"Whoosh—"
A dazzling light came up, the Gyarados finished his Mega Evolution, and a wholly new Mega Gyarados stood on the field. The savagery of his shape left Korran staring with his mouth open and unable to shut it.
He had been stunned all over again. This world was too fantastical by half.
Everything he had run into today left him feeling that the world was somehow false.
Had they not run because the two Pokémon were in no state to go on?
It did not look much like it now.
A man as young as this, and absurdly strong with it, holding psychic power at peak Gym-class; five Elites together could stand against the Suicune he was so proud of; he had been forced to put out everything he had, to keep them from combining, to go at the Gyarados and the Slaking in particular; and no sooner had the light of victory shown than the Slaking broke through on the spot, and after that he had seen the Gyarados evolve!
Was the Gyarados not the final form? How could it possibly evolve again??
He half suspected there was something wrong with his own eyes, but there it was in front of him, and he could not accept it.
What sort of man was this? He looked plainly weak, and then fought like something out of a story?? What kind of immortal was he?
After the Mega Evolution the Gyarados's energy level had risen to 58, close to the standard of peak Gym-class.
The Slaking, after his breakthrough, had come to 51, and what he was really worth was unknown, since he had not yet fought.
That gave Vance more confidence still. Before the breakthrough he had dared to go head-on with an Elite-Four-class Dusknoir; how much more so now.
Even if the thing across from him was that Suicune.
It was not a true Suicune, only some stripped-down Suicune that had been produced by means nobody knew.
The power of a Legendary in it was very ordinary. It had no effect on him, put no weight on him, and could not draw on heaven and earth to hold him down. What was there to fear in that?
So, having shown his Mega Evolution now, he had no intention of letting Korran get away. Victory was not only a matter of settling the Pokémon; settling the Trainer was victory too.
"Ding. You are now a Gym-class Trainer. Your reward has been issued."
Just as the Slaking broke through to Gym-class, the system's chime sounded. There was another gift waiting for him to collect.
"Collect."
A thought from Vance and he chose to take it. It might come in useful.
"Ding. Congratulations on obtaining the Intermediate Viridian Power!"
"The Intermediate Viridian Power, is it."
Vance was a little disappointed, but he could live with it. The Viridian Power in him rose sharply and entered the Intermediate stage, and a great many uses of the Viridian Power appeared in his mind at the same moment.
Vance put the Viridian Power to work at once and laid it over the Gyarados and the Slaking.
It restored them, and strengthened them at the same time.
The Intermediate Viridian Power added a level to the Slaking's standard; on the Mega Gyarados it had almost no strengthening effect at all, and only thickened his aura by a trace.
Vance did not neglect the Zweilous and the Aerodactyl either, and put the healing on them too.
As matters stood now, three at peak Gym-class plus two of Gym-class strength stood against one Elite-Four-class and one Gym-class.
The Intermediate Viridian Power was a great deal stronger than the Novice one.
"How did your Gyarados carry out that Mega Evolution!!"
Korran said it aloud. Instinct told him that if he could learn the answer, a fortune beyond dreams would fall to him.
Feeling it out again, he found that the Slaking and the Gyarados had not broken through to Elite-Four-class; and reckoning it up, it still had a hope of winning.
His Suicune was strong!
"You ought to be thinking about how to stay alive."
Vance's figure vanished all at once, and the Mega Gyarados and the Slaking moved at the same moment, going for the Suicune.
Earlier, with the Gyarados not yet Mega Evolved and the Slaking not yet through his barrier, Vance had held something back and directed from the middle, taking a supporting hand in the fight. Now he was going to give it everything.
To be sure of it, Vance resorted to the pills again to lift his own strength, though this time it went a great deal better than the last, and did his body less harm.
"Hmph. Insolent."
A vast hand, blue and hazy, appeared. The Alakazam threw itself across in front, both heads putting out their power together, and gathered a solid wall of light before it.
"Boom—"
The great hand came down, the wall of light broke open all at once, and the hand turned into a finger and jabbed downward.
Below it the spoons in the Alakazam's hands gave out two waves of light to meet the "finger" the energy had become.
The two powers struck each other like lightning, and a peal of thunder cracked out of nothing in the air.
"Alakazam—"
The Alakazam went on pouring out power, looking hard pressed by it, and fine cracks appeared in the spoons in its hands.
"Suicune! Suicune, come here, quickly!!"
Seeing how badly it was going, Korran called for the Suicune at once.
"Ooooooh—"
The Suicune tried to come, and the Gyarados and the Slaking blocked it — the Slaking in particular, appearing and vanishing like a ghost, teleporting all over the ground, so that however fast the Suicune was, it stayed tangled up with him.
"Bang, bang, bang—"
Taking his chance, Vance launched a hard attack. The Alakazam went on holding out grimly, and still could not hold Vance, and its defence was broken open.
Slipping past the Alakazam's Psybeam, he was very close now; a great fist of energy glittering with light came down and drove it into the ground.
He looked at Korran, who had lost his head with fright, and was about to strike — and the Alakazam's power appeared again, cutting him off, stopping him from getting at Korran.
"Loyal, aren't you."
Vance laughed softly, and a vast power went out from him, all of it pouring down on the Alakazam.
"Bang—"
Under that power one of the Alakazam's heads burst, and its whole body went down on the ground like a piece of torn cloth.
In the space of a breath, the attackers and the defenders had changed places.