"Come on, send out your Lucario!"
"This time, my Darkrai will definitely win!"
Stefan looked at Ethan, his face full of confidence.
"Darkrai, huh... Then, I'll leave it to you."
Ethan thought for a moment and also took out a Poké Ball.
Accompanied by a flash of white light from inside the Poké Ball, a colossus nearly four meters tall appeared on the field.
"Is that... Tyranitar?"
"Eh, no, something doesn't fit. Tyranitar doesn't look like that, nor is it that big, and besides, it doesn't have those red spikes."
Seeing the Pokémon that had appeared, the spectators began discussing among themselves.
"It's... Sandslash!"
"My God, how can that Sandslash be so huge!"
Upon realizing the Pokémon's identity, one spectator let out a cry of surprise.
Only then did the others react as well, all of them left dumbfounded as they looked at the gigantic Sandslash.
They did not know much about the concept of Totem Pokémon. So, upon seeing Totem Sandslash, they were truly shocked.
"Those red spikes... It's that Sandslash that defeated Medicham!"
"But why did that Sandslash become a Totem Pokémon?!"
On the field, Stefan had recognized Ethan's Shiny Sandslash.
Precisely because of that, he was so surprised.
Making an ordinary Pokémon evolve into a Totem Pokémon was something countless researchers from different Leagues had been trying to do for years.
And now, a living example had appeared before them, symbolizing another great achievement of the academic world.
"Sha!"
When Sandslash came onto the field, it directly fixed its gaze on Darkrai.
After evaluating its opponent this time, Sandslash nodded in satisfaction.
Using a Mythical Pokémon to demonstrate its rise was simply perfect.
"Even if it is a Totem Pokémon, don't dream of facing a deity!"
After his brief surprise, Stefan's face recovered its calm.
When both sides were ready, the referee announced the start of the battle at the appropriate moment.
"Darkrai, Nightmare!"
As soon as the battle began, Darkrai spread its nightmare energy across the field.
Nightmare energy was a special ability unique to Darkrai; if the opponent could not even defend against that, then it did not deserve to become its opponent.
"Sandslash, use the Totem aura to block it!"
Seeing the nightmare energy approach, Ethan's eyes narrowed slightly.
In the next instant, a faint luminescence began to emerge from Sandslash's body.
Under the mantle of that light, the nightmare energy was blocked with complete ease.
"The nightmare energy... was neutralized so easily?"
Stefan was stunned again, quite surprised.
On the other side, however, an expression of "just as I thought" appeared on Ethan's face.
Everything pointed to the Totem aura having a special relationship with the Sparkling Stone and with Necrozma.
At that moment, because it carried the Sparkling Stone with it, Sandslash's Totem aura had also acquired the special glow characteristic of the stone.
And the facts proved that this kind of special glow countered some energies of a dark nature extremely well, among them Darkrai's nightmare energy.
"Good work! Prepare to advance. Sandslash, use Spin Drive!"
After successfully breaking through the nightmare energy with the radiance of the Totem aura, Sandslash also began to move.
Its nearly four-meter body curled up into a sphere and directly executed the combination of the move Rollout and the move Rapid Spin.
Originally, Sandslash's combined move Spin Drive already had terrifying power.
Now, after successfully becoming a Totem Pokémon and undergoing a gigantic change in size, when using that move with such a body, its power multiplied several times over!
Boom, boom, boom!
Under the pressure of the move Spin Drive, even the ground began to tremble.
"Dark Pulse!"
With a wave of its hand, Darkrai condensed an attack in it and launched it directly at Sandslash.
The current Darkrai, after Stefan's training, had clearly improved the power of the move Dark Pulse.
But even so, the move Dark Pulse barely managed to slow Sandslash's advance a little.
Quickly emerging from the smoke, Sandslash continued maintaining the state of the move Spin Drive and, in addition, pushed the use of the move Defense Curl to the maximum, raising the power of the move Rollout even further.
Thus, under the addition of a second use of the combination of the moves: Defense Curl, Rapid Spin, Rollout, plus the Totem aura and the Totem body, the power of the move Super Spin Drive directly broke through the barrier between the Quasi-Elite level and the Elite level.
"An Elite-level attack!"
"Has this Ethan already taken that step?!"
Even the four Elite-level Trainers of the Federal League present among the spectators showed surprise in their eyes.
As Elite-level Trainers, naturally, they were the ones best able to judge the power of the move Super Spin Drive.
"Double Team!"
Facing the move Spin Drive rushing toward it, Darkrai's figure blurred and split into several images.
Sandslash roared across the field, striking only one of the false images, and continued onward.
"Darkrai, Dark Void!"
Darkrai's figure floated in the air while nightmare energy condensed in its hand before being fired.
The move Dark Void continuously compressed and condensed the nightmare energy, slowly descending from the sky, giving the impression that the entire firmament was falling onto the earth.
"Sandslash, Sand Spin Whirl!"
Facing the pressure of the move Dark Void, Sandslash began to activate the power of the sandstorm within itself.
Then, a mass of yellow sand could be seen spinning along with the movement of Sandslash's body, and it began rotating faster and faster.
At first glance, it looked like a normal sandstorm, but as soon as Sandslash activated the move Defense Curl, that rotating sand began to take the shape of a constantly spinning sandy sphere, which launched itself to directly face the move Dark Void in the sky!
Boom, boom, boom!
At that moment, all the spectators outside the field had their gazes fixed on the scene.
In the sky and on the earth, two spheres, one black and one yellow, collided with each other as if a planet were crashing into another.
Finally, with an explosion, both energies burst across the field, while large amounts of yellow sand were sent flying in all directions.
The clash of both attacks ended completely evenly, without either managing to overpower the other!
When all that sand dissipated, the figures of Sandslash and Darkrai appeared suspended in the air, facing each other from a distance.
"It stopped it!"
"That Sandslash is incredibly strong!"
Seeing that scene, the spectators were very surprised.
Facing the God of Nightmares, Darkrai, Sandslash truly had not fallen into disadvantage at all!
"Again... another high-level technique, and not just one!"
Watching Sandslash control the sandstorm, Stefan's face darkened a little.
In that state, Sandslash suddenly gave him the feeling of facing the tyrant of the desert, Tyranitar.
And perhaps, even Tyranitar did not possess such a terrifying presence and strength!
(End of chapter)