The New Normal - 16-1

The New Normal – 16-1 – A Battle of Champions

The upcoming battle between Steven and Wallace was probably the most anticipated event in the last few months – even if you take into account all of the political changes that have occurred. Everyone and their families were talking about the implications of a possible Steven victory, and what it would mean for Hoenn’s future.

Unlike the previous two challenges for the title of Champion performed by Lance and Cynthia, where it was pretty clear who the public wanted to win, this time public support was split perfectly down the middle.

Wallace was a very popular Champion, and he was accredited with many achievements that solidified his legacy as a great leader. There was no doubt that Hoenn would continue to prosper under him. However, he had also been Champion for some time, and there were always those that craved the new. Besides that, Steven had a very large following of his own – stemming both from his title as heir to Devon Corp and as a powerful trainer, and he had secured many business connections that would pave the way for a smooth transition if he became Champion.

Not only that, but as his victories over the Hoenn Elite Four had proved that Steven very much had the strength that a Champion ought to have.

Therefore, Elesa and I decided to take a small break as we watched the battle between the two. I had wanted Cynthia to join us, but she was watching the battle with her own advisors in her office so that she could react immediately if Steven actually won.

“What are your thoughts on Steven? Think he’ll make a better Champion than Wallace?” Elesa asked from where she was sat next to me in my old room of the Celestic Town Research Centre. But the old TV had been upgraded to a large flatscreen for easier viewing.

“Well, I’m biased due to the political arrangements we have, but yes.” I replied, “I’m more friends with Steven than I am with Wallace – even if I respect the two of them equally. Steven might be unreasonably wealthy, but he has a fair temperament. His friendship with Bruno should prove that.”

Funnily enough, Steven’s very public friendship with Bruno had done wonders for the former’s reputation. Despite his best efforts, Steven always had difficulty shedding the ‘spoilt heir’ label that many automatically slapped on him. But after the public began to see Steven interacting with Bruno, who historically had little tolerance for whiny heirs like so many of Steven’s peers, they started to realise that Steven wasn’t as bad as they thought he was.

“…Must be nice to have such viable Champion candidates.” Elesa said with a surprising amount of bitterness, “Unova… well, I shouldn’t say anymore.”

It didn’t take a genius to figure out what she was getting at. Despite her attempts to hide it, it was clear that she was disappointed with Alder’s reign as Champion.

During our training sessions, she would occasionally drop a few comments about how negatively Alder compared to the Champions she had met. And from what I knew, she was far from the only one upset at the current situation in Unova. From what I had heard from the others, the rest of the Unova Gym Leaders shared similar sentiments.

They weren’t angry at Alder. Just disappointed.

I respectfully didn’t comment on that. Instead, I kept my silence until Wallace and Steven made their way into the arena. They were both dressed as I expected they would – with Steven in his expensive, custom made suit, and Wallace with his usual eye-catching and colourful outfit.

Neither had anything to say to each other as we all waited for the announcer to finish with his introductions. When that was all wrapped up, the battle to decide the Championship of Hoenn finally began.

“Wailord, come!”

“Goodra, go!”

An utterly enormous Wailord slammed down onto the battlefield. Actually, the word ‘enormous’ was still an understatement, as the ginormous Water type practically took up half of the battlefield with its size alone. Steven’s H-Goodra – a Pokémon that normally towered over most of its opponents – looked absolutely tiny in comparison.

Wailord was well-known to be Wallace’s favoured lead Pokémon, and just like everyone expected, the Rain instantly began to fall. However, Goodra capitalised on the Rain by unleashing a quick and powerful Thunderbolt to crash down from above.

Yet Wailord seemingly shrugged off the Thunderbolt with its own bulk, before it summoned a large vortex of water around Goodra, trapping it in a Whirlpool. The fast and swirling waters ensnared Goodra tightly within, preventing it from switching out and kept it mostly rooted in place.

“Keep on using Thunder, Goodra. It can’t dodge!”

“Amnesia and Aqua Ring, Wailord. You can withstand this!”

A powerful volley of Thunders continued to crash down endlessly on the Wailord, whose size made it impossible to dodge anything. But Wailord didn’t need to dodge when it could swiftly set up with both an Amnesia and Aqua Ring, sharply increasing its own Special Defenses while making it so that it would slowly regenerate its own health overtime.

