Chapter 257: 257

Alex quickly went to Blaziken and healed her1 with a [Super Potion].

After Blaziken woke up, Alex praised her to lift up her spirit. She is the youngest, so it was understandable for her to lose because of the lack of experience.

Especially when Alex said, "In the next tournament, you will show them how strong you are," he noticed how the fire had lit up Blaziken's eyes again.

After praising Blaziken, he went to Ditto to praise him too.

He was very proud of Ditto and he himself found a new side of Ditto that he had never seen before.

Ditto talent for tactics doesn't seem to be weak and had even increased compared to the last tournament.

Although Ditto didn't use any out of the world tactics, Alex felt its sense of planning and understanding of tactics was specially upgraded. It seems all the time getting better in chess had paid off now.

Ditto had a good understanding of timing about when to use which moves to get maximum advantage.

In spite of it taking longer for Ditto to prepare a move than Blaziken, he had used more moves than her even if you don't count [Teleport].

Not only Alex congratulates Ditto, but all other Pokémon said at least a few nice words. Even Blaziken compliments Ditto for its skill.

Ditto, who heard so many compliments at once, flushed and was so shy that it said nothing the whole time.

Alex watch this scene with a smile on his face.

He really felt the moments like that show their close bond as a family.

Everyone understood that Ditto by far is the Pokémon with the worst potential and not particularly strong.

That's why all Pokémon wanted Ditto to have his moments where he can shine. And now that that has happened, everyone is trying to sweeten this moment.

....

Gardevoir and Umbreon stood in front of each other on the battlefield.

"3,2,1, GO!"

Both started to prepare their moves immediately, but neither moved from their place for a while.

Then, Umbreon suddenly started slowly walking towards the middle of the battlefield.

Gardevoir finished first and used [Calm Mind]. Then she immediately started preparing it again.

Umbreon finished a little later and then used the move [Snarl].

Alex saw how Umbreon was using this move and couldn't help but want to pat her on the back.

[Snarl] is a Dark-type move that doesn't only deal damage but also lowers the Sp Atk of the Pokémon hit by this move.

In addition, this move has a ridiculously long range that hits all Pokémon in 360 degrees.

This move is impossible to avoid unless the field is big enough to get out of its long range.

That was one of the reasons why Alex bought this move.

Gardevoir will not only take damage from this move, but her Sp Atk will also lower the more often she is hit by this move.

Umbreon used the move while standing in the middle of the field, fully covering it and sending the wave of power with her as a centre, ensured that the Gardevoir could not avoid this damage.

Gardevoir was hit and suffered a good deal of damage, but she didn't let this break her focus.

Although she had lost about 20% HP from this 1 hit, she immediately thought up a counter.

Gardevoir suddenly stopped the move she had been preparing and began preparing another move after she had controlled the backlash of stopping the move.

Umbreon stayed in the middle and prepared another [Snarl].

This time, Gardevoir finished first, even if she was a bit slower than the last time.

Gardevoir gave a smile and used [Disable].

Umbreon, who had almost finished the preparation of her move, felt like all the energy from the move had suddenly vanished.

[Disable] has a lot of restrictions to properly use it. However, not only is Gardevoir on a level higher than Umbreon, but she has also made this move an Expert-rank to take the full benefit of it.

It was precisely because of this that she could disable even an Expert-rank move of Umbreon.

Umbreon looked unaffected by this new development.

She used [Quick Attack] as she dashed towards Gardevoir and her whole body rammed into Gardevoir.

Like [Teleport] or [Protect], [Quick Attack] is a move that hardly needs any preparation time. And just like these moves, this move has a limit.

It can only be used once, and then you have to wait a short time until it can be used again.

In addition, you can't prepare any other move for following 1 second, which is a huge con for Alex and, also the reason, why he doesn't like to use this move.

Not preparing a move for 1 second may sound insignificant, but a Pokémon usually needs no more than 2.5 seconds to prepare an Expert-rank move. So, it can give the opponent a big lead in using the next move first. Apart from that, this 1 second starts only after the user of [Quick Attack] has hit the foe or has used up all of its energy.

Alex has experimented a lot with this move, and at least on the Normal-rank, this move seems to be mediocre for Alex.

This move is good just to quickly bridge distances, and even in this case, it is a worse version of [Teleport].

Gardevoir was hit again and sustained a bit of damage. Even against a weak move like [Quick Attack], she lost almost 10% due to her very poor HP value and a mediocre Def value.

