What kind of power Venusaur possessed was something Ash definitely wouldn't reveal, so it was better to focus all attention on the battle now.
Morty took a deep breath, pushing the shock in his heart down to the bottom. Now that he knew the reason for Venusaur's strength, he couldn't continue to go head-to-head. He had to bring out the specialty of Ghost-type Pokémon.
"Banette, Mean Look!"
Theoretically, Banette couldn't learn Mean Look, but his Banette had utilized some special methods and finally managed it. This move was a necessary technique used to set up another move. Without Mean Look, the other move would also lose its meaning.
Banette struggled to float up from the crater, the stitches on its body having split in several places, revealing the pitch-black internal space inside. But its momentum hadn't weakened by much. The previous attack had caused damage, but it wasn't fatal.
A black light drifted out from inside Banette's body, flying onto Venusaur's body with lightning speed. This was a move that prevented Trainers from recalling their Pokémon into a Poké Ball. Unless Venusaur lost its ability to battle, Banette lost its ability to battle, or Banette was recalled, Ash could no longer switch Pokémon.
Ash also had no intention of letting Venusaur dodge Mean Look. For this kind of tracking energy, unless he could recall Venusaur into the Poké Ball before the opponent made a move, it simply couldn't be dodged.
"Banette, Curse!"
After hearing Morty's command, a layer of eerie ghostly purple light suddenly emerged on Banette's tattered body. That light condensed into a distorted rune, exuding a chilling and eerie aura. At the same time, Banette's own stamina was flowing away at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Ghost-type Pokémon casting Curse required sacrificing half of their own vitality as a price to continuously drain the opponent's stamina. This attack method could not be resisted by any moves. Whether it was Detect or Protect, there was no way to defend against it. Before the Pokémon could be recalled into the Poké Ball, its stamina would continuously decay.
"Ash, quickly have Venusaur dodge!" Misty in the spectator stands couldn't help shouting out.
Mean Look stacked with Curse. This move combination could basically guarantee taking down a Pokémon. If it were hit by Curse, even if Venusaur's vitality was immense, it simply wouldn't be able to escape unscathed.
However, Ash had no intention of letting Venusaur dodge or defend. He looked at the cursing rune that was condensing, the corners of his mouth slightly curving up.
"Venusaur, Frenzy Plant."
"Venusaur!"
Venusaur let out a heaven-shaking roar, his four sturdy paws heavily stomping on the ground.
The floor of the entire Gym trembled violently under this stomp. Countless arm-thick emerald-green vines burst out from the ground, every single vine covered with hardened keratin like dragon scales, their tips flashing with metallic cold light. These vines, like angry giant pythons, carrying a destructive momentum, frantically surged toward Banette.
Almost at the very same instant, the ghostly purple rune on Banette's body detached, like a chilling venomous snake, passing through the gaps of layers of vines, and plunged straight into Venusaur's body.
And the countless vines of Frenzy Plant also solidly slammed onto Banette's body.
A deafening explosion erupted in the Gym. Banette's already tattered body was hit head-on by the countless hardened vines, like a rag doll struck by a giant hammer, blasted flying and crashing into the Gym's barrier, bouncing back to the ground, and smashing out another crater.
Its body was covered with startling cracks, and those crimson eyes completely lost their luster. This move had caused massive damage, and coupled with the backlash of Curse, its stamina right now was like a candle in the wind.
At the same time, Venusaur's body suddenly stiffened. An eerie ghostly purple light leaked from within his body, wrapping around his form like something gnawing at his bones, beginning to frantically devour his vitality.
Curse took effect.
"Good!" Morty clenched his fists, a trace of joy flashing in his eyes.
It didn't matter if he couldn't win head-on. As long as Curse took effect, Venusaur would continuously lose stamina. A Curse cast at the cost of Banette sacrificing half of its vitality was not something even an Elite Four Peak Pokémon could hold on against for long. He just needed to wait.
As for whether Banette could withstand Venusaur's subsequent attacks, Morty still had confidence in this point. Although Banette's stamina was now like a candle in the wind, Ghost-type Pokémon had plenty of bizarre and unpredictable methods.
