After sending away another dejected "genius youth," Aiden let out a breath, raised both hands, and stretched.
It had been a while since he experienced such high-intensity consecutive battles—it was a test of his stamina too.
However, fortunately, the opponents he had encountered so far didn't require much thought from him. Even playing casually, he could still defeat them.
Counting from Okamoto at the beginning, he had already accepted challenges from nearly 10 newcomers.
Despite their obvious progress and becoming more cautious by avoiding the pitfalls their predecessors had already fallen into, they were still slightly lacking.
With just a slight effort on his part, he let these children who had yet to experience the harshness of society taste the cruel side of "Pokémon battles."
"However, being unable to see through such simple tactics—they really are too young after all—"
Recalling the youth he had intentionally gone easy on, allowing him to complete his setup, only to have his spirit completely shattered by Sylveon's single Roar, Aiden couldn't help but shake his head.
Knock knock knock
The door was knocked, interrupting Aiden's thoughts.
Just as he was about to respond, the door was already violently pushed open by the student outside. Then, a wheat-skinned girl wearing casual sportswear with a high ponytail showcasing youthful vitality appeared before his eyes.
"Teacher Aiden, I'm here to challenge you again!!!"
After pushing open the door, Nemona walked straight toward Aiden.
Completely different from the expressions of other students who came to challenge him, there was no nervousness or anxiety in her eyes—only the desire to battle Aiden once more.
Seeing that the student challenging him this time was actually Nemona, Aiden couldn't help but reveal a smile.
"You've finally come, Nemona."
"Ever since you got the Sunshine Gym badge, you've been preparing for today's battle, haven't you?"
"Yes! These past few months, I've been using Teacher Aiden as my imaginary enemy and specially prepared quite a few finishing moves. Teacher Aiden, don't let your guard down~"
Nemona, as always, displayed her incomparably confident side, hands on hips and chest puffed out as she responded.
"After all, if I can't defeat Teacher Azure, I won't be able to become this year's Champion!"
"Excellent! Full of spirit!"
Aiden nodded, expressing approval of Nemona's mindset.
"Well then, let's skip the interview for now and get straight to the main event."
After speaking, he had already walked to one side of the battlefield and gestured toward Nemona with a welcoming motion.
"If it's you, perhaps you really could become the first Trainer to earn my recognition today~"
"I'll do my best!"
Nemona nodded very solemnly, then revealed a Friend Ball she was holding, standing in place waiting for Aiden to speak.
Obviously, she planned to observe Aiden's lead choice first.
Aiden also saw through her thoughts but didn't pay too much attention to it. After brief consideration, he simply took out a Poké Ball from his pocket.
The difficulty of the Elite Four consecutive battles was already high enough, so having them as the Elite Four send out their Pokémon first and giving challengers some thinking time was an unwritten rule.
"I choose you, Sylveon!"
This time, Aiden chose to lead with Sylveon, planning to first probe Nemona's tactical reserves before further adjusting his own approach.
"Sylveon, huh—"
Nemona murmured, resting her chin on her hand in thought.
Of this initial Pokémon of Teacher Aiden's, she of course knew it very well.
Because it had learned Sketch—a move theoretically only Smeargle could learn—its move pool was bottomless, making it impossible to predict what tactics it would use next.
So, she could only adapt to circumstances during the battle.
For ordinary rookie Trainers, achieving this was indeed difficult. After all, battle reactions ultimately required a "high-end product" built up through extensive battle experience.
But for Nemona—it wasn't much of a problem at all.
Her battle instincts were extremely sharp, and her instinct-driven fighting style was itself built upon excellent reaction ability.
So, she immediately determined her lead Pokémon.
"My choice is—"
"I choose you, my ace specially made for Teacher Aiden~"
"Gholdengo!!!"
The Poké Ball clattered to the ground with a crisp sound, followed by a flash of red light.
After the light faded, a metallic creature composed entirely of golden coins, with a confident smile on its face, appeared before them.
"As expected, it's Gholdengo—"
Aiden nodded inwardly.
As early as three months ago, he already knew that Nemona possessed a Gimmighoul.
