Dragonite flew through the air while Metagross hovered above a rock. Despite being on the Water Field, both Pokémon Trainers had chosen to ignore the terrain advantage, leaving not a single Water-type Pokémon on the field.
This was fairly rare, especially in such an important match.
Other competitors would have seized every opportunity to give their Pokémon an advantage. How could they possibly waste one like this?
Tetsuya's choice was understandable. He had not sent out a Water-type Pokémon from the start, so it was hardly strange that he still wasn't using the terrain to fight. But Xia You's Blastoise had just performed brilliantly, hadn't suffered any injuries, and held the terrain advantage, yet he had chosen to switch it out. That was rather puzzling.
Only people like Ash, who had known him since Kanto, understood that unless he was deliberately doing otherwise, switching Pokémon after every battle was a habit Xia You had maintained from the beginning.
There were advantages and disadvantages to this. Constantly switching Pokémon allowed every one of them to participate and gain practical battle experience. However, revealing every participating Pokémon too early also meant laying his lineup out in the open and losing the element of surprise.
Only someone with tremendous confidence in his Pokémon would choose to do this.
And clearly, in their eyes, Xia You was precisely that sort of person!
Meanwhile, Metagross and Dragonite had already begun exchanging blows.
Like Blastoise before it, Metagross used Confusion to launch a ranged attack, attempting to defeat Dragonite on the opposite half of the field.
But Dragonite was no Sceptile from the previous round, and naturally had its own way to respond.
Dragonite calmly used Twister. The instant the whirlwind formed, the wind swept up the pool water, creating a waterspout on the field. While