Chapter 88: First Blood

Shanren's command was likewise 【Psychic】.

This special move targeting the opponent's physical defense was perfectly suited for dealing with Chansey, whose physical defense was pathetically weak—as long as the latter stayed on the field, spamming it without thinking posed no problem at all.

Alcremie's folded ears flipped upward, and blue light waves instantly condensed within them into countless orbs of psychic energy.

Just as Chansey once again attempted to channel its psychic power, it viciously released these psychic orbs, causing the two moves to collide once more.

Dust drifted, then quickly dispersed.

"Both competitors have once again traded blows in the invisible realm! A battle you can't see really gets the heart pounding!"

The host's impassioned voice echoed through the broadcast.

Baimu frowned, confirming that Alcremie really hadn't been holding back—the latter's ears were special organs that explosively released psychic power, and once opened, there was no possibility of pulling punches.

This proved that Chansey's and Alcremie's psychic power levels were actually about the same, and the latter might even be a bit weaker, since it was using an offensive move.

—Alcremie's level isn't high.

He could only think of this one possibility, and couldn't help feeling a bit frustrated.

The strength of the Pokémon Shanren had previously revealed far exceeded this level, so why had he chosen such a low-level Pokémon to battle him?

Did the high-level ones stop listening?

Or… did he not need those powerful Pokémon, and Alcremie alone could handle him and Mawile and the rest?

No matter which thought Shanren harbored.

Baimu regretted that he hadn't been able to force the other to use his full strength. This kind of evenly matched bout did show the possibility of winning, but it wasn't what he wanted.

As a trainer, allowing the opponent to feel they could take him down without going all out was also his own dereliction of duty.

Then.

In that case, he'd use real strength to force Shanren to bring out his full power!

Baimu pulled out a Poké Ball and swapped Chansey off the field, and while the smoke hadn't fully dispersed, he quickly sent out Roggenrola.

"Sand Tomb!"

"Rog!"

Roggenrola let out a muffled roar, as if it understood the trainer's pent-up frustration, and surging tides of yellow quicksand poured from the dense black hollows across its body, its scale and volume completely exceeding Roggenrola's own size.

And this forward-sweeping sandstorm soon collided with the rainbow-colored light waves released by Alcremie.

Seeing his opponent swap, Shanren naturally wouldn't stupidly pretend he hadn't noticed, so the instant Roggenrola landed, he took the initiative to attack.

But Roggenrola's opening speed was also very fast, causing 【Psybeam】 to fail to land on Roggenrola before it crashed into the Sand Tomb it had released.

Boom!

The rainbow-colored light waves blasted apart a portion of the quicksand, but failed to punch through it completely, and instead got swallowed up. The fundamental reason was that Roggenrola behind it was still endlessly spewing yellow sand, replenishing the parts lost by the Sand Tomb.

*First Evolution*

Hmmm—

The dust roared and spun, its scale instantly becoming enormous. Alcremie, affected by the wind, was sucked into the catastrophic Sand Tomb.

Shanren crossed his arms in front of his face and quickly retreated several steps to avoid being caught in the Sand Tomb's reach.

And inside the Sand Tomb.

The fine quicksand, blown by the fierce wind, tore at Alcremie's body like blades, and the latter couldn't help but show a pained expression.

At this moment.

A pale pink barrier suddenly appeared, spinning around Alcremie. The ferocious quicksand passed through the barrier, but its speed and power were both reduced.

Using the breather the Reflect gave it, Alcremie's ears perked up, blue light flashed in its eyes, and it swiftly flew out of the sandstorm, successfully escaping the Sand Tomb.

But the instant it poked its head out above, a black shadow pounced through the air!

"Myaowr!"

Alcremie gave a start and immediately unfolded its ears, releasing a powerful psychic shockwave.

Yet at the very moment it acted, a command from its trainer came sharply from behind, vastly different from its own decision.

"Stop!"

The arrow was already on the string and had to fly—the fired psychic shockwave naturally couldn't be recalled.

But what it hadn't expected was that the black shadow moved even faster than it!

A streak of dark red light suddenly materialized before it into a vicious great maw that lunged forward. The psychic shockwave, already detached, collided with it, but was quickly torn open by the dark red light into a wide gap. The enormous mouth passed through this gap and bit savagely into it!

Boom!

A muffled explosion.

The pink spatial barrier shattered—whether it had reached its limit or been crunched apart by Mawile was unclear.

Alcremie was blasted back into the Sand Tomb, spinning back and forth like clothes in a tumble dryer, then was violently flung out, tumbling twice across the ground before revealing a pair of swirly eyes.

Beeee—

A piercing alarm and the audience's uproar rang out together.

"Alcremie is unable to battle! The first Pokémon unable to battle has appeared! Surprisingly, the gap has opened on Shanren's side first!"

The host's voice was not without surprise. Watching Mawile return to Baimu's side, he couldn't help passing the commentary to the guest beside him. "Why do you think Alcremie was taken down so cleanly? Mr. Fuyama!"

The guest named Fuyama smiled. "It's simple. First, we have to admit Trainer Baimu is very clever. After discovering Chansey couldn't produce results, he swapped it off the field right away and chose Roggenrola to use Sand Tomb to bind Alcremie.

"But in reality, the true target of the Sand Tomb wasn't Alcremie—it was Trainer Shanren."

"Ah! I see!"

"Exactly. The Sand Tomb Roggenrola released without regard for cost was extraordinarily massive, and Trainer Shanren's initial position couldn't effectively keep him safe from the grit, so he had to retreat to a safe environment first."

Fuyama paused. "And during that time, Trainer Baimu swapped again, replacing Roggenrola with Mawile, who used Magnet Rise to wait for Alcremie escaping the Sand Tomb, and ultimately used a high-speed ambush to break through Alcremie's psychic shockwave and score the win."

Using moves to affect the trainer might be considered underhanded in other regions, but the Orei region didn't care about that—as long as it wasn't a deliberate attack on the trainer, being affected was your own problem.

Therefore, neither the host nor the audience saw any problem with Baimu's tactics.

—Shanren himself thought so too.

"This guy really is no ordinary one."

He had originally wanted to use a Pokémon of roughly equal level to have a battle, to prove that his own tactical skill was no worse than the opponent's, but he never expected that his own overconfidence had instead let the opponent draw first blood.

No wonder his father said that the opponent possessed an extraordinarily powerful ability to train Pokémon.

While recalling his Espeon, Shanren decided on the tactic he would carry out next.

A Luxury Ball flew out.

Pop!

"Yadon!"

The simple and honest pink hippopotamus swung the tail that was being bitten by the enormous Tian Luo, revealing a harmless, innocent smile.

The hermit-crab Pokémon, Water and Psychic type, Slowbro!

Sharp rocks materialized one after another in the air, but Slowbro acted as if it hadn't seen them at all, letting them explode violently within the shroud of Bai Guang, and likewise ignoring the flying rock debris that was just as destructive.

And when the white smoke cleared.

Slowbro's nearly undamaged appearance was revealed.

Its face still wore that same dumb, blank smile.