"Koffing, Sludge Attack~"
"Scyther, Air Slash~"
The muscular man and the cute girl, this duo, were the first to issue commands.
Koffing spewed out dirty purple sludge, carrying a bit of poison within, while Scyther emitted white air blades from its sharp scythes.
The two attacks flew towards Piplup and Staravia respectively.
"Staravia, Steel Wing!"
Facing the incoming blades, Ash's side opted for a head-on approach.
Staravia's wings glowed white as it actively charged towards the five or six incoming Air Slashs, directly crushing the blades with its Steel Wings.
Piplup, however, couldn't do the same, but it spun in place, emitting sparkling Bubble Beam from its mouth.
It formed a spherical protective shield with Piplup as the center and a one-meter radius, successfully defending itself using Bubble Beam.
"What the heck?" The muscular man on the opposite side was full of question marks.
"Ash, this move is really useful!"
Dawn ignored his question and instead praised Ash, because this move was modified by Ash and taught to her Pokémon last night.
"Of course!" Ash replied with a smile.
The move Piplup was currently using was, naturally, the Counter Shield (Counter Shield) from the original work.
To help Dawn adjust her condition yesterday, they even conducted a guided training session in the evening.
This included teaching three Pokémon, excluding Audino, to learn Counter Shield.
The main consideration was their relatively weak strength; to cope with today's battle, they learned some new techniques to increase their combat ability.
"Hmph, Thunderbolt!"
Seeing this, the muscular man immediately changed his command, having Koffing unleash an electric-type Thunderbolt.
Electric-type is super effective against Water-type; it would surely break through the current situation.
"Not a chance, Staravia, Aerial Ace!"
"Staravia~"
Staravia, who was locked in a fierce battle with Scyther, immediately changed direction, charging towards Koffing with extreme speed and knocking it flying before it could even use Thunderbolt.
"What!" Such speed was truly beyond the muscular man's expectation.
"Good opportunity, Brave Bird!" Seeing this, Ash immediately shouted towards Staravia.
Having gained an advantage, golden tail flames immediately erupted from Staravia's rear, as it pursued Koffing in the direction it was knocked flying, pressing its advantage.
"Oh no, Scyther, X-Scissor to stop Staravia!"
Everything changed too suddenly; the cute girl only came to her senses after a while.
"Piplup, rush over and use Peck!" Dawn tacitly switched opponents with Ash, sending Piplup to face Scyther.
"Piplup~"
Piplup spun its body as it charged towards Scyther, piercing the opponent's body with its hard beak.
At the same time, because it was a Flying-type move, this move was double effective against Bug-type Scyther, severely injuring Scyther in one hit.
"Bubble Beam!"
Seeing that the opponent had not yet fallen, Dawn immediately followed up with a Bubble Beam to finish it off, defeating Scyther and securing the victory.
And Staravia's Brave Bird also directly hit Koffing; after taking the powerful move, it immediately collapsed, unconscious.
"Scyther and Koffing are unable to battle! Piplup and Staravia are the winners! Therefore, the victors are contestants Dawn and Ash!"
The referee surveyed the situation and immediately announced the outcome of the match.
"Yay!"
Dawn first bent down to pat Piplup, praising it, and then extended her hand to Ash, who was beside her praising Staravia.
The two exchanged smiles and high-fived skillfully as a sign of encouragement.
After the match, the two returned to the contestant lounge to watch the battles of other contestants.
Among them, Brock and his older sister-like partner, Sumire, had to be discussed.
Although this older sister was very beautiful, her Pokémon, Wingull, was genuinely average in strength.
Fortunately, Brock, with his excellent command, directed Sudowoodo to output damage to the enemy while also taking on the heavy responsibility of tanking damage and providing support.
This truly exhausted Sudowoodo, but it successfully cooperated with Wingull to secure victory.
This also made Sumire look at Brock in a new light, which truly surprised her.
She hadn't expected the slightly younger, perverted-looking young man to be so strong.
And Brock also behaved quite modestly, with no unusual expression on his face.
This was mainly because Sumire had already stated that she didn't like younger boys, and as a sensible person, Brock would never pester anyone.
So, he behaved quite properly throughout the entire process.
As outsiders, Dawn and Ash couldn't help but feel surprised, and even exclaimed that Brock had changed his ways.
However, they didn't dwell on it much, instead focusing their attention on the upcoming combination of Paul and Conway.
Paul and Conway sent out Chimchar and Slowking respectively, while their opponents were Rhydon and Magmortar!
It seemed like a rather difficult battle.
But in fact, it was not; Chimchar's performance here couldn't be described as too spectacular.
After all, Chimchar was the only one on the field in its initial form; besides using Magmortar's Lava Plume to increase the damage of its Flamethrower for output, it posed no significant threat.
Instead, it was hit by Rhydon, who could use Surf; if it hadn't been hit by Hydro Pump repeatedly before, Chimchar would have almost lost its ability to battle.
Fortunately, Conway's Slowking was quite excellent; with a single Blizzard, it directly knocked out Rhydon when it used Surf to hit Chimchar.
The rest was a two-on-one battle with the low-HP Chimchar, using Hydro Pump in conjunction with Chimchar's Dig to defeat Magmortar.
Finally, they successfully advanced to the next match.
"Squeak, squeak~"
After defeating its opponent through countless hardships, Chimchar couldn't help but raise its hands, excitedly shouting and cheering despite its exhausted body.
"Hmph, useless thing, and you can still be happy about this!"
The cold voice entered Chimchar's ears, like cold water splashed on its head, immediately stopping its inner excitement.
"Hmm, Mr. Paul, actually, you don't need to provoke Chimchar like this!" Conway adjusted his glasses, calmly advising Chimchar.
"I agree with your ideas and tactics, but this guy is very special; I have special expectations for him!"
To Conway, Paul unexpectedly did not speak bluntly with cold words.
But he only relatively subtly hinted to the other party to not meddle, and then he put Chimchar away and left on his own.
"Hmph, it seems that this guy didn't listen to Ms. Cynthia's words at all!" Witnessing this scene, Dawn said indignantly.
"..."
Ash, on the other hand, was calmly thinking, and immediately realized that the time for Paul to release Chimchar was fast approaching.
Just a little longer, and he would be able to get this infinitely potential Chimchar.