Evolving from Gimmighoul into the powerful Pokédex #1000 Pokémon Gholdengo normally required a large amount of time, traveling across Paldea to collect Gimmighoul Coins.
Only after collecting exactly 1000 coins could Gimmighoul use them to construct a sufficiently perfect body, thereby possessing this golden form and completing its transformation.
Aiden carefully observed Nemona's Gholdengo for quite a while, suddenly sighing in his heart—the only problem with good things is that they're expensive.
The value of these ancient gold coins was definitely not low, and the quantity was quite limited, making it difficult to obtain enough coins through normal channels for Gimmighoul to evolve.
Only by engaging in "shadow duels" with other Gimmighoul and slowly accumulating them would work.
But for young lady Nemona, this trash time that could be saved with money wasn't even worth being called a problem—
Relying on the "true tycoon," aka her CEO father, Nemona had indeed managed to gather 1000 coins before the Victory Road as she wished, establishing a certain bond with this Gholdengo.
And Gholdengo's signature move Make It Rain posed quite a threat to Sylveon as well.
It was indeed an excellent counter pick.
Aiden nodded, forming a general assessment of Nemona's thinking.
"Gholdengo, Nasty Plot!"
Compared to Aiden's thinking, Nemona's next move was much more straightforward.
Without the slightest hesitation, she immediately commanded Gholdengo to set up on the spot, completely ignoring whatever Aiden might do.
The reason was very simple—
Gholdengo's ability was the noble Good as Gold, which allowed it to ignore the effects of most status moves targeting itself. Unlike that poor Trainer from before, it wouldn't be toyed with by Aiden.
Whether Taunt or Roar, they were meaningless to Gholdengo and could be directly ignored.
And Sylveon's proud Fairy-type moves were merely tickling it.
It could completely ignore the opponent and do its own thing—Nasty Plot into Nasty Plot into Make It Rain to sweep the team, with HP loss quickly recovered through Recover.
This was Gholdengo's power.
It had stats when it needed stats, and mechanics when it needed mechanics.
Watching Nemona's Gholdengo tilt its head, with black energy condensing into a question mark above it, Aiden lowered his head and began thinking—so, did his Sylveon have any good way to deal with it?
Without thinking for too long, he already had the answer in his heart.
"Sylveon, use Light Screen to reduce the opponent's move damage as much as possible."
"Syl~"
Sylveon waved its four feelers, quickly spreading energy across the field before it, forming a transparent barrier covering its front.
From Nemona's perspective, since Aiden didn't plan to switch out Sylveon and send out another Pokémon to deal with it, it looked like he was preparing to fight a war of attrition with Gholdengo.
After all, Sylveon could also use Shadow Ball. Although the power might be slightly weaker, with Light Screen's protection, it might not be without a chance.
That's probably what Teacher Aiden was thinking, right?
Nemona basically confirmed her thoughts, but wasn't in a hurry—
Because Gholdengo's speed was much faster than Sylveon's, the battle initiative would always be on her side.
If Teacher Aiden planned to go easy on her like he did with the other students—
Gholdengo was the best choice to break through his defenses!
"Gholdengo, use Nasty Plot again!"
Nemona admitted she might indeed be a bit greedy, but against Teacher Aiden, overly conventional choices would definitely cause problems.
After multiple battles with Aiden, this intuitively sharp young lady had already detected the best way to defeat him: not playing by the rules!
Gholdengo's finishing move Make It Rain consumed a portion of energy with each use, causing subsequent moves to decrease in power, so setting up twice was more reliable.
At the very least, it could unleash more high-power finishing moves and strive to cause more KOs.
However—
What she didn't know was that from Aiden's perspective, her choice was actually a bit too conventional.
With Light Screen reducing move damage, Sylveon's safety was temporarily guaranteed, and Aiden wasn't in a hurry to make a move against Gholdengo.
Instead, Nemona's consecutive Nasty Plots made Aiden reveal a smile of a successful scheme.
"Being greedy with setup isn't a good habit~"
Although being greedy with setup when playing Gholdengo was indeed human nature—
Aiden kept the latter half in his heart, his eyes sharpening before he decisively gave the command: "Sylveon, use Psych Up!"
