The one-hit knockout really would make this battle go down in history.
But Zeke would be remembered as the fool who lost. He'd never live it down.
The thought made him feel sick.
Up on the viewing platform, Lance shook his head.
"Zeke was too careless. No matter how unlikely a Grass-type Hidden Power was, it was still possible."
His stern gaze swept over the battlefield.
He knew exactly what Zeke had been thinking. "If he'd had Gastrodon use Curse or Amnesia first, Caster would be the one in trouble now."
Lorelei smiled without saying anything.
If Zeke had that kind of talent, he wouldn't have spent 12 years traveling without making a name for himself.
At his command position, Caster was grinning from ear to ear.
"Thanks, Gastrodon!"
He glanced at the Gastrodon Zeke had recalled and pressed his palms together. "We couldn't have won without your Hidden Power. Really, you didn't lose to me. You lost to yourself. Go get some rest!"
Gastrodon had supplied the very thing that beat it!
Zeke grew agitated. He'd expected so much of Gastrodon, and it had lost the opening bout.
To turn things around, he sent out his ace without hesitation. "Let's battle, Metagross!"
"Metagross!"
It was a huge, blue-green steel creature, with a discus-shaped body and four thick legs extending from its sides.
A silver metal X crossed its face, with a red eye at each of the X's lower corners. A large, tooth-filled mouth opened on its underside.
"Metagross!"
Caster narrowed his eyes in concern.
Metagross was a pseudo-legendary Pokémon from Hoenn, with tremendous psychic power, data-processing abilities, and physical strength. It was a formidable opponent.
It probably had Clear Body, too, which prevented its stats from being lowered.
That meant weakening it wouldn't work.
Its Steel typing let it resist plenty of attacks, making it even harder to deal with.
"Metagross!"
Metagross didn't have Levitate, but it could fly using its psychic power.
That effectively eliminated its weakness to Ground-type attacks, too.
The floating steel fortress looked hard to beat, but Caster decided to try an attack. "Dragonair, Supersonic!"
Fight Metagross up close? No, better not!
"Draair!"
Dragonair opened its mouth in midair and released harsh sound waves to confuse Metagross.
"Metagross, Psychic Noise!"
An eerie light shone over Metagross's body. Psychic-type energy surged around it and formed sound waves. They were invisible, but Dragonair felt them strike its mind.
A moment later, Dragonair's face twisted in pain. Its Supersonic cut off, and it swayed before dropping out of the air.
"Dragonair!"
Caster's shout brought Dragonair back to its senses. It tried to steady itself and return to the fight.
Just then, an invisible gravitational field pulled it down. It felt as though a huge weight had been strapped to its body.
Dragonair tried to rise, but it couldn't stop falling.
"Metagross!"
Metagross shot upward like a rocket and pounded the falling Dragonair with its four thick metal claws.
Meteor Mash, a Steel-type move!
Every punch carried enough force to shatter rock.
Blow after blow hammered into Dragonair, driving it back into the sky against the pull of gravity.
After more than a dozen punches, Dragonair plunged headfirst to the ground.
"Dragonair is unable to battle!"
The referee hurried to announce the result. "Caster, please send out your next Pokémon!"
"Dragonair lost that easily?"
"How can a Pokémon as terrifying as Metagross even exist?!"
"Seriously! How do you beat a steel monster like that?"
"Is Caster going to lose?"
The mood in Caster's livestream sank.
They'd never seen one of his Pokémon go down so quickly.
"Thank you, Dragonair. Get some rest now!"
After recalling Dragonair, Caster gave the Metagross hovering triumphantly overhead a cold look. "Go, Slowking!"
This Metagross was powerful. Pikachu and Mudkip were no match for it.
Only Slowking and Gyarados could stand up to it.
But Gyarados was his real trump card, and Caster didn't want to reveal it yet.
"Slowking!"
Red light flashed. The round-bellied Slowking appeared with its hands behind its back, looking every bit the leader.
A field of pink energy spread across the entire battlefield.
Psychic Terrain was in place!
When Slowking saw Metagross, its friendly smile vanished.
"Metagross!"
"Slowking!"
The battle continued.
Without waiting for orders, the two Pokémon began a contest of psychic power from opposite sides of the field.
Slowking had never feared anyone in a contest like this.
It looked completely at ease.
Across from it, Metagross's smug expression gradually grew serious.
"Shellder, set up Toxic Spikes now!"
Caster sent the order through telepathy so no one else could hear.
Since becoming the shell crown, Shellder had lost its mouth and could no longer speak. That didn't stop it from carrying out his orders.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Poison-type energy gathered over Slowking's head, forming dark purple spikes that drifted down onto Zeke's side of the field.
Within moments, that half of the battlefield seemed to darken.
"Slowking still has enough power to set up Toxic Spikes while matching Metagross's psychic strength?"
Up on the platform, Mr. Goodshow looked astonished. "Just how much psychic power does that Slowking have?"
"Was this Slowpoke hatched from the Pokémon Egg we recovered from Team Rocket?"
Lance looked surprised, too.
Despite the distance, his Power of Viridian allowed him to sense something familiar about Slowking.
"I thought that Egg wouldn't survive. I never expected him to hatch it!"
Had Sabrina helped him?
He could sense Sabrina's influence in Slowking, too.
The way she used psychic power was easy to recognize!
Lorelei kept watching with a gentle smile.
"Metagross, stop competing with it in psychic power!"
Zeke realized his mistake and changed tactics. "Use Meteor Mash! Those fists of yours are bigger than punching bags. Let it feel them!"
Metagross's psychic power was impressive, but its physical strength was far greater.
It was foolish to challenge Slowking at what Slowking did best.
"Metagross!"
Metagross caught on, too, and charged at Slowking, swinging all four metal fists.
"Slowking!"
Slowking tried to hold Metagross in place with its psychic power. It didn't work at all.
Metagross was a Psychic type and knew how to use its own power, so restraining it that way had little effect.
Its metal body was also immensely strong. Once it got moving, it was as hard to stop as a battleship.
Hum! Hum! Hum!
Three Reflect barriers appeared in succession in front of Metagross.
Metagross's punches shattered them like glass. They couldn't stop it.
Slowking had to raise both hands and form a translucent Protect barrier in front of itself. The barrier barely held Metagross back.
"Metagross!"
To everyone's surprise, Metagross kept punching, as tireless as a machine.
Cracks spread through Slowking's Protect barrier under the blows.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
Five thick icicles rose from Slowking's crown and shot toward Metagross to cover Slowking's retreat.
But Metagross's Meteor Mash was too powerful. It used just two arms to smash apart all five icicles.
The cold they carried had little effect on the Steel-type Metagross.
"It's that strong?"
Even Caster was stunned.
No wonder this Metagross was Zeke's ace. Its strength was frightening!
Caster knew they couldn't go on like this, even if Shellder could still put up another Protect barrier.
They couldn't keep defending forever. Slowking needed a way to fight back.
Watching the cracks multiply across the barrier, Caster took a deep breath and shouted, "Slowking, use Shell Smash!"
The shell crown on Slowking's head cracked with a sharp splitting sound.
Slowking broke free of its crown and slid away. The crown stayed behind as a decoy to hold off Metagross.
At the same time, two dim flashes appeared over the shell crown.
The uncrowned Slowking flashed six times in succession. Its power surged, and even its muscles grew larger.
The moment Slowking broke out of its shell crown, the guests on the viewing platform, the tens of thousands of spectators, and the more than a million fans in Caster's livestream all stared in disbelief.
Seriously! Is that Shell Smash even legal?