Hand it over!

I'll give him a surprise in a moment. As Zhang Cheng thought this, he ordered Poliwag to launch a probing attack with Water Gun.

His opponent's Oshawott countered with Brine. The two jets of water collided in midair, but Brine proved stronger, breaking through Water Gun and surging toward Poliwag.

Poliwag was struck by Brine, but because Water Gun had weakened the attack beforehand, the damage was not too severe.

Seeing that his attack had gained the upper hand, Ye Lang gave Zhang Cheng no chance to catch his breath and continued attacking with Brine.

Zhang Cheng had only used Water Gun to test the power of Oshawott's moves. Now that he had a grasp of their strength, he devised a countermeasure.

Poliwag took this blast of Brine head-on and closed in on Oshawott.

At that point, Ye Lang sensed that something was wrong and ordered Oshawott to retreat.

But it was already too late. Once Poliwag reached Oshawott, it immediately attacked with Thief. Hand it over!

The attack hit Oshawott squarely, dealing damage while stealing its held item.

Poliwag obtained the Leftovers, which activated and healed some of the damage from the earlier Brine attacks.

Ye Lang was stunned by the sight. What kind of trick was that? Oshawott's held item is gone!

Zhang Cheng gave Ye Lang no time to react. While Ye Lang stood dazed, Poliwag used Hypnosis, hitting Oshawott dead-on.

Oshawott fell straight asleep. With Hypnosis successful, Poliwag charged up a full-power Bubble Beam and blasted it at Oshawott.

Caught completely defenseless, Oshawott took a devastating hit and woke from its sleep.

Looking at the situation before him, Ye Lang began to panic. His attacks struggled to deal much damage to Poliwag, and now his opponent had stolen his held item. He could no longer see any chance of winning.

Still, Ye Lang refused to accept that fact. He could not believe that his starter Pokémon was losing to Zhang Cheng's Poliwag.

Nearly out of his mind, Ye Lang ordered Oshawott to attack desperately, first with Brine, then with Hidden Power, bombarding Poliwag in a frenzy.

Poliwag used its moves to weaken the incoming attacks, then recovered with the Leftovers. Oshawott's assault had little effect.

After attacking for some time, Oshawott had severely exhausted its stamina and was now at its opponent's mercy.

Once a Trainer lost his reason and could no longer make sound judgments, the outcome of the match was already decided.

Poliwag unleashed Bubble Beam, once again hitting Oshawott before it could dodge. The heavy damage left Oshawott on the verge of fainting.

"I don't think there's any reason to keep fighting. Just concede instead of letting your Pokémon suffer more pointless damage," Zhang Cheng reminded him kindly.

But to Ye Lang, those words sounded like mockery. How could he possibly surrender? He continued frantically ordering Oshawott to attack.

Seeing that his warning had done no good, Zhang Cheng shook his head and had Poliwag keep attacking, knocking Oshawott out.

Since Ye Lang refused to accept reality, Zhang Cheng would knock some sense into him in the most direct and effective way.

"The battle is over. Oshawott is unable to battle. The winner of this match is Zhang Cheng."

Once the referee announced the result, Zhang Cheng left the battlefield.

Ye Lang stared blankly at the outcome before him and only left the battlefield after another reminder from the referee.

After this battle, Ye Lang lost his earlier sense of superiority. There was always someone better out there, and excessive confidence would only make his failures worse.

When Zhang Cheng returned to Class One's rest area, his classmates congratulated him on advancing to the finals.

Zhang Cheng briefly responded to his classmates, then sat down to rest and wait for the next battle.

He had barely sat down when his phone chimed. He opened it and saw a message from Bai Yuling:

"Not bad today, little bro. Give it your best tomorrow and make our class proud."

"OK. Consider it done."

After chatting with Bai Yuling for a while, the second match began. Zhang Cheng put away his phone and watched Ye Tian's battle.

Ye Tian was facing a Trainer from his own class. Since their class had advanced two extra Trainers in the first round, there was bound to be a match between two members of Class Two in the second round.

Ye Tian's opponent was a Trainer who used Machop. Seeing that it was a Fighting-type Pokémon, Zhang Cheng shook his head.

Fighting-type Pokémon feared Flying-type and Psychic-type moves most, and Ye Tian's Butterfree had Gust and Confusion, which were precisely those two types.

There was no suspense in this battle. On top of that, Zhang Cheng noticed that this Machop's Ability was No Guard.

This Ability worked somewhat differently in actual battles than it did in the games. When a Pokémon had No Guard and the two combatants' speeds were not too far apart, neither could dodge the other's attacks.

However, if the two Pokémon's levels were far apart and there was a large difference in speed, it was possible to dodge Machop's attacks.

For a Fighting-type Pokémon like Machop, this Ability was actually quite good. But facing a Pokémon with a type advantage over it was a miserable experience.

Butterfree's Confusion and Gust hit Machop one after another. Although Machop's attacks could also hit Butterfree, they were not very effective.

Another Confusion struck, and Machop immediately became unable to battle. Ye Tian won.

After winning, Ye Tian walked straight off the battlefield. This battle had put him under no pressure whatsoever.

The competition continued. The third match was between two Trainers with level 10 Pokémon. After an exchange of attacks, the Trainer from Class Two won.

Next came Hao Chenggong's battle in the fourth match. As expected, he also won and advanced to tomorrow's finals.

With four matches finished, Zhang Cheng was the only member of Class One who had reached the finals.

Watching the last two Trainers take the field, Zhang Cheng wondered whether his classmate could win some pride back by securing a spot. Otherwise, it would be far too embarrassing for their class.

The final battle soon began. After observing both sides, Zhang Cheng found that they were evenly matched in strength. At this point, it would come down to the contest between the Trainers.

A Trainer's ability to give commands had a major impact on a match. Good commands could turn the situation around and snatch victory from defeat.