If it were your typical Water type, they would not be able to withstand against a constant barrage of devastating Thunders, given that it was one of the most powerful Electric type moves there is. And especially not from a H-Goodra, due to its remarkable Special Attack.

However, Wallace’s Wailord was doing just that – with the help of the Special Defense boost from Amnesia, Wailord looked primed to simply tank through the Thunders until Steven’s Goodra slowly tired itself out. Its defensive capabilities were extraordinary.

Steven must have realised this too and rapidly changed tactics.

“Acid Spray, Goodra!”

His Goodra proceeded to spit out a poisonous glob of acidic fluid that struck Wailord in the face. The damage that it did was minimal, but Wailord let out a groan of discomfort as the Acid Spray greatly lowered its Special Defense. Wailord could easily restore that lost Special Defense with another Amnesia, but Goodra could reduce it quicker than it could increase it back up again.

Therefore, it was now Wailord’s turn to go on the aggressive, and an enormous torrent of Water erupted out from Wailord. The tidal wave of water unleashed by that Water Spout all crashed down on Goodra, who blocked some of the damage with a Protect shield. However, in the process, the Water Spout also managed to Soak the Goodra, turning it into a Water type.

Before Goodra could comprehend the forced Type switch, Wailord let out a roar as it suddenly threw itself forwards into a humongous Body Slam that sent it crashing against the far smaller Goodra.

On paper, Wailord’s physical attack stat was not as high as many other Pokémon. But that didn’t matter when Wailord weighed and was the same size of a steel freight ship – a ship that had just slammed right into you.

Goodra was sent flying backwards and was smashed against the psychic barriers, and Wailord quickly followed that up with a powerful Hydro Pump – looking to finish off Goodra right here and now.

Yet, to Wallace’s unpleasant surprise, despite being hit with its full weight and might, and even after losing its Steel resistances thanks to the Soak, Goodra didn’t lose its focus. Instead, it determinedly pulled itself off the ground and threw up a Protect shield that managed to block the incoming Hydro Pump, before retaliating with a crackling bolt of Thunder that pierced right through Wailord.

This time, the Thunder finally landed the paralysis. Which caused the already slow Wailord to become even slower – almost cripplingly so.

This gave plenty of time for Goodra to not only heal itself up with a Life Dew, but also return to the offense as it flooded Wailord with a wave of Acid Sprays, greatly reducing its Special Defenses. Wailord immediately went for the Mist, but it was already too late.

With its Special Defenses heavily reduced, and with it now being slowed to a crawl by the paralysis, it was like Wailord had been beached. It could do little as Goodra rained down with Thunder after Thunder – which this time inflicted significant damage against Wailord.

To its credit, Wailord held on for longer than most people would have expected, even in such bad conditions. It valiantly held its ground, taking every opportunity to throw up a Protect shield to buy more time for the Aqua Ring to heal itself up, and also punishing Goodra with an Earthquake if it failed to fire off a Thunder in time.

Yet, in the end, it wasn’t enough to turn the tides. But just as Wailord looked like it was about to go down, Steven made another order.

“Sunny Day, Goodra!”

His Goodra temporarily stopped firing off Thunders as it fired a beam of light into the air, switching the weather over to the Sun. Unfortunately, Wailord could only capitalise on this with one final Earthquake before a final Thunderbolt finished off the Water type.

Wallace wasted no time with sending out his next Pokémon.

“Ludicolo, go!”

I didn’t even have time to review the previous battle in my head before Ludicolo had already charged up and fired off a Solar Beam. Goodra barely had a chance to react, forcing it to rely on its instincts as it withdrew into its own shell and took Shelter.

However, Steven had forgotten about one thing – his Goodra had been Soaked and forcefully switched to a Water type. Therefore, it lost the quadruple resistances of its previous Steel/Dragon Type to Grass type moves and was instead weak to the Solar Beam.

Goodra let out a pained cry as it was blasted back until it was knocked down onto the ground in an unsightly heap. Ludicolo swiftly followed up on this by rushing forwards, switched the weather back to Rain, and firing off a Giga Drain that finished off the heavily injured Goodra. It barely had a chance to fight back.

And now with the Rain and Swift Swim, not only were Ludicolo’s Water attacks now highly buffed, it was also now incredibly fast under the Rain.

