might also be legendary Pokémon.
But the majority supported Lin Feng.
Because every single one of Lin Feng's Pokémon was incredibly strong.
And every single one of them was beautiful.
That was the key point.
Because another large group of viewers believed:
Who cares if they're strong? Looking good is what matters most!
As public opinion continued to build, the atmosphere in the audience changed as well.
Now, what everyone looked forward to most was tomorrow's championship battle…
Or perhaps, would those two meet before the finals even arrived?
"Dear audience, hello everyone! Welcome to the East China Stadium! I'm Li Bing, commentator for this year's Horizon League! No need for extra talk, let's get straight to it!"
Li Bing rode out from backstage on Aegislash.
The entire stadium erupted into loud cheers.
And in the contestant area—
After several days of battles, aside from a very small number of trainers still hiding secret trump cards, nearly every contestant already had a decent understanding of the others.
And now, all sixteen remaining contestants had arrived in the battle area. No one was waiting in their rooms anymore.
The giant central screen began rotating their virtual avatars.
To Lin Feng's surprise, the first person selected was actually… himself?
That instantly made most of the other contestants tense up, all fearing the next chosen trainer would be them.
At the same time, the audience's eyes lit up.
The first match was Lin Feng's?
Before the crowd could even start guessing whether Tobias would be drawn immediately, the second contestant had already appeared.
And then—
Someone in the contestant area quietly broke down inside.
Lin Feng turned curiously to look.
It was Fang Youzhi.
Overall, the Silver Tournament and the Horizon League had fairly similar competition structures.
During the previous Top 32 round, Fang Youzhi had a slight advantage in terrain matchups, so advancing hadn't been too difficult.
He had just been calculating which opponents he might face if he wanted a chance to break into the Top 8.
But before he even finished calculating…
The result had already arrived.
"Feng… Lin Feng…"
He forced an ugly smile at Lin Feng.
"Yeah… see you on the battlefield."
Although the two of them shared some friendship, once they stepped onto the battlefield, Lin Feng would never let his Pokémon lose because of that friendship.
"It's over… it's over…"
Fang Youzhi's spirit completely collapsed.
He suddenly remembered how, when he came back before, he had proudly gone to Lin Feng and excitedly said he had reached the Top 8 of the Silver Tournament—
when in reality, he had only made it to the Top 16.
He had even bragged that he was aiming for the Top 4.
Now…
He sighed deeply, looking completely drained.
But the match would not wait for him.
Once the contestants were selected, the battle began immediately.
The two stepped onto the stage.
The chosen battlefield was the most common one: the Rock Field.
This kind of terrain gave no particular advantage to any Pokémon, so there was no need to pay much attention to it.
Lin Feng chose Milotic.
Because he knew Fang Youzhi would send out Flareon.
And sure enough, things happened exactly as he expected.
The moment Flareon appeared, it was visibly startled.
But only for a split second.
It lowered its body slightly—
an attacking stance.
But it was useless.
Lin Feng gave the order directly.
"Water Gun!"
Milotic's Water Gun was fast, precise, and clean.
It struck Flareon head-on, leaving it dizzy and overwhelmed before it was quickly defeated.
Then came the second battle.
The third battle…
Whether it was Snorlax, Jynx, or Jolteon—
none of them could last more than a few turns against Lin Feng's Pokémon.
Although this outcome had been expected from the start, Fang Youzhi still looked sad and disappointed as he stepped down from the stage.
Lin Feng watched him quietly and didn't say much.
Fang Youzhi was already a true trainer.
His path had been long.
It should be said that any trainer who could reach the Horizon League had already traveled extensively and experienced countless setbacks along the way.
Their mental resilience was naturally strong.
He would recover from this emotional disappointment soon enough.
Of course—
except when facing him.
Since the result of the match had been so expected and nothing particularly shocking happened, Lin Feng's battle didn't cause too much of a stir among the audience.
But that didn't mean they weren't paying attention to his next match.
If anything, they were looking forward to the finals even more.
When the finals came, who would become Champion?
Tobias had never revealed a second Pokémon.
And every one of Lin Feng's Pokémon had already displayed overwhelming strength.
After the first match ended, Lin Feng didn't leave.
Instead, he returned to the contestant area and stayed to watch the following battles.
Second match…
Third match…
Seventh match.
Eighth match…
In just one morning, the entire Round of Sixteen had come to an end.
By then, every contestant had already gained a considerable amount of fame.
Among them was Tobias, who still had never revealed a second Pokémon.
There was Feng Yin, who specialized in Ghost-type Pokémon.
And there was Li Xuan, who possessed a Shiny Charizard.
Interestingly, Lin Feng had originally believed that Lin Shilan would almost certainly make it into the Top 8—
but she ended up losing to Li Xuan.
During the battle, Lin Shilan still used the same strategy as before:
send out Salamence first, hoping it would defeat the first opponent and stack Moxie boosts.
Unfortunately, in the very first battle, Li Xuan chose Charizard.
Two equally wild and untamed shiny dragon-like Pokémon clashed in the sky and across the battlefield, their power and elemental collisions sending the audience into wild cheers.
Although Charizard was at a disadvantage at the beginning—
in the end, under its trainer's loud shouting, it activated Blaze.
And the result was…
both Charizard and Salamence lost the ability to battle.
Even Lin Feng couldn't help sighing in admiration.
It really had to be Fire-type Pokémon.
They always managed to bring hope when their trainers were pushed into desperate situations.
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