Although Gardevoir had done no harm in the whole fight, she was very confident.

After a second, Umbreon started preparing her next move.

But Gardevoir, who had been preparing a move for a long time, used the move almost an instant before Umbreon had finished her preparation.

Gardevoir's hands started glowing before she used [Dazzling Gleam].

Umbreon was hit but showed no signs of pain even though she lost more than 20% of her HP after the hit.

Shortly afterwards, Gardevoir used [Teleport] again.

Umbreon showed no anger but rather a smile as suddenly her whole body began to glow up.

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Her body suddenly released black energy that quickly followed Gardevoir.

Alex knew immediately the move Umbreon was using.

'Pursuit.'

In this world, [Pursuit] functions very similar yet a bit differently than in the games.

As soon as the activation requirements are met, the move is used automatically. It doesn't matter whether the user has not fully prepared it or wants to wait for a bit.

In addition, the requirements to activate [Pursuit] are a bit weird.

As soon as a Pokémon manipulates the space, the Pokémon is automatically hit by this move. This can be something like Pokémon teleporting to a place on the field or switching out with a Pokémon who is currently in a Pokéball.

It's a powerful move that can be used in tournaments against a Pokémon that can teleport.

Gardevoir was hit again and showed a slight surprise.

She knew that Umbreon could use this move, but she didn't think Umbreon would make such a gambit.

But she quickly composed herself.

She felt that she had enough cards to win this fight.

Gardevoir immediately started preparing a new move.

Umbreon started running in the direction of Gardevoir as she prepared a new move.

Gardevoir, who started first & finished first, used [Dazzling Gleam], which, just like [Psychic], is almost non-dodgeable.

Umbreon was also finished, but she was still not within the attack reach.

Gardevoir knew that Umbreon was not using [Pursuit]. She pretended to be making a new move. But in reality, she was waiting for the Umbreon to get close enough so that she could use [Teleport] so that she can build a greater distance from Umbreon than if she were to use it now.

When Umbreon was only 35 meters away, Gardevoir immediately used [Teleport] and increased the distance between them once again.

Then she started preparing a new move.

Umbreon, who had prepared the move [Payback], suddenly felt that she had made a mistake.

Alex couldn't help but think that it was a shame that [Pursuit] wasn't on the Expert-rank. Though Alex never planned to train this move on the Expert-rank. At least for the near future.

The move was just too situational and often useless in a real fight.

Umbreon has other moves that are more important to train on the Expert-rank.

Both Gardevoir and Umbreon started preparing their moves.

Gardevoir finished first and used [Dazzling Gleam].

Umbreon was attacked by a beam and was even hit in a vital spot, her head.

She suffered a lot of damage, and her head started to bleed.

But she stayed calm and also used her move [Swift].

Gardevoir tried not to evade, instead used her finished move.

To Umbreon's surprise, Gardevoir did not use an attack move but [Calm Mind].

Umbreon started preparing [Rest] because she couldn't take any more damage and didn't want to take a risk of being hit by such a crit hit again.

She instantly fell asleep as her wounds began to heal at a visible rate.

Gardevoir gave a victorious smile.

She teleported in front of Umbreon and started preparing a move.

Umbreon was also preparing [Sleep Talk] while she was asleep.

To Alex's slight surprise, Umbreon finished first and used [Work Up].

'Wow! She's really unlucky that this very move was used among all the Expert-rank moves.'

Gardevoir finished a bit later and used [Guard Swap]. The user of this move swaps their Def and Sp Def values with the foe.

Guard Swap can only be used within a certain range, and the user has to have at least the same level as the target.

Shortly after, she teleported 80 meters away and was preparing another move.

This time, Umbreon's [Sleep Talk] used [Facade]. But because no Pokémon was in the range, it was cancelled.

Gradevoir then started using [Calm Mind].

After a few moves, Umbreon woke up, but it was too late.

Gardevoir had strengthened herself to the max.

Umbreon tried to defeat the injured Gardevoir with a couple of Swifts.

But Gardevoir took advantage of this and used Draining Kiss as Umbreon couldn't move and gained more HP than she lost due to [Swift].

In addition, Umbreon suffered damage and even lost more than 25% of HP.

Alex, who saw this, said in a low voice, "It's over."

***

[EN]: Me, who finally finished this chapter late at night and can now go to sleep: "It's over."

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