But when I turned to look at Steven – he didn’t look upset by this. No, this was a man with a plan.

As if he had expected this exact scenario to happen, Steven confidently sent out his Claydol. Wallace’s eyes immediately widened with alarm – as if he realised what was about to come – and he instantly moved to recall his Ludicolo.

Unfortunately, he was too slow.

“Sand Tomb, Claydol.”

Before Ludicolo could be withdrawn, a vortex of sand was quickly formed around Ludicolo’s legs, engulfing them and preventing it from being switched out – causing the beam of red light from its Pokéball to bounce off of Ludicolo.

Subsequently, a large psychic field enveloped the entire arena as Claydol rapidly set up a Trick Room. Within the field, reality bent and twisted so that the speedy and agile Ludicolo was slowed to a crawl, while Claydol sped up significantly.

Ludicolo instinctively responded with a rain-boosted Hydro Pump, but now Claydol was fast enough to easily Teleport out of the way and set up with both a Reflect and Light Screen, neutering any further attacks from the Water type.

“Encore, Ludicolo!”

“Psychic!”

Knowing that his options were very limited, Wallace tried to trap Claydol into repeatedly setting up Light Screens with an Encore. Unfortunately for the Champion, Claydol fired off a quick Psychic before the Encore could land, causing his plan to fail.

In the end, Wallace had just moved a step too slow and had fallen for Steven’s trap. In this position, there was little Ludicolo could do against Claydol, trapped and slowed as it was.

Wallace’s Ludicolo was infamous for its incredible speed and power – especially when bolstered by the Rain. But Claydol had neutralised and countered both of its greatest advantages, leaving it completely helpless.

Ludicolo did try to fight back, but it was clearly not used to fighting with the Trick Room. And its attacks were either broken by a Psychic from Claydol, or simply shrugged off thanks to the Light Screen.

Knowing that his opponent was helpless and unable to switch out, Steven even took his time with knocking out Ludicolo by allowing the Encore to run out and then having Claydol set up with a few Calm Minds, Cosmic Powers, and Stealth Rocks in preparation for the next opponent. It also switched out the Rain for the Sun.

Eventually, a final Psychic took down Ludicolo – just in time for the Trick Room to fade away.

“…I didn’t know that Steven had a Claydol.” I heard Elesa mutter, “I didn’t think he’d own a non-Steel type.”

“He used it in his fight against Bruno.” I said, my eyes still glued to the screen. I had a sneaking suspicion that Claydol was meant to be Steven’s trump card for the fight. And that feeling was quickly proven right.

Wallace had sent out his Walrein next – a Pokémon that the public had affectionately titled ‘The Bane of Dragons’. This was due to its incredible bulk that gave it the ability to tank through all but the most powerful of Dragon attacks, and Walrein had the massive power needed to fight back with hard-hitting Ice Beams.

It was pretty ironic that even though Glacia was known to be the premier Ice specialist in Hoenn, and even had a Walrein as her starter and ace, many considered Wallace’s Walrein to be almost as strong as hers – while it wasn’t even Wallace’s ace.

Which is why what happened next was so jaw-dropping.

As soon as Walrein emerged from its Pokéball, Claydol immediately trapped it within another Sand Tomb to prevent it from being recalled. Meanwhile, all those Stealth Rocks that had been set up stabbed themselves painfully into Walrein, tearing out a decent portion of its health.

Next, as if to add insult to injury, Claydol fired off a Skill Swap, swapping its own Levitate for the much more useful Thick Fat from Walrein. Therefore, with Thick Fat lowering the effectiveness of Ice and Fire type moves, while the Sun halved the effectiveness of Water moves, this basically crippled Walrein’s ability to deal any sort of supereffective damage to Claydol.

And this was all before the slow Walrein even got a chance to move.

As Walrein primarily attacked with both Water and Ice moves, these combination of effects meant that Walrein was literally only able to fight back with neutral moves. However, with Claydol already having buffed up its Defenses and Special Defenses with multiple Cosmic Powers, those wouldn’t do much damage to the buffed Psychic type.

Right now, the only way for Walrein to claw back any sort of advantage was to make use of a Haze to purge the buffs off of Claydol. However, considering that Walrein hadn’t used the move yet, it likely didn’t know the move.

