On the senior's side, most of them wore a grim expression after seeing the outcome of the first match.
"Why didn't you tell us about this, Mualani?"
Kala complained, his voice accusatory as he glared at said white-blue haired girl.
"Hey! Don't put the blame on me! I also had no idea. I already said he got Mawile yesterday. And before that, the first time I met her was just before the Ranking Battle."
"Huh? He hasn't got Mawile for a month and they can already Mega Evolve?"
Isa scrunched her eyebrows in disbelief. To undergo Mega Evolution, in addition to the Mega Stone and Key Stone, another crucial requirement was a deep bond between the Trainer and the Pokemon.
This was the very reason Hunter J, despite having the Key Stone and Salamencite, couldn't let Salamence undergo Mega Evolution. She was too callous.
"Well, from what I've seen, Mawile is always super clingy to Dan. Maybe the two of them just hit it off?"
Mualani guessed, a hand resting under her chin.
"Although it's indeed puzzling how Mawile can Mega Evolve, that is not our primary concern right now. Winning is."
Roman interjected, stopping the group from further delving into this topic.
"Ah, right! What should we do? Do we change our lineup?"
Liuai asked.
"If Talong is able to set up the field, we'll switch Celiz and have Isa go next. Otherwise, I'll be the one to appear."
"Me? Alright!"
Isa's ears perked. With an excited grin, she continued watching the battle.
…
On the field, Talong took back Bewear, and under Coach Jomar's signal, released his second Pokemon.
With the flash of red light from the Pokeball, a dark, purple-white, bipedal Pokemon appeared. He had a white face, round head and pear-shaped body, as well as an upward-turned spiral horns. He also had white hands and feet with three digits on each of them.
When he landed on the field, Psychic energy surged out and seeped into the floor. Then, the flow of energy inside the arena began to get disturbed.
"A male Indeedee…"
Dante murmured as he stared at his opponent's Pokemon. He glanced at the battlefield that was surging with Psychic energy.
Indeedee is a Normal and Psychic type Pokemon. Unlike most Psychic types, they are one of the few who crave human interaction. This is because these Pokemon derive energy from feelings of gratitude, willingly serving other humans and Pokemon.
However, while Indeedee is friendly to humans, most of their kind dislike conflict. Therefore, it is rare to see a Traine get an Indeedee for a Pokemon battle. Any who managed to do so is considered extremely lucky.
After all, except for the Legendary Pokemon Tapu Lele, Indeedee is the only other Pokemon who possessed Psychic Surge- an Ability that allows the user to easily summon a Psychic Terrain.
In the Psychic Terrain, the field is flooded with Psychic energy. This causes Psychic-type moves to be boosted in strength. At the same time, moves that require sophisticated Psychic energy manipulation will be harder to use.
The most prominent example of these are priority moves. Priority moves work by accelerating the user's mental process through Psychic energy, allowing them to move much faster than they normally could.
However, under Psychic Terrain, these moves lose their effectiveness. Only those priority moves that target the user can still work. However, if a Pokemon fully mastered the priority move, they may still use it under the terrain's effect.
"Mawile, use Crunch!"
"Indeedee, Trick Room."
The 2nd round begins.
At the start, a silver field expanded from Indeedee's body. Its range quickly spread, reaching the rushing Mawile. When Dante saw this, he finally understood his opponent's plan.
When the field enveloped her body, Mawile tensed in preparation. But when it passed through her, and even until she arrived in front of Indeedee, she felt nothing unusual. In fact, she even felt as if her whole body had grown lighter.
She shrugged, thinking the opponent had failed. Then, her two jaws covered in Dark-type energy chomped down on the Indeedee who still had his eyes closed. He was knocked out instantly.
"Indeedee is unable to battle! Talong has no more Pokemon. Main team, send out your next challenger!"
"Mawile!" (Heh, I could do this all day!)
Mawile harrumphed, returning to Dante for another round of praise. But this time, instead of a compliment, Dante flicked her forehead.
"Don't get complacent. They sacrificed Indeedee on purpose, to set up the Trick Room against you."
"Maw?" (Trick Room?)
"Yes. You didn't notice its effect because you're slower than Indeedee. But your next opponent…"
"Alright, I'm up!"
Isa walked towards the arena with a ferocious grin on her face. She patted Talong's shoulder, signalling him to get off.