Holding out against attacks for a period of time was completely not a problem. By then, even if Venusaur didn't lose its ability to battle, it would be severely weakened, paving the way for the next Pokémon's appearance.
However, the next second, the joy on Morty's face froze.
The huge flower on Venusaur's back suddenly bloomed with a soft emerald-green light, which intertwined with the ghostly purple light of Curse, making a hissing sound, as if water and fire had met, mutually melting each other away.
Following that, a scene that left everyone dumbfounded occurred. That cursing rune, which had already plunged into Venusaur's body, was actually being forced out, squeezed from his body by an invisible force.
The ghostly purple rune floated in mid-air, enveloped by the emerald-green light of life, like snow meeting the blazing sun, melting and dissolving at a speed visible to the naked eye. In just a few breaths, that cursing rune, which was enough to give Elite Four Peak Pokémon a headache, completely turned into a wispy smoke and dissipated into the air.
Venusaur shook his head and snorted, looking as relaxed as if he'd just been bitten by a mosquito.
"How is that possible?" Morty's voice carried disbelief.
That was Curse. One of the most vicious and troublesome moves of the Ghost-type. The combination of Curse and Mean Look, even Champion-level Pokémon would find it a headache, because Curse decayed stamina based on the target's maximum stamina. A percentage drain. No matter how strong you were or how high your vitality was, as long as it deducted your stamina by percentage, you could only fall in regret.
But what did Venusaur do? He actually expelled the Curse directly. Was he dreaming? How could such an unthinkable thing happen?
Expelling a Curse from the body was the kind of thing only deities should be capable of accomplishing. Even if Venusaur had obtained the inheritance of a Legendary Pokémon, he was currently only Elite Four High, still far away from true deity level.
"My Venusaur has unique abilities in terms of vitality, making him a natural counter to moves like Curse." Ash took the initiative to state the reason why Venusaur was able to lift the Curse. To put it bluntly, Xerneas's life power could restrain these kinds of moves that reduced life and rushed toward death. "This level of moves won't have any effect on Venusaur. You'd need to bring Yveltal itself for that." Ash said with a smug look on his face.
Of course, that last sentence was completely bragging. Right now, Venusaur had merely obtained Xerneas's inheritance. He hadn't converted this power into his own thing yet. Like Charizard and Gardevoir, they both possessed parts of deities' powers and had eventually converted them into things belonging to themselves.
Charizard had the Amaterasu Flame. Gardevoir had Spirit Force. But Venusaur hadn't reached that stage yet. So if Yveltal's true body actually came over, Venusaur probably wouldn't even last a single second before collapsing.
"Yveltal. Never heard that name before, but I roughly understand. To deal with this Venusaur of yours, it seems we can only use conventional methods." Regarding deities from other regions, Morty wasn't very familiar with them, but this didn't prevent him from determining Venusaur's uniqueness.
To deal with this Venusaur, those tricky Ghost-type moves might not take effect anymore. He could only rely on normal battles to win.
However, in order to make Venusaur swallow the Mean Look and Curse combo, his Banette's stamina had almost reached the freezing point. To put it bluntly, today's Banette simply didn't have the qualification to compete on the same stage with Venusaur.
But as a Gym Trainer, it was naturally impossible to choose to give up. Even if only the last bit of stamina remained, he had to fight with everything he had.
"Banette, Poltergeist!"
Morty's resonant voice rang out in the Gym. Frenzy Plant had just finished being released. According to common sense, any Pokémon after using such a high-power move would have a brief recovery period. This was basic knowledge and also Morty's only chance. Since Curse had been cracked by Venusaur in that unthinkable way, he could only take advantage of this recovery window for one final strike.
Poltergeist, a Ghost-type physical move. This move could turn the opponent's held item against it to attack from the inside, with power comparable to large moves like Thunder. However, if the opponent had no held item, this move would fail. Therefore, before using it, one had to confirm whether the opponent had a held item, otherwise the move would fail and even leave the user in a vulnerable state.
Just now Banette had used Knock Off. Although that move didn't land, judging from the reactions of Ash and Venusaur, Venusaur definitely had a held item on him. In that case, Poltergeist could take effect.