I expected Steven to have researched that well in advance and plan his whole strategy around that very fact.

Therefore, much like its ally before it, Walrein had been completely neutered by this nuisance of a Claydol. I noticed that this was very much a repeating pattern in this fight.

Honestly, it was pretty ironic to me that Steven was fighting like a Psychic specialist rather than a Steel one. His approach had been very methodical, looking to stack as many advantages and buffs on himself while debuffing and crippling his opponents as much as possible.

Ironically, in the battle thus far, only his fight with Goodra had remotely resembled anything akin to how a typical Steel specialist would fight – his other two knockouts were secured by his Claydol and its Psychic trickery.

Nevertheless, the effectiveness of this strategy could not be questioned, as it didn’t take long for Claydol to secure its second knockout of the fight as it slowly but surely pummelled Walrein down with a volley of Stored Powers.

However, just before Walrein was knocked out, it had managed to land an Encore on the Claydol, locking it into Stored Power. And before I could realise what Wallace’s plan was, he immediately sent out his starter and ace.

His Milotic.

And it instantly threw up a Mirror Coat. The subsequent Stored Power was shot back to its caster at twice the power, obliterating the surprised Claydol and sending it crashing to the ground. Worse, Claydol was still locked in its Encore, meaning it could do nothing as a Haze removed all of its buffs before a powerful Moonblast exploded right on top of it.

Knowing that the battle was lost, Steven acted decisively.

“I retire my Claydol.” He announced, shocking the crowd with his declaration.

To the common observer, Steven had no reason to retire his Claydol so early when it still had so much health. However, I nodded approvingly at his decision. With all of its buffs gone and it still locked into an Encore for a few more precious moments, Claydol was just a liability, and would have allowed Milotic to begin setting up.

And Steven could not allow that to happen.

So, he sent out the only Pokémon on his team that could even remotely deal with Milotic – his Metagross.

And now, Ace met against Ace. I expected the battle to be decided in this very moment. If Steven won here, then his victory was in the bag as Wallace likely didn’t have enough team members left to make a reversal. On the other hand, Wallace winning here would be the start of a comeback for the Champion.

“METAAA!!!” The four-legged Steel titan landed on the battlefield with an audible thump, causing the ground to shake violently.

Milotic began the battle by quickly setting up an Aqua Ring and the Rain simultaneously. On the other hand, Metagross’ eyes flashed pink as it made use of its four minds, setting up with an Agility, Hone Claws, Iron Defense, and a new set of Light Screens all simultaneously.

However, Wallace made no move to stop it, seemingly content in allowing Metagross to freely buff itself up. Instead, it settled for setting up a further Safeguard and firing off a Whirlpool, trapping Metagross within a vortex of swirling waters and dealing damage over time.

I was curious to see why Wallace was okay with letting Metagross set up like that, and Wallace quickly answered that curiosity.

“Psych Up!”

A swirl of psychic energy radiated out from Milotic as it copied all of Metagross stat boosts, effectively neutralising any advantage that Metagross would have gained from being able to set up with all those buffs.

Therefore, both Pokémon now had highly increased Attack, Defense, Accuracy, and Speed – which all cancelled each other out.

I saw a small frown appear on Steven’s face as he realised that Wallace had turned the tables on him, though he didn’t seem to hesitate as he ordered his Metagross forwards – its four arms crackling with electricity.

A flurry of Thunder Punches slammed themselves repeatedly into Milotic. But despite it being supereffective, Milotic looked completely unbothered as it shrugged off the hit and replied by slamming down with an Aqua Tail of its own, returning the aggression with its own.

The fight quickly descended into a chaotic brawl.

Slipping past an Aqua Tail, Metagross lifted one of its arms before hammering it downwards right into Milotic’s skull.

But Milotic took the hit with barely a flinch and retaliated by unleashing a quick Bulldoze, causing Metagross to slightly stumble.

Metagross tried to recover, but Milotic moved first and followed up with a powerful Hydro Pump, forming an enormous ray of water in its mouth.

But a quick pulse of Psychic interrupted the attack, buying enough time for Metagross to blitz forwards and slam its crackling fists against Milotic’s jaw in a thunderous uppercut. Simultaneously, a second and third Psychic slammed into Milotic from both sides. Metagross even tried to go for the Sunny Day.

