CH86 (700), First Minor Gym (3)

"You might have forced me down to my last Pokemon, but whether you win or not is not another question," Gym Leader Daniel declared after recalling his Gengar that had just finished reforming after blowing itself apart. Listening to his words I could not help but wonder if grandstanding was part of the job description of a Gym Leader. I mean Stephanie also let loose a few of those, and now Daniel followed suit as well. Well, it did unmistakably rile up the audience seeing how they were cheering at his words.

"Go ahead," I simply said since losing time was to our disadvantage because Fortuna/Togekiss was cursed, and the crowd seemed slightly disappointed that I did not give a witty comeback or something along those lines. Nonetheless, we had no time for banter, and had Daniel not simply nodded before releasing his next Pokemon after that I would have probably complained to the referee that he was strategically delaying time. 

Yet, Daniel did call out his final Pokemon, which as I had suspected was his final/third (high) silver stage Pokemon. With Dusclops' appearance, the referee gave the signal to start/resume the battle, and both Pokemon directly performed their moves once he did that. Dusclops raised his arm and pointed at Fortuna, who had used Metronome causing her to visibly Recover, to shine in a second shade after which Fortuna complained that her Metronome got blocked.

Still, despite her complaints, she swiftly followed up with a bunch of Air Slash, and I saw her briefly shudder between the second and third one, though she did not let the pain stop her. Dusclops blocked the ones it couldn't dodge with Shadow Balls, before quickly sinking into the ground to avoid the ones it had no time/chance to block. Honestly, Hades/Gengar did it as well, but when an opposing ghost used their natural ability to phase through most stuff to dodge our attacks, I felt a bit annoyed.

Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do about it aside from keeping count of how long it stayed "submerged" since there was a 5-second limit for ghost phasing in official matches unless it was part of an active move. Either way, Fortuna did not waste any time and used Calm Mind while Dusclops was hiding. She also complained that she felt herself expend more energy than usual while using her moves, which I recognized as a result of Dusclops likely possessing Pressure as its ability. 

Dusclops reappeared behind Fortuna and utilized Gravity just as she finished using Calm Mind. The sudden increase in Gravity caused Fortuna to plummet a bit before she regained her bearings and resisted Dusclops' Gravity. That caused some all-around astonishment, but Fortuna was used to extra Gravity since we utilized it to train, so while making use of the discrepancy between Dusclops' plan and reality, Fortuna fired an Air Slash at Dusclops' head as it was rushing toward the position Fortuna would have crashed in.

I felt a bit frustrated when the Curse struck again just as Fortuna tried to follow up with a second Air Slash to take advantage of the flinch that triggered after Fortuna finally managed to land an Air Slash on Dusclops. I was glad that Fortuna managed to use Recover at the beginning of the fight, or she would have likely been close to done by now.

Nonetheless, while the sudden initiation of the Curse interrupted her second Air Slash, she powered through and followed up with a third one. Unfortunately, Dusclops managed to recover from its flinch moments before the Air Slash could hit it, and Dusclops let itself fall into the ground, resulting in the ground blocking the Air Slash. Fortuna made use of its immaterial state and used Life Dew to recover some more to buy herself more time to fight.

Dusclops reappeared as the Life Dew was doing its work, and it used another Disable to block Fortuna from using Life Dew to recover even further. Fortuna ignored that and directly used Extrasensory to attack Dusclops while it was within reach. That exchange seemed to elicit a change in strategy from Daniel since he actually had his Dusclops use Curse as it was tanking the Extrasensory.

Dusclops followed through, causing Fortuna to be doubly Cursed. While the Curse of a Ghost only worked once on someone without the possibility of stacking Curses, the same was not the for multiple Ghosts cursing a single Pokemon. Honestly, this was the first time we were in such a situation, so I was unsure what a stacked Curse would do since I had not looked it up. I did not expect us to land in this situation before, though maybe I should have.

Still, I had Fortuna ignore that for now and counterattack while Dusclops was weakened due to its sacrifice for Curse. Meanwhile, I had a second thought stream go through my super Library to find out the effect of a stacked Curse. As it turned out, stacked curses not only caused more damage each time the Curse got triggered, but it also shortened the time between curse outbreaks. The higher the stack count, the higher the damage caused and the shorter the time between bouts.

Anyway, Fortuna fired a volley of Air Slashes at Dusclops, but they went full evasion mode on us. Dusclops dropped through the ground and dodged the attack. It briefly showed its head and used Absorb for a few seconds before diving down again to dodge Fortuna's attempt to counterattack. A Curse outbreak happened a few seconds after that, and Dusclops did not let that opportunity slip by. It reappeared and released a Confuse Ray, which Fortuna was unable to dodge, before using another Absorb.

Despite their advantage, Daniel had Dusclops retreat again, and just in time as well since Fortuna luckily ended up using Metronome in her confusion, which apparently was no longer disabled. The Metronome ended up turning into an Earth Power, which happened to be a good counter for Dusclops' little dive below the ground.

