CH87 (317), Global Competition Day One

I chose to stay at the stadium since my first battle was scheduled for 10:45 a.m. I would be having my Pokemon battle right here at the Motochika Grand Stadium, so it made no sense to me to go out in that short time frame.

Instead, I decided to use that time to check out the competition website to see who I would be facing. Well, it turned out that my opponent was Carlos Tempest, who was representing the western continent during the global competition.

He was a student at one of the grass academies in Galar, and unsurprisingly his Pokemon followed that type as well. He had revealed 4 Pokemon so far, and all four had reached the (high) silver stage by now if they had not been at that point before the competitions began.

The Pokemon he had were a Ludicolo, Shiftry, Tsareena, and Flapple. The last one had me snort a bit. It might seem a bit unfair since its racial value was not low, but in my opinion, Flapple was the second most pathetic dragon in the world, right after its alternate evolution Appletun.

Still, no matter what, it was still a dragon, and as I said it was not really weak, despite my bias I had to admit that much. Now, the question was whom I was going to use against Carlos.

We were already on the global stage, so there was no need for me to hold back any longer. No need to adhere to any of the conditions, such as avoiding a type advantage or not using any gold stage Pokemon.

I was going to tell my Pokemon to go all out since I was not planning to have them battle more than one round per battle, so there was no need to preserve any energy for further battles.

Except for Horus/Xatu and Mothra/Butterfree, who I was going to keep back until the final day, everyone else was a go, including the Slythering Six. They had complained that Stan/Gyarados was the only one that got some action, so I told them that they would get to fight as well.

Alright, I knew who I was going to use for the battle. I would first send out Ignis/Gyarados. Regardless of which one of his Pokemon Carlos send out, I was sure that my fire-variant Gyarados would make quick work of it.

My second Pokemon was going to be Kun/Azuraid, while my final Pokemon would be Medusa/Gyarados. Honestly, I did not believe that the whole battle would take more than 15 minutes, but who knew, maybe Carlos would surprise me and manage to hold out for 20 minutes.

Heh, jokes aside, none of my Pokemon would be holding back, in fact, they were going to go all out, so I was thinking that the battles might end up shorter than the continental battles.

Anyway, while I was at it, I also checked the details of my personal battle as well. I found out that the fight was scheduled for 3:45 p.m, which meant that I had more than 4 hours after my Pokemon battle to explore Fontaine City a bit before I had to participate in the personal battle.

The battle would be held at one of the other venues, but I was confident that I would make it there on time. I did have a lot of time to find it after all. My opponent was Caroline Moore, representing the southern continent.

She was actually a local from one of the local ninja academies. From the info on the website, she had a poison affinity and was an expert poison user who integrated poison in her ninja style, so she was more than capable of both long-range and close-range combat.

Moving on, while I was browsing the net for information on my opponents, the Pokemon battle here at the Motochika Grand Stadium finally finished. The battle actually took a bit longer than the organizers expected but after 50 minutes, Oric, the guy representing the eastern continent, won.

I was called up and had to wait at the side while the battlefield was restored by the staff. I saw Carlos waiting on the opposite side of the field, and once the battlefield was back to pristine condition, both of us stepped into our respective trainer areas.

The usual intro from the host as well as the referee happened and the signal to start the battle finally came. As soon as that happened, both Carlos and I released our Pokemon.

Carlos's Pokemon was the first to materialize, and he had chosen to start with his Ludicolo. Just a second after Ludicolo emerged, Ignis appeared on my side of the field, and as soon as he did, the excited crowd quietened down at his sight.

It was understandable since they were actually seeing a Gyarados that looked quite a bit different from the usual one, but no less intimidating. Especially, since his Intimidate ability activated upon his arrival. Ignis's 15 meters length helped as well.

The changes could not be overlooked since he was maroon instead of blue, and the white parts were light blue instead. Moreover, he had a two-pointed crest rather than a three-pointed one. That they were much longer and somewhat resembled branches was immediately apparent as well.

His fins were a golden yellow instead of white, and while he had the basic form of a Gyarados, it was evident to everyone that this was definitely a type-variant instead of some Shiny Gyarados.

So, it was no surprise that the crowd broke out in excited cheers after breaking out of their astonishment. Even Carlos and his Ludicolo were momentarily stupefied, but they broke out of it as soon as Ignis began his opening moveset version 2.

He used Sunny Day and followed that up with a Dragon Dance. The first opening set was Rain Dance followed by Dragon Dance, but that would have helped Ludicolo more than it did Ignis, so he went for Sunny Day instead.

While Ignis was doing his Dragon Dance, Ludicolo tried to change the weather in its favor with a Rain Dance, but it failed since Ignis had anticipated that and thus overcharged Sunny Day as much as possible using his superior parameters.

Ludicolo probably would have to use 2 Rain Dances to break it up and a third to successfully cause a rainfall. Not that they knew that since that was my estimation.

Still, while Ludicolo failed his Rain Dance, Ignis finished his Dragon Dance and went on the offensive. He rushed at Ludicolo while using Heat Wave. Ludicolo actually chose to tank the Heat Wave and set off another Rain Dance, successfully breaking up our Sunny Day.