Yet even through this devastating assault, Milotic maintained its focus and broke through one of the Psychics with a hammering blow from its Aqua Tail. Metagross was momentarily knocked aside, interrupting the attempted Sunny Day, and this time the follow-up Hydro Pump successfully blasted Metagross with a massive torrent of water, forcing it backwards.

Despite their mutual aggression and intense exchange of moves, the two looked pretty equal.

However, I noticed that thanks to the Rain, Milotic’s attacks were hitting much harder than Metagross, as the latter was building up injuries far quicker than Milotic. This was made worse by the fact that Milotic was also passively healing up with an Aqua Ring, giving it a level of sustainability unmatched by nearly any other Pokémon. Milotic couldn’t even be paralysed thanks to the Safeguard it had set up.

It was just like I had witnessed in the previous Tournament when Cynthia and Wallace faced off against the remaining Top 3 winners. There, Wallace’s Milotic held off against both Drake’s Salamence and Pryce’s Mamoswine simultaneously without going down.

Much like it was doing now, it was repeatedly able to shrug off blows that would have easily brought down a lesser Pokémon, and so even though Metagross’ strikes were powerful enough to form craters in the ground with each strike of its fists, partially thanks to the buffs that it copied through Psych Up, Milotic was able to tank through all of them.

This was Metagross’ ‘weakness’ – if you could even call it that. Unlike Tyrant or Emperor, Metagross’ base strength was nowhere near as high as ours. Instead, its advantage was that it could rapidly buff itself up with its four different minds simultaneously, allowing it to quickly match us in strength and defence.

However, that advantage had been countered with the Psych Up from Milotic.

Therefore, at this rate, it would be Milotic that came out on top against Metagross – which was completely insane if you thought about it, considering that Metagross were considered to be one of the Pokémon that represented the pinnacle of strength, while Milotic was known as little more than a beautiful Pokémon that are mostly seen at contests instead of battles.

If nothing changed, then Steven was about to lose his starter.

I watched as a frown appeared on Steven’s face as the man looked like he was wracking his brains for a solution. Unfortunately for him, that was much easier said than done. And all the while the two Pokémon continued their brawl, and for every moment that passed it seemed like Metagross was slowly losing more and more ground as Milotic gradually overpowered it.

But then I caught a small flash of inspiration flicker through his eyes; Steven had thought of something.

“EXPLOSION, NOW!”

Without hesitation, Metagross threw itself forwards, grappling onto Milotic as it trapped the Water type tightly within all four of its arms. A growing white light started to radiate out of Metagross’ chest and Milotic quickly threw up a Protect shield to shield against the impact – only for the Protect shield to be expended from a quick Bullet Punch from Metagross. Before Milotic could shove the Steel type away with an Aqua Tail – Metagross Exploded.

And the resulting detonation was equal parts as deafening as it was devastating.

The horrifically destructive shockwaves instantly pulverised the psychic shields around the arena. The audience fell into screams of panic as everything was blown backwards – the chairs and seats that were bolted down onto the ground were no exception. I even saw that the heavily reinforced glass used to protect the VIP section began to crack and shatter from the blast, though it barely held together.

As the dust and chaos cleared, Metagross’ fallen form had crumbled to the ground, with Milotic looming over it victoriously – though also heavily injured. Even with all of its incredible defenses, an Explosion was a Pokémon’s most powerful move for a reason, and Milotic was reduced to this slumped over wreck, as if it was teetering on the edge of being knocked out.

However, before the announcer could say anything, Steven instantly withdrew his Metagross and sent forth his Magnezone.

“THUNDER!”

A huge bolt of lightning came crashing down from above, painfully electrocuting the already-injured Milotic. More Thunders quickly followed after the first, and with the protection of its Safeguard having expired, Milotic was too injured to slither out of the way and was eventually paralysed.

“ZAP CANNON AND FINISH IT OFF!”

Not giving Milotic any opportunity to regenerate its own health, Magnezone charged up and unleashed an enormous ball of hyper-concentrated electricity that violently exploded right on top of Milotic. The Water type let out a pained cry as it was overloaded with far too much electricity.

But even then, Milotic struggled to keep itself in the fight – refusing to go down just like that. Even as a dangerous amount of electricity coursed through its own body, it channelled whatever was left of its willpower so that it wouldn’t go down.

