The Pokémon Contest's first qualifying round would advance eight people, followed by one-on-one duels until the final.
Seeing that she wasn't paired with Abigail in the first round, Serena turned to look at Abigail: "Then good luck, let's meet in the finals!"
"See you in the finals," Abigail said, turning her head to look at her opponent on the screen.
Meanwhile, at the Pelican Town Community Center, Joy was currently explaining the rules of Contest Battles to everyone.
Everyone listened in a daze, only knowing that if moves were used gorgeously enough, it could make the opponent lose points, and if you could defeat the opponent's Pokémon, then no matter how many points they had, it would instantly drop to zero.
The Pokémon below were also hearing these rules for the first time. However, upon hearing that as long as they could defeat their opponent they could advance smoothly, they were no longer nervous one by one, and even climbed onto the table to leisurely distribute Gus's snacks.
Gus had no objection to this. He said cheerfully: "Eat, eat. If it's not enough, I'll go make more at the saloon later."
"Rattata!"
During the discussion, the preparation time had passed. The first battle was Abigail's.
The opponent's Trainer held an Inkay.
Seeing Abigail was at a type disadvantage from the start, Joy at the counter couldn't help but become nervous.
Meanwhile, Ron helped move several boards, turned his head, and just happened to see Gunther coming out of the library. "How do you have time to come out?" Pam couldn't help asking: "Besides holidays, I've never seen you in town during the day."
"Came to watch—ah, there's a broadcast here too," Gunther stopped upon hearing this, looking at Abigail on the television: "No one notified me. If I hadn't just called the Pokémon Center, I wouldn't have known Abigail was competing in Kalos today!"
Saying this, he leaned in to examine it: "Is this an Inkay?"
Seeing Ron nod, Gunther thought again.
He knew a bit about type advantages and had researched quite a bit himself, so he thought and said: "So that means Gengar is countered by it?"
"Mm."
But Ron didn't think Gengar would lose.
If he had to say why, it was probably the several rings on Gengar's claws.
They were respectively a Citrine Ring with Defense +1, a Jade Ring with 10% critical hit rate, and a Ruby Ring with 10% attack power boost.
Gunther knew little about rings, so at this moment his face showed some faint worry for Abigail.
Ron glanced at him, then turned back to continue working.
"Inkay, use Psybeam!"
"Inkay gorgeously used Psybeam! Beautiful light completely envelops its body, complementing its body color! A gorgeous strike!"
The host's commentary came from the television.
Before the words finished, Abigail had already lost five points because of this.
"Amber, use Shadow Ball!"
"Gengar used Shadow Ball!"
"Shadow Ball hit Inkay!"
"Inkay is unable to battle! Gengar wins! The winner is Abigail from Pelican Town!"
"?" Gunther paused, pushed his glasses, and didn't understand for a moment. He looked again and again in confusion: "How could this happen?"
Before he finished speaking, another cheer erupted from the Community Center.
Robin couldn't help but smile, turning back to continue hammering nails into the wooden boards.
But Pokémon battles were still a fresh experience for all of Pelican Town.
Although several families had Pokémon, no one called themselves a "Pokémon Trainer." Most treated Pokémon as family and friends, so there was no reason to have their family compete with others' families to see who was stronger.
"Too bad Gengar only has three fingers on one hand," Ron was counting Gengar's fingers, currently feeling regret about this.
Abigail had been away during this time, and he had obtained quite a few more rings. Counting it up, even if he put them on all the toes, he couldn't stack many.
"Froak?" Froakie squatting on Ron's shoulder immediately looked down to count its fingers.
After confirming that it only had ten fingers including its toes, Froakie's face turned solemn.
"Froakie—"
How many fingers did Bellossom have——
"Froak!"
Bellossom has no fingers!
Froakie was instantly relieved. It then patted Ron's shoulder with a face full of regret.
"?" Ron wasn't using mind-reading at this moment, so he didn't know what Froakie was thinking. He was still pondering whether to send a few more rings to Abigail, just in time to help him test their effects in actual battle.
While calculating, Abigail had already left the stage over there.
"Although the moves weren't gorgeous enough, it can be seen that she has trained her Gengar very well," the judge said.
"This child has been raised quite well. She seems to be from Pelican Town? It seems I've been hearing about Pelican Town quite a bit recently."
With these words, the audience at the venue remembered the famous Pelican Town from some time ago.
Because only a batch of novice Trainers' Pokémon came from there, before long, Pelican Town's matter had already become old news on Kalos's internet.
Only now did everyone remember that there seemed to have been a batch of Fletchling that were excellent in all aspects, also from Pelican Town's nursery.
Meanwhile, Serena below the stage looked at the Inkay that had fallen in one hit again, her expression somewhat grave for a moment.
She had seen this scene several times.
This meant that if she faced Abigail later, rather than gorgeous moves, what was more important was how to avoid being knocked out by Gengar before she could even perform.
While thinking, she waved at Abigail.
The next round wasn't a battle between the two, so both had to watch the competition. Serena had specifically saved a seat for Abigail.
Gengar hadn't taken any damage at all, and hadn't even exerted much effort, so there was no need to rest. It followed Abigail to sit in the audience seats.
"I'm starting to get a bit nervous," Serena said.
If she had to say, after traveling for so many years, she definitely had high-level Pokémon in her own hands too.
But this was Abigail's first competition—she always felt that winning this way would be somewhat disgraceful.
"What are you thinking?" Abigail sat down and turned her head: "You're not thinking of letting me win, are you?"
"Ah—" Serena looked at her with a face that said "how did you know."
"It's written all over your face." Abigail pinched Serena's face and leaned back in her chair: "Don't let me win. I've decided, regardless of win or lose, I'm only going to participate in Gym battles."
"Not participating in Pokémon Contests anymore? Why?"
"Ah—how to say it." Abigail thought and said: "I can't quite explain it. Rather than winning, I just wanted to promote this dress—but, I have a friend. I think maybe she would want to participate."
Saying this, Abigail leaned back in her chair, remembering the phone call she had just received.
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