Fang Yuan felt that the opening speech of the World Sprite Alliance conference was the most comfortable one he had ever experienced in the many competitions he had attended.
Although the speech was more or less the same every four years, with Meloetta providing the background music, hardly anyone would feel impatient.
Amidst Meloetta's melody, the opening ceremony quickly ended, and following the ceremony, it was time for the announcement of the competition's progress, grouping, and drawing lots.
In the Silver City venue, there was a giant holographic screen floating in the air, allowing the countless people present to clearly see the images on it.
Setting aside the 16 seed teams participating in the Attribute Specific events, the remaining 256 teams were divided into sixteen groups, with 16 teams in each group.
Fang Yuan and the others were all staring at the screen, searching for the symbol of the Five-star Red Flag.
"Group seven." Su Shu was the first one in the team to locate China's Second Team and then reminded everyone:
"Uh... Egypt's First Team, Portugal first team, Thailand first team, Dutch Team 1... There are eight first teams in our group, and the other seven are second teams."
"There are no strong nations among the second teams; it looks like we'll be competing with those eight first teams," Shang Ren said, sounding relieved as he read through the groups.
That's good; other than Windmill Country, none of them seem particularly strong.
"Egypt... Thailand?" Fang Yuan said with a chuckle upon seeing the list.
"What about them?" Xie Qingyi, who was standing in front of Fang Yuan, asked.
"Oh, nothing much, just that Egypt's second team and Thailand's Fire King, who came to Hua Nation for training, happened to have been blown away by me. I wonder if I'll run into any acquaintances."
As Fang Yuan finished speaking, the other nine teammates all sported a look of dismay, thinking of Fang Yuan's feat of taking on the Japanese Dragon King by himself and feeling sorry for any trainers from those two countries who might encounter Fang Yuan.
The world is so vast, but to encounter Fang Yuan, luck would not be bad.
After the division of the sixteen major groups ended, the drawing of lots began. According to the rules of the lottery, Fang Yuan's team should meet one of the four first-team countries.
"Good luck," Jiang Li said to Fang Yuan. Their first team had advanced directly to the championship finals, and now their main task was to win the gold medal. The regional preliminary competition for the second team was entirely entrusted to Fang Yuan.
The World Championship team from Hua Nation did not have a leading trainer and was entirely under the responsibility of the two team captains. The national team members had already touched the Top Tier Domain, and few trainers could point fingers at them.
The association was also supportive. During this period, while it would provide full cooperation and help, it would not interfere with the tactical arrangement of the national team.
This situation was quite common among the strong nations. Although the national team athletes were of the younger generation, their strength was not necessarily inferior to the older generation.
With the continuous development of the Trainer Domain, the gap in strength between the new and old generations will become smaller and smaller until a flourishing age like in the Pokémon World arises.
............
The seventh district, the competition will take place at the Rainbow Arena in the southern district of Silver City, lasting nine days with regional preliminaries being held concurrently.
During this period, the 16 seed teams will also finish the entertainment competitions of 