This strike, even if it couldn't defeat Venusaur, had to weaken Venusaur's stamina as much as possible to pave the way for the next Pokémon's entrance.
Banette struggled to float up from the crater, its crimson eyes revealing a final ghostly purple light. The next second, an eerie Ghost-type energy surged out from within its body, like invisible tentacles, sweeping toward Venusaur.
However, just at the moment when Poltergeist was about to touch Venusaur, the command that made Morty's entire body stiffen rang out again.
"Venusaur, Frenzy Plant."
Ash's voice rang out once more, yet this command caused Morty's heart to suddenly stop. His pupils shrank to pinpoints, his face filled with disbelief.
Frenzy Plant? Again? This was impossible. Venusaur had just used Frenzy Plant. What's more, twice in a row. How could a high-power move like this not have a recovery period? Even an Elite Four Peak Pokémon couldn't completely eliminate the lag of Frenzy Plant.
However, Venusaur's response was a heaven-shaking roar.
"Venusaur!" Four sturdy paws stomped on the ground once again, countless emerald-green vines covered with hardened keratin bursting out from the ground.
That speed was astonishingly fast, and the momentum was even more fierce than the previous two waves. Venusaur not only truly cast Frenzy Plant again, but its power was even stronger than before.
Poltergeist's energy didn't even have time to touch Venusaur's body before it was directly torn to pieces by the overwhelming hardened vines. Immediately after, those vines rushed toward Banette without stopping, completely submerging its tattered body.
Dust filled the air, and shattered stones splashed everywhere.
When the vines slowly retracted, revealing the scene in the center of the field, Banette had completely lost consciousness, lying paralyzed on the ground like a tattered rag, unable to move anymore.
The whole audience was silent.
No one expected that Morty's first Pokémon would be defeated so thoroughly, without even causing any substantive damage to Venusaur throughout the entire process. The levels of both sides were the same, but the actual gap was enormous. This had a great deal to do with Morty not having intelligence on Venusaur.
In order to make Curse hit accurately, he had chosen to take a Frenzy Plant head-on. As a result, not only did Curse have no effect, but Banette's own stamina was halved because of Curse's casting cost.
Afterward, Morty wanted to make a final stand, preparing to cause as much damage to Venusaur as possible before going down, and used Poltergeist, a Ghost-type ultimate move.
As a result, Venusaur unexpectedly ignored the recovery lag of Frenzy Plant, turning his hand to use another Frenzy Plant, purely treating an ultimate move as a basic attack.
Facing this information gap, even with equivalent levels, Banette was beaten until it had no power to fight back. In the end it could only obediently lie down on the ground.
Lily and the other students of Morty's were all dumbfounded watching this. They had never seen Morty beaten like this. In their impression, no matter how powerful a Trainer Morty faced, he could always have a back-and-forth battle, and the exchanges were always biased toward Morty teaching the opponent a lesson.
Never had anyone forced Morty to use his true full strength. This time, the Trainer named Ash not only defeated the all-out Morty, but did it in a way that left him with zero power to fight back.
"Banette is unable to battle! Venusaur wins!" After a long pause, Lily, acting as the referee, raised her hand and announced loudly.
Morty took a deep breath and recalled Banette into the Poké Ball. In the end, it still couldn't cause any substantial damage to Venusaur. Was this the Rainbow Hero chosen by Ho-Oh? The Pokémon and Trainer levels were completely on a different tier from the people he had encountered before.
"I admit, your Venusaur is indeed very strong." Morty's voice regained its calm, but deep within his eyes, a trace of new fighting spirit ignited. "But this is only the first match. The battle has only just begun."
He tossed the Poké Ball high into the air, and as a flash of light passed, an eerie figure appeared on the field.
That was a Pokémon purple all over, with a round body, an iconic grin stretching from ear to ear, and a pair of crimson eyes flashing with cunning light in the darkness. The edges of its body were faintly blurry, as if it could melt into the shadows at any moment.
As soon as it appeared, the temperature of the entire Gym seemed to drop by a few degrees, and an eerie cold aura silently spread.
Gengar, a Ghost and Poison dual-type Pokémon. Morty's ace.