Reiji hadn't sent out Golbat this time because he wanted to sharpen Croagunk instead. He hadn't expected the other guy to bring out a Pokémon meant to counter Golbat, though. That was one bad read.
Still, Croagunk's poison wouldn't do much to Magneton either. Thankfully, Croagunk was dual-type, and its Fighting side hit Magneton hard.
"Damn, guessed wrong." The masked trainer looked sick. He had sent out Magneton hoping to steal an easy win, only for Reiji to switch Pokémon at the last second.
The truth was, Reiji hadn't predicted anything. He had simply wanted Croagunk to fight, and by pure luck, he had countered the other man's counter.
"The battle begins!"
"Whatever. Magneton, Thunder Wave!"
"Croagunk, dodge!"
Croagunk saw the twin yellow arcs streaking toward it and sprang backward, avoiding the Thunder Wave.
"Use Thunder Wave again!" The masked trainer stubbornly doubled down. Since he couldn't get a clean type advantage, he at least wanted to land a status condition first.
Reiji almost laughed. "This guy really is obsessed with Thunder Wave."
"Croagunk, Mud-Slap!"
Croagunk scooped up chunks of mud from the ground and hurled them forward. If they landed, they would not only hit Magneton but also mess with its accuracy.
Mud flew in a rapid burst. Under its trainer's orders, Magneton tried to dodge, but several clumps still smacked into it. That made its Thunder Wave even less likely to land.
In the end, Croagunk got impatient with grabbing mud by hand and simply spat mud straight from its mouth.
"That's Mud Shot?" Reiji blinked. He hadn't expected Croagunk to pick up a new move in the middle of a battle.
"Magneton, Gyro Ball!" The masked trainer had finally had enough of the constant mud harassment and changed tactics.
Magneton spun in place, flinging the mud off its body, then rushed straight at Croagunk.
"Croagunk, Drain Punch. Hit it out of the air!"
That suited Reiji just fine.
Gyro Ball was a Steel-type move whose power rose when the user was slower than the target. Unfortunately for Magneton, its base Speed was 70 while Croagunk's was only 50, so it wasn't getting much out of that effect. Even so, a spinning steel body slamming straight in still wasn't something you took lightly.
Croagunk's Anticipation kicked in. That danger sense let it judge where the attack was coming from.
The instant Magneton spun into range, Croagunk slipped aside, caught it during the turn, and drove a Drain Punch into its body. Magneton was blasted backward and crashed to the floor right in front of its trainer, unconscious.
"I lost."
The masked trainer stared at his fallen Magneton, recalled it, and stepped off the field without another word. He was done for the night. First priority now was getting it treated.
That made it three wins in a row for Reiji.
A stir ran through the crowd.
"He won again. Three straight? Where did this kid even come from?"
"Never seen him before. He's good, though. Three straight wins isn't nothing."
The people who had bet on Reiji were making easy money now, and everyone started talking about where he had come from. The regulars here knew each other by face or reputation, and nobody had heard of him before.
Croagunk wasn't a common Pokémon either. It came from Sinnoh. The only place most of them had seen it mentioned was on the strongest-type challenge board, and even then it was its evolved form, Toxicroak.
Now a Croagunk had suddenly shown up here too, which only made people more interested.
Reiji ignored the noise around him and recalled Croagunk. Another challenger appeared not long after, tossed a hundred thousand Pokédollars to the referee, and the next battle started.
"Go, Exeggutor!"
"Croagunk!"
Reiji sent Croagunk out again. This time, the opponent had brought an Exeggutor.
"An Exeggutor with Psychic-type moves…" Reiji rubbed his chin. The other side clearly wanted to hit Croagunk with a four-times-effective attack, but Exeggutor was also weak to Croagunk's Poison-type offense.
It balanced out well enough. On paper, neither side held a clean edge. They would have to fight it out.
"Exeggutor, Hypnosis!"
"Croagunk, close your eyes!"
That was the cleanest answer Reiji had.
Croagunk shut its eyes at once. If it didn't look into Exeggutor's eyes, the sleep-inducing wave wouldn't catch it.