However, Magnezone ruthlessly finished it off with a final Thunderbolt. The lance of thunder speared right through Milotic’s willpower, and finally brought it down.

“…Wow.” It took me a small moment to realise what Steven had done, but once I realised it, I couldn’t help but make my admiration known, “I didn’t even think of that.”

Elesa turned to me confusedly, “Wait, what did he do?”

“Steven took advantage of the fact that Milotic didn’t get its Special Defenses buffed up with the Psych Up.” I explained, “If you remember the buffs that it copied, it only copied Metagross’ Attack, Defense, Accuracy, and Speed buffs. Therefore, it remained susceptible to Special Attacks. Steven capitalised on this by Exploding with his Metagross, heavily injuring the Milotic, before sending out his Magnezone to finish the job with its powerful and supereffective Special Attacks. He was able to do enough damage before Milotic could start regenerating health with its Aqua Ring or Life Dew.”

I remembered seeing a similar tactic used like this before, as it was the trick that Karen used against Agatha during her own fight. Steven must have studied that battle and took notes.

Therefore, with Wallace’s ace now taken down, it meant that he only had two Pokémon remaining against Steven’s three. And as I expected, Wallace chose to send out his sole Ground type against Steven’s Electric type.

“Go, Whiscash!”

“Come back, Magnezone! Your turn, Skarmory!”

Steven moved quickly and switched out his Magnezone for his Skarmory, likely intending to preserve the former to deal with Wallace’s final Water type. Meanwhile, Whiscash began to set up with a Dragon Dance, but it was only able to complete one before a Taunt from Skarmory cut off any further attempts.

Skarmory then fired off a Sunny Day as a beam of light ascended into the skies, turning the weather back to Sun. Whiscash retaliated by unleashing an avalanche of rocks as it tried to impale Skarmory with a Stone Edge, but Skarmory’s impressive defences allowed it to shrug off the attacks as it took to the skies.

Now in the air and safely away from Whiscash, Skarmory began to set up with Iron Defenses, sharply boosting its Defense so that Whiscash’s primary form of damage in Rock attacks would just bounce off.

With his Whiscash Taunted, it had few options to take down the agile and defensive Skarmory. So Wallace had no other choice but to switch it out and reveal his final Pokémon.

“Gyarados!”

A large, blue serpentine figure emerged onto the battlefield. However, I immediately realised that something was wrong. Because unlike every other Gyarados that I had seen thus far, Wallace’s Gyarados was utterly serene and calm.

It didn’t radiate any of the wrathful violence that the others did. Gyarados were supposed to be beings of unending wrath and rage; a being of pure violence. It was definitely not supposed to stare at the airborne Skarmory with a measured and analytical gaze – and yet Wallace’s Gyarados was doing just that.

…I never thought I would see a Gyarados that was not a barely restrained ball of rage. This honestly might be Wallace’s most incredible feat.

“Taunt it, Skarmory!”

“Thunderbolt, Gyarados!”

Thinking that Skarmory was temporarily safe in the air, the Steel type shot off a Taunt that enveloped the Gyarados. However, the Taunt barely looked effective as not even the slightest hint of rage appeared in Gyarados’ eyes, all the while the Water type unleashed a fast Thunderbolt that struck down and surprised the mid-air Skarmory with its unexpected level of power.

It began to fall out of the air. But before another Thunderbolt could hit it, Skarmory used Roost to both heal itself up and also to temporarily remove its weakness to Electric moves. However, Gyarados simply transitioned to firing off a Flamethrower, accurately predicting Skarmory’s descent and scorching the Steel type within a torrent of burning flames – which was further boosted by the Sun.

Once again, much to the pain of Skarmory, Wallace’s Gyarados stood out from all of its peers as it seemed to primarily be a Special Attacker rather than a physical one.

However, despite being thoroughly Burned, Skarmory still had the resilience and presence of mind to retaliate with a combo of Dark Pulse and Air Slash, managing to flinch the Gyarados. This bought enough time for Skarmory to unleash an ear-splitting shriek as it threw out a Metal Sound, sharply lowering Gyarados’ Special Defenses.

But that was all it could do. Gyarados rapidly recovered from its flinch and retaliated with another Thunderbolt, this time managing to paralyse Skarmory.

