Surely not.
Ronan had been enjoying the picture of his own victory, and this Slaking emptied a bucket of cold water over it.
"That presence — it's very nearly Elite-Four-class already, one step short of the door. And if his Viridian Power goes on top of that, then isn't it... Elite-Four-class!!"
Ronan said it with his head aching. He had only just managed to wear one of them down, and here came another. A headache indeed.
So what was to be done?
Ronan decided to wait it out again, and wear this Slaking down as well.
Close to Elite-Four-class meant it had not broken through to Elite-Four-class, and between it and a true Elite-Four-class Pokémon there was still some distance.
As for the power that came from an amplification — the old saying held. The strength would fade. Endure, and the win was yours.
So man and Pokémon kept to the same holding tactics as before: endure, endure until this Slaking's strength ran thin, and then come out and clear the field.
"Slowking, the same as before. Hold on, hold on, and the win is ours."
Ronan shouted it across to it. With the Slaking out, there was nothing for it but to let Slowking go on taking the weight.
Any of his other Pokémon, Ronan thought, would only be going out to be served up; better not to send them at all, better to keep to the old tactics.
Shabby, perhaps, but it worked, did it not?
"Look at the way he's standing. He means to turtle again."
Ambrose said it from up in the stands, with a certain mockery in his voice.
"Winning is the object. The means don't matter."
Emery, beside him, shook his head and answered.
"And besides, it isn't as though you don't know how frightening that Slaking is. As it stands now, I should think it could handle even an Elite-Four-class opponent."
Emery said it, weighing it up.
"That... well, that's true enough."
Ambrose said it sheepishly, his mind going back to Trial Island and the state in which they had met this Slaking — that uncanny, formidable strength which had left the pair of them covered in lumps.
It had been terrible even then. He did not dare imagine how far it had come after so long in his boss's hands.
That Slaking had left the two of them with a deep impression of its power all the same.
While the two of them were talking, there were several others watching them from out of sight.
"The people Lord Vayne wants — it's those two, isn't it."
One of them said it. To look at them they were altogether ordinary, the kind who would not stand out in a crowd.
"Yes."
"Make a note of them, then."
The several of them talked it over a moment, then withdrew.
And Ambrose and the other, taken up with their conversation, never noticed that they were being watched from the dark.
"Hm?? Why isn't he amplifying the Slaking's strength? Can it be that his Viridian Power has reached its limit?? Ha, that would be good news. Still, I had better play it safe."
Ronan put his smile away and kept Slowking in its defensive stance.
"Begin!"
The referee gave the word, and the Slaking lying on the ground suddenly opened its eyes. Its muscles knotted, and a savage presence rose off it.
Slowking felt at once that it could not breathe, as though something savage and far above it had fixed its eye on it.
A blur in front of it, and the Slaking's shape was already there before it; what filled its vision was a fist wrapped in a hazy blue.
Every defensive force along the way, meeting that fist, was broken through, and the blow reached flesh without hindrance.
"Whump—"
Nothing was heard but a single cry from Slowking. Its body went down with a crash and struck the ground hard.
"Lie down again, Slaking. We'll be wanting that later."
Vance's words sounded in the Slaking's ear.
So, having struck its blow, the Slaking made a show of it, narrowed its eyes and lay down on the ground.
Just like any ordinary Slaking: one blow, then a rest.
"Slowking, quickly, use Heal Pulse. Get yourself back."
This was hard going. That Slaking had been raised to such a pitch. Its strength was beyond imagining too — were it not for the limit of its species, which had it in that idle, weary state now, Slowking would already have been finished.
Slowking finished its Heal Pulse and recovered a little, and then the Slaking was seen to move again.
"Full defence! You have to hold!!"
Ronan said it loudly, his voice fretful.
"Whump—"
Slowking would very much have liked to say that it was already defending with everything it had, but there was no time to say it: the Slaking's fist had arrived again.
The same move, the same punch, perfectly plain, with nothing showy about it and nothing special in it — and behind it a power there was no matching, slamming into its body.
And it, as before, was knocked off the ground, drew an arc through the air and came down hard.
"How can it still be like this? We can't hold it? Then take the chance, Slowking — Hyper Beam!"
Ronan changed his tactics in a hurry too, giving up the chance to heal and choosing to attack.
He had seen what healing came to: it was broken through just the same. Better this — deal damage while the Slaking was in its idle state, and after that fight a running, tangling fight. There might still be hope of a win.
He had a Trainer's competence about him; one look at how badly it was going and he adjusted his tactics at once.
"Boom—"
Out of the white smoke of the explosion the Slaking's figure appeared, unhurt, raising its fist in the same way, with no showy move about it.
Slowking and its Trainer looked at that, and their scalps prickled.
"He must be doing this himself. I had forgotten — working with him covers over a great deal of what's wrong with that Truant Ability."
"Slowking, get out of there, quickly. Stop defending. Keep it to close fighting."
"Whump—"
"Want to run, do you. Think again."
Vance said it with a cold laugh, and then the Slaking was there again, not far from Slowking. However it moved, the Slaking stayed with it, and there was no getting away.
"It's over."
Vance said it evenly.
"Boom—"
The Slaking and Slowking came down to the ground together, blasting a great crater into it.
In the crater the Slaking lay sprawled at its ease, while Slowking had lost the power to fight, and its consciousness with it.