That's right—everything was within Aiden's plan.
Good as Gold was indeed a perfect ability, capable of blocking all status moves targeting itself and allowing Gholdengo to guard against almost all tricky moves. Even Perish Song could be completely ignored.
In a sense, this Pokémon was indeed a hard counter to the vast majority of tactical setups he had prepared this time.
But what would happen if the move's target wasn't Gholdengo?
The answer was naturally—
"Syl~"
Sylveon's focus locked onto its opponent, immediately noticing the two conspicuous black question marks on Gholdengo's forehead.
The Psych Up move needed to select a Pokémon, but merely as an observation target.
The actual use of this move was to apply psychological suggestion to the user itself, thereby synchronizing with the observed target's stat changes.
In other words, the one actually affected wasn't Gholdengo, but Sylveon herself!
When two black question marks also appeared above Sylveon's head and its aura changed somewhat, Nemona finally reacted, her eyes widening.
"So there was this kind of countermeasure?"
This move was a conventional solution for Aiden, but it was Nemona's first time seeing it, so she found it quite novel.
After using Light Screen to weaken Gholdengo's move damage, it was equivalent to canceling out Gholdengo's type advantage over Sylveon. Combined with the inherited setup effects after Psych Up—
Both sides were now on equal footing.
No, if we were talking about defensive capabilities, Sylveon was clearly superior, and the opponent's Shadow Ball would also genuinely deal super effective damage to Gholdengo.
The situation had actually turned against her.
"Amazing, Teacher Aiden!"
Nemona expressed her admiration from the heart, but the smile on her face remained confident.
"However, the real match has only just begun, right!"
As she spoke, she had already taken out a Tera Orb from her pocket and extended two fingers toward Aiden.
"To defeat Teacher Aiden, I've made lots of preparations, you know~"
"Now, show the power of Terastallization, Gholdengo!"
Aiden raised an eyebrow but didn't speak, quietly waiting for her to throw the Tera Orb with full force.
If it was just about dealing with Gholdengo, he of course still had follow-up plans.
For example, also using Terastallization to avoid Sylveon's weaknesses, or simply using Baton Pass to switch out Sylveon and send out another Pokémon.
If he wanted to be slightly more unconventional, from the very beginning he could have temporarily borrowed Marshadow's power and used its signature move "Spectral Thief" to completely solve Gholdengo's setup problem.
Or even Sylveon's exclusive Z-Move could easily take care of Gholdengo.
But obviously, any of these methods would have exceeded the scope of this test itself—overkill for a Victory Road assessment with difficulty calibrated to Elite Four level.
So, Aiden chose to welcome Nemona's growth with a smile.
Perhaps from the moment the battle began, when she first sent out Gholdengo, she had already roughly predicted his thoughts.
Nemona knew that he understood her thoughts, so she had prepared everything in advance.
Therefore, her Gholdengo would definitely be—
Tera Steel!
Just as Aiden thought, the Tera Orb Nemona threw suddenly burst open, with silver-white powder scattering across the ground and immediately attaching to Gholdengo, forming a transparent Tera armor.
"Gholdengo, use Make It Rain!!!"
Nemona's commanding voice at this moment was very imposing, seemingly already convinced of her victory.
After temporarily changing its type to pure Steel, the threat Sylveon's Shadow Ball could pose to it instantly vanished. Moreover, Gholdengo's speed was also above Sylveon's, so even trading blows wouldn't yield any benefits.
More crucially—Terastallization further strengthened the power of the same-type move Make It Rain.
For Sylveon, this was absolutely a terrifying finishing move.
"Syl—"
Facing the wave of gold coins summoned by Gholdengo, rolling toward her, Sylveon instinctively let out a pathetic cry of despair.
This move—so scary!
Just as Sylveon was preparing to grit her teeth and tank the move before looking for an opportunity to counterattack, a red light suddenly flashed, recalling her into the Poké Ball.
At the same time, applause from Aiden soon rang out across the field.
"Nemona, well done."
Without excessive words, Aiden's single sentence made the smile reappear on Nemona's face.
Yay!
She had finally earned Teacher Aiden's recognition!
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