This behavior led me to the conclusion that Ludicolo had Rain Dish as its ability, so it was willing to suffer some damage to make it rain. However, before it could finish its final/third Rain Dance, Ignis was upon it and interrupted its "dance" with a Crunch.

This forced Ludicolo to abort its "dance" and it actually managed to dodge by using Fake Out to dodge beside Ignis. It tried to follow that up with a Zen Headbutt, but Ignis dodged it with a Bounce, and while he was above Ludicolo he fired a Flamethrower at it.

Ludicolo countered that with Hydro Pump, but that meant it could not dodge when Ignis came back down from his previous Bounce, so Ignis slammed right on top of Ludicolo, who broke up its Hydro Pump at the last moment to try to dodge, or rather roll out of the way, which failed.

Then Ignis did something that probably no one expected him to do, he wrapped himself around Ludicolo using the fact that he was on top of it, and as soon as Ludicolo was immobilized he fired a Hyper Beam at its head at point blank, completely ignoring the fact that he would suffer secondary damage.

Ludicolo had frantically tried to free itself but failed since it was wrapped up, and Ignis was ignoring/enduring its Hydro Pump. Still, it failed and got hit by the Hyper Beam, which caused an explosion after hitting its face, obscuring everyone's view. The only thing visible was Ignis's ongoing Hyper Beam.

Thankfully for everyone present, Ignis did not keep the Hyper Beam up for as long as he could since I was unsure if Ludicolo would have survived a Hyper Beam at the face from him for a prolonged time.

Still, the three seconds proved to be enough to knock out Ludicolo since it was unconscious when the dust settled, and aside from some burn wounds on its face, it looked mostly unharmed. Well, if we ignored that it was out cold.

The referee declared Ignis the winner and Carlos recalled his Ludicolo. I could see a bit of shock and disbelief on his face while he did that. He probably had a hard time wrapping his head around the fact that his Ludicolo got taken out within less than three minutes.

To be honest, I had not thought that Ignis would finish the fight this fast as well. When I told them that they could go all out, I expected their opponents to last for at least 5 minutes, but Ignis had been a bit over-eager with how he overcharged all the moves he used during the fight.

While he was not showing it, I could feel him being decently tired despite having only fought for 2 or 3 minutes. This kind of fighting style was obviously not sustainable, but that was not a problem, since I was recalling him anyway.

Once both of us had recalled their Pokemon, the referee gave the signal to release our next one. Carlos called out his Tsareena, while I called out Kun. His appearance caused another commotion among the audience, even if it was a smaller one than the one caused by Ignis.

Azuraid were pretty rare Pokemon after all, even if they were not as interesting as a Gyarados type-variant. I was sure the attention I was receiving was increasing with each Pokemon I was revealing, and if not for the support of the Aura Guardians/Academy, as well as my guaranteed spot with a professor, I would have had reason to be worried.

However, thanks to my success at garnering support and protection I had no reason to be afraid, which was why I had no problem with showing off a bit. It would increase my worth in the eyes of my prospective professors, so that was a definitive plus.

Anyway, as soon as he appeared on the field, Kun took off into the air, opening up the distance between himself and Tsareena, directly limiting her offensive options to long-range moves.

She did not let that bother her and directly fired a salvo of Magical Leaf at Kun, who countered that with Air Cutter. They repeated that a few times to see if they could overwhelm the other's move or not before they stopped.

It seemed Kun decided to follow in Ignis's footsteps since he directly sent a Hurricane at Tsareena, who tried to block it with a Leaf Storm, and she was succeeding until Kun raised the ante by firing a Flamethrower at his Hurricane, turning it into a flaming tornado that burned her Leaf Storm into cinders.

Tsareena was trying to withstand the flaming catastrophe, by combining Triple Axel and Rapid Spin to cool the air around her and reduce the damage caused to her by the burning Hurricane.

However, Kun did not plan to sit still, or hover around, while she was mitigating his offense, and he attacked her with Air Slash while she was spinning away.

She got hit and the inclusion of Air Slash to her spin cause an explosion that sent her flying. Her flight actually propelled her out of the danger area, so that was good for her, but Kun did not plan to let her enjoy that.

He fired an Ice Beam at her, which forced her to dodge around while still rolling on the ground. She used Vine Whips to achieve that, or it would have been impossible for her to dodge while being flung away.

Still, while she was dodging, Kun boxed her in a bit thanks to the ice that Ice Beam left behind, and when she crashed into a bit of ice while dodging Kun's latest attack, he used her momentary pause to Lock On(to) her.

Once he did that, he fired a Hyper Beam at her, which flawlessly struck her, and finally resulted in her knockout. Well, at least she managed to last more than 5 minutes, so I could say that she did a good job. The referee declared her unable to battle, and I recalled a visibly tired Kun while Carlos did the same with his unconscious Tsareena.

This time around Carlos did not look shocked, on the contrary, he gave a satisfied nod while recalling his Tsareena. Probably because she did a good show of resisting Kun, unlike Ludicolo who got taken out before it could do much.

Regardless, the referee gave the signal and we released our third, and in Carlos's case final Pokemon.

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