“Rock Tomb, Skarmory! You have to slow it down!”

“Fire Blast, Gyarados! Finish it!”

Skarmory valiantly fought through the paralysis and, just as Gyarados unleashed a huge orb of searing flames towards it, succeeded in slamming several pillars of rocks into Gyarados’ side with the Rock Tomb – slowing it down. Yet that success came at a price, and Skarmory was unable to move out of the way in time before being incinerated by the enormous orb of searing flames.

Skarmory was knocked out.

Magnezone returned to the battlefield. The Electric type instantly unleashed a combined barrage of Discharges, Thunderbolts, and Thunder Waves. Meanwhile, Gyarados threw up a Protect shield while retaliating with its own Earthquakes and Flamethrowers, and the match became another duel between two Special Attackers.

In the end, Magnezone proved itself to be the victor. Wallace’s Gyarados may be a much more powerful Special Attacker compared to every other Gyarados I had seen, but Magnezone still overpowered it thanks to the sheer volume of attacks that it could fire off at once.

Gyarados had made a good showing, but it was always going to be at a major disadvantage when facing off a Pokémon that it was quadruply weak to.

That just left Whiscash left as Wallace’s final Pokémon, but everyone already knew the outcome was already set in stone. Magnezone took to the skies with a Magnet Rise to get away from any Ground Attacks, and started to harass Whiscash with a series of Supersonic, Tri-Attacks, and even Hyper Beams. Every once in a while it would also throw out a Screech to sharply lower Whiscash’s defenses.

Meanwhile, Whiscash initially tried to take down Magnezone by turning the weather back to the Rain and sniping it down with Hydro Pumps. They did considerable damage, but not quickly enough for Wallace’s liking. Then, Wallace switched tactics and began to set up with Dragon Dances, hoping to make use of Magnezone’s relatively weak damage to buff itself up in preparation for Steven’s next Pokémon.

However, the moment he saw this, Steven ordered his Magnezone to Explode, doing as much damage it could before sending out his Aggron to finish the job.

And it did so. With Whiscash already injured and its Defenses sharply reduced, Aggron was able to tear right through it with its signature Ferrous Storm – a move unique to Steven. A vortex of razor-sharp iron shredded and eviscerated the injured Whiscash, causing it to flinch for long enough that a final Iron Head into Iron Tail combo finished it off.

Thus, with Wallace’s final Pokémon going down, Steven had won.

“…AND THE BATTLE IS OVER! WITH A FINAL SCORE OF 6-5, STEVEN MANAGES TO TRIUMPH OVER THE CHAMPION OF HOENN! THE REIGN OF WALLACE IS OVER! STEVEN HAS NOW BECOME THE NEWEST CHAMPION OF HOENN! MAY HE LEAD US TO FURTHER GLORY!”

“STEVEN! STEVEN! STEVEN!”

“ALL HAIL THE NEW CHAMPION!”

And Hoenn welcomed in a new Champion.

A.N. The battle between Wallace and Steven is finally here – as I felt that it was the best thing to have to start off Arc 16 – ‘Unity’! After rewriting this battle several times, I hope I did the battle justice. There were several things I wanted to highlight in the battle, and I tried to be as creative as possible so that this battle could stand out from others like it.

With Wallace, I wanted to harken back to the utter resilience that his Milotic had shown in the past Tournament, with how it managed to tank through practically everything thrown at it. And here, I hoped I showed that it was still more than a match for Metagross. Likewise, with Wallace’s Gyarados, I felt it would be unique to show a different side to Gyarados that others didn’t make use of. I felt it was fitting for Wallace to have the only calm Gyarados shown so far. Overall, with Wallace, I wanted to highlight his resilience and defensive prowess that is shared amongst all his Pokémon, and how – in a straight fight – Wallace might actually be stronger than Steven.

Meanwhile, with Steven, I really wanted to highlight his cunning. The man might be a Steel specialist, but it is his sharp mind that allows him to stand apart from the other Champions. That’s why he has a Claydol as a surprise ace, and why he was able to overpower multiple of Wallace’s Pokémon not with brute strength (as Lance might have done) but with smart strategies and by maximising his own advantages.

The consequences of his victory will be shown soon. Hope you enjoyed!