"Exeggutor, Bullet Seed!" Seeing Croagunk fighting blind, Exeggutor's trainer brightened immediately. To him, Croagunk had just turned into a free target.
Seeds spat from Exeggutor's mouths in a rapid burst, but Croagunk still dodged them by instinct alone. All that evasive sparring from before was paying off now.
It had pushed that danger-sense training to the limit. It could feel the direction of incoming attacks and jump clear of the line of fire before the seeds ever landed.
"What? How is that possible?" Exeggutor's trainer couldn't believe Croagunk was still dodging with its eyes closed.
"Idiot," Reiji muttered under his breath. Then he called out, "Croagunk, open your eyes. It can't use Hypnosis while it's attacking."
Croagunk opened its eyes again, and from that point on Bullet Seed had even less chance of landing. It hadn't trained all that dodging for nothing.
"Croagunk, rush in and use Poison Jab!"
Croagunk wove around the seeds and sprinted toward Exeggutor.
"Don't let it get close!" Exeggutor's trainer knew Reiji's Pokémon all had brutal poison. If Croagunk landed a Poison-type move, this fight was over.
"Exeggutor, Confusion!"
Exeggutor's eyes lit up blue and locked onto the fast-approaching Croagunk, trying to pin it in place with psychic force.
"Croagunk, push through with Protect!"
Reiji didn't have a perfect answer to Confusion, so he chose the simplest one. Force his way through it. He still didn't want to reveal Shadow Ball yet.
At the same time, this made one thing clear: Croagunk needed some Dark-type moves later. It would need them if it wanted a clean answer to psychic pressure.
Croagunk braced itself against the psychic force, kicked off with both legs, and burst straight into Exeggutor's space. Its dark-purple hand flashed, then stabbed into Exeggutor's belly with a Poison Jab, driving the venom in with it.
"That's it. Exeggutor's poisoned." Its trainer grabbed at his hair and looked close to falling apart.
He was right. Exeggutor took super effective damage from the Poison Jab, then got hit with severe poison on top of that. It rolled on the ground in pain.
"Come back, Exeggutor!"
The trainer recalled it at once and hurried off to get it detoxified.
"Damn, that thing really is poisonous…"
"Yeah. The Golbat was like that, and now this Croagunk too…"
"Where did he even get these monsters? Exeggutor only got touched once and it was already poisoned."
After another win, Reiji recalled Croagunk. He could tell his basic pattern had already been exposed. Anyone stepping up from here on would definitely come prepared for it.
That was exactly what he wanted.
If nobody targeted Croagunk properly, he'd never find its limit.
To get it ready for the next fight, he released Croagunk again and tossed it a premium Fighting-type Pokéblock so it could recover some of its stamina.
Croagunk chewed on the Pokéblock and looked around. The crowd seemed to be getting bigger.
Word had already spread about Reiji's two straight wins with Golbat and Croagunk's two straight wins after that. More people were drifting over to watch him now.
Good battles were rare to begin with, and a good battle attached to a win streak drew people even faster. Plenty came to watch. Nobody came up to challenge.
This time he had to wait a full three minutes before another masked trainer finally stepped onto the field and tossed a hundred thousand League coins to the referee.
"Send out your Pokémon!"
"Go, Zangoose!"
"Croagunk!"
Reiji recalled Croagunk for a second, then sent it right back out. This time the opponent had chosen Zangoose, a tall, upright Pokémon shaped almost like a large cat, with two long black claws running down its forearms.
"Zangoose…" Reiji thought it over. If he remembered correctly, that Pokémon had Immunity, which meant it couldn't be poisoned. That made it a pretty solid answer to Croagunk's venom.
Then again, Zangoose was a Normal-type, which meant it was weak to Fighting-type attacks. Reiji wasn't sure whether the opponent had thought that part through.
"Zangoose, Dig!" The masked trainer clearly didn't want a head-on fight. He wanted to circle first and test the waters.
Zangoose burrowed underground, and Croagunk lost sight of it at once. There was no telling where it would surface.
"Croagunk, stay calm. Feel the tremors under your feet."
Reiji's voice steadied it immediately.
Croagunk settled down at once. As long as Reiji was there, it had nothing to fear.