While Earth Power was not indiscriminate like Earthquake, it still affected a relatively large area, and unlike Earthquake, Earth Power actively used energy throughout the move, which meant that it could affect Dusclops even in its intangible form underground. As a result, Dusclops got flung out of the ground, right into the path of Fortuna's second Metronome-triggered move, Zap Cannon.

The move not only hurt Dusclops but also left some electric energy running through its body, indicating that it could seize up at any moment if the electric energy got triggered. Fortuna's luck was really incredible, the way it managed to trigger Metronome twice despite the confusion. Not to mention that those Metronomes turned into optimal moves for the situation.

Sadly, another Curse outbreak happened right after Fortuna released the Zap Cannon, and the pain she felt along with her confusion caused her to fall out of the sky. Dusclops did not let go of the chance and jumped onto Fortuna. It first used Ice Punch followed by Thunder Punch, though it seized up after using the second one.

Unfortunately, we were unable to take advantage of that because Fortuna could no longer keep fighting. That was fine though since she had done her best. She had put up a good fight against Dusclops despite being cursed, and even though she had lost, she still hurt Dusclops so much that I seriously doubted whether it would be able to put up a good fight against my next/final Pokemon.

Anyway, I recalled Fortuna and praised her a bit before putting her ball away while the referee declared Fortuna unable to battle and Dusclops the victor. When he asked me to call out my next combatant, I took out Gaara/Gabite's ball and released him onto the field. Gaara stared at Dusclops, who had already recovered from its momentary paralysis by now and was staring back, though it looked worse for wear.

Regardless, both Pokemon sprung to action as soon as the referee gave the go. Gaara triggered a Sandstorm, while Dusclops released a Will-O-Wisp, though it got blocked by the sand of the Sandstorm that Gaara took control of. Daniel/Dusclops tried to resort to their ground dip strategy, but Gaara made use of Sand Tomb and his Sand Control to take away that option from Dusclops with each use of Sand Tomb.

Since the sand-turned ground was under Gaara's control, or more precisely infused with his energy, it allowed him to detect Dusclops if it tried to pass through it. He then used his energy to force Dusclops out of the sand or risk getting attacked by it. At some point, hiding beneath the ground was no longer viable for Dusclops, and from there Gaara's job became quite easier. 

He made use of his Sand Control, the sand of the Sandstorm, and the sand on the ground from the Sand Tombs to attack Dusclops from all directions, forcing it to frantically block and dodge as much as possible, while tanking the hits it couldn't block or dodge. Due to its weariness and injury from before, it didn't take long for Dusclops to fall unconscious under Gaara's all-encompassing onslaught.

"Dusclops is unable to battle, making Gabite the victor. Therefore, Mikail Geo wins the Gym Battle," the referee declared after Dusclops lost. The audience cheered for me once he announced my victory. Meanwhile, Gym Leader Daniel recalled his beaten Pokemon and put its ball away before looking over at me.

"Congratulations on your victory," he said with a smile. "It was a great battle, and you more than earned the Hardfort Badge," he continued while waving his son Vuran to his side, who gave him the Badge. After accepting the Badge from Vuran, Daniel came up to me. "You deserve it," he said with a nod as he handed me the Badge. The crowd cheered once more when he did that, and some of them began to chant my name.

"Thank you," I responded to Daniel before turning toward the crowd to thank them for their support. Only after that did I check out the Badge. Unlike the S-rank Badge I acquired from Stephanie, the B-rank Badge Daniel gave me was quite ordinary. All B-rank Badges had the same shape, here in Hoenn they looked like slightly larger coins.

What distinguished this Badge from other B-rank badges was its light purple hue, which indicated that it belonged to a ghost-based Minor Gym, along with the word Hardfort embossed on one side of the Badge to indicate the city/Gym that handed out the Badge, and two stars embossed on the other side to show the difficulty of the challenge completed to earn the Badge.

After finishing my inspection of the Badge, I put it away before my focus was drawn back to Gym Leader Daniel who chose to engage me in a short but enthusiastic talk about the possibility of a ghost-type Eeveelution being discovered within his lifetime. It was clear where Vuran had gotten his enthusiasm from. I made sure to be honest with him, so I told him that I had no idea when the discovery would be made, though I added that I was pretty sure that such an Eeveelution was possible.

I ended up getting swept away by Daniel's enthusiasm for a bit and I ended up promising him to inform him as soon as I stumbled upon any definite information on the matter. He even gave me his private number to ensure that I could reach him and I left after saving the number on my phone. It was not even 4 p.m. yet, but I still did not plan to leave Hardfort City. While I was not planning to explore the city any more than I did so far, continuing my journey could wait until tomorrow. 

I was planning to spend the rest of the day inside Utopia. We had to celebrate our victory after all, even if it was just over a Minor Gym. A Gym was still a Gym after all. So, I made my way to a secluded spot and entered Utopia, where I was greeted by my Pokemon, who had watched the live projection together at my place.

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