"What? No 'thanks' or anything?"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever. You did good. Now shoo! You're wasting time!"
The corner of Talong's mouth twitched. He debated arguing for a couple of seconds, before deciding this immature brat is not worth it and just walked off.
"Haha! Get ready to be crushed! Go, Torkoal!"
With Torkoal's appearance, the temperature around the field rose. Above the turtle Pokemon's shell, a yellow light made of concentrated Fire-type energy was released and floated high in the air.
Sunny Day was activated.
When he saw who the opponent sent out, Dante nodded to himself.
Trick Room is a Psychic type move that swaps the perception in speed between the two Pokemon on the field. The reason Mawile wasn't affected, and even had a boost in speed, is because she was slower than Indeedee.
But now, it's different. Torkoal, with a racial speed limit of 20, is much slower than Mawile. He's also a Fire-type, which has an advantage against the Fairy/Steel type Mawile.
However, Dante smirked. If they thought they could defeat her just by using this strategy, they clearly underestimated him and Mawile.
"Mawile, form a barricade with Rock Tomb."
"Use Eruption, Torkoal!"
Torkoal's body turned red. On the holes above his shell, lava gushed out, flying high overhead and heading at Mawile's general direction.
Eruption is a Fire-type move with the base power depending on the user's HP. With Torkoal being at full health, the move's current base power is 150. Coupled with using it under harsh sunlight, the power of this attack is enough to knock out Mawile in one hit.
Mawile hid herself behind a wall of large boulders under Dante's command. Although a few of them cracked and dissipated into Rock-type energy by Torkoal's attack, some still remained and blocked the flames before it could reach her.
"Now! Punch those rocks towards Torkoal!"
"It's useless! Continue with the Eruption, Torkoal!"
With her Huge Power Ability, Mawile's punch sent the stones flying towards Torkoal like a cannonball. However, her attack also caused the stones to become more fragile, easily disintegrating when Torkoal's Eruption hit it.
The battle turned into a brief stalemate. When the stones on Mawile's side ran out, she would use Rock Tomb again and block a wave of Torkoal's attack. Then, she would punch the remaining stones; thus starting a new cycle.
…
"So, Dante chose to delay the time until the Trick Room expires. Not the ideal scenario, but acceptable nonetheless."
Roman pushed up his glasses and softly murmured. The best outcome would have been for Mawile to rush forward. Then, with his advantage in speed, Torkoal would launch a powerful blow before the cream-colored Pokemon could reach him.
However, the current scenario is also good. Although Mega Mawile is powerful, she can't permanently keep her form. Mawile will return to her base state when Dante finally runs out of energy. And at that point, she won't be much of a threat.
Roman was deep in thought when Mualani's voice pulled him back.
"Hey, is it just me? Or is Mawile's attack getting faster and faster?"
"Hmm? Is the Trick Room about to expire?"
"Impossible! We've trained very hard for that move. It should last 2 more minutes!"
Even though he said so, Talong himself grew doubtful when he saw that the speed at which the stones flew was indeed getting noticeably faster.
"Ah! It's similar to what happened in my fight against Azumarill! She's using Power-up Punch when punching the stones!"
On the battlefield, Dante smirked.
"Hey, thanks for giving us enough time."
"Huh?"
Isa scrunched her eyebrows in confusion. Unlike the others outside the field, she hadn't yet noticed the strangeness going on.
"Mawile, use Rock Slide."
After blocking another wave of Eruption from Torkoal, Dante didn't let Mawile punch the stone again. Instead, she summoned large rocks in the sky, falling down like meteors and…landing right behind Mawile.
"Pfft! What was that aim?! You tryin' to hit yourself?"
Isa laughed.
In contrast, Dante had a calm smile as he answered.
"No. These are ammunition."
Mawile's two jaws took a piece of rock each, and before Isa could squeak out another sentence, one of the jaws blurred, sending out a piece of rock at near-invisible speed.
Torkoal wasn't even able to react before the stone struck him. His body flipped over in the air several times, before landing with his belly face-up.
"...Torkoal is unable to battle! Trainer Isa, release your next Pokemon."
A/N: I had a hard time thinking how the Psychic Terrain functions in the real world. In the game, it just says, 'the battlefield became weird' and suddenly, priority moves can't be used anymore. Like, how? I tried explaining it the best I could. Hopefully, it makes sense.