Reiji had given it a home, warmth, friends, and something to hope for. He had never abandoned it. He had changed its life. So Croagunk trusted him completely.
The tremors underfoot grew sharper and closer. Croagunk realized Zangoose was about to break through, and the instant the claws ripped up through the dirt, it kicked off the ground and jumped clear.
Zangoose burst out of the earth—but hit nothing.
With the ambush dodged, it landed back on the field and scraped its claws together while glaring at Croagunk.
"Zangoose, Aerial Ace!"
Zangoose lunged forward at once, slashing repeatedly at Croagunk.
But every swipe missed. Croagunk slipped around them one after another with clean, practiced movements. That long stretch of dodge training was finally showing up in a real fight.
"Croagunk, Bullet Punch!"
Croagunk shot an arm out and hammered Zangoose several times in quick succession, striking even faster than Zangoose itself.
That was the point of Bullet Punch. It was a priority move. In battle, moves weren't decided by Speed alone. Priority came first.
If one side used a move with higher priority, it acted first no matter how fast or slow the Pokémon was. Only when both moves had the same priority did Speed decide who moved first.
Bullet Punch sat one step above ordinary attacks in priority, so naturally it came out faster than Aerial Ace.
Of course, Bullet Punch was still a Steel-type move, not a Fighting-type one, and its power was only a miserable forty.
Reiji hadn't used it for damage. He had used it to break Zangoose's rhythm.
Zangoose had a base Speed of 90. Croagunk only had 50. Croagunk could dodge for a while, but not forever. If that exchange dragged on, sooner or later Zangoose would start landing hits.
"Croagunk, Drain Punch!"
The instant Bullet Punch disrupted Zangoose's offense, Reiji ordered the follow-up. He chose Drain Punch, not Dynamic Punch. For now, he wanted the safer option.
"Damn it!" The masked challenger panicked as soon as he saw Zangoose losing the close-range exchange. He had expected Reiji to rely on poison again. Bullet Punch had thrown his whole plan sideways.
That meant Zangoose's Immunity was useless, while Croagunk still had a Fighting-type move ready to punish it.
Zangoose got knocked to the ground by the Drain Punch. When it scrambled back up, it saw Croagunk curling a finger at it.
Was that a taunt?
Zangoose's eyes flushed red in an instant.
It locked onto Croagunk with naked rage. It hunted poisonous creatures for a living, and now one of them was mocking it to its face.
"There it is." Reiji's eyes sharpened. "It learned Taunt."
Croagunk was still somewhat outclassed by Zangoose. In a straight, calm fight, it probably wouldn't win. But an enraged Zangoose wouldn't listen to its trainer anymore.
"Zangoose, stop! Stop and use Aerial Ace!"
The trainer shouted himself hoarse, but Zangoose ignored every word. It didn't even bother with a move this time. It just charged Croagunk head-on.
"Its head's gone now. Croagunk, block with Protect, then finish it with Dynamic Punch."
Reiji shook his head. This one was over.
Lose your composure in a battle and you've already lost half of it. Lose your rhythm too, and the whole fight collapses.
And right now, Dynamic Punch was exactly the move he wanted.
Croagunk raised Protect and took the claw strike head-on behind the barrier.
Zangoose didn't circle around it. It kept hammering at the shield from the front. Then, just as it started to slow for a breath, Croagunk drove a punch straight into its stomach and blasted it backward.
Dynamic Punch always left the target confused.
Even if Zangoose could still crawl back to its feet, a confused Zangoose wouldn't listen to its trainer anymore. It would only lash out wildly, and there was no way it was beating Croagunk in that state.
A moment later, the masked trainer recalled Zangoose, and the match ended with the challenger's defeat.
Reiji and Croagunk had taken another win.
The crowd broke into another wave of noise.
"Five straight wins. Croagunk's got three on its own now!"
"This trainer's strong. Who's going to stop him?"
People craned their necks and looked around, waiting to see who would take the field for match number six. They also wanted to see just how far this unknown trainer could push the streak.
Right after Reiji recalled Croagunk, another challenger stepped up without a word and tossed a hundred thousand to the referee.
[End of chapter]
[100 Power Stones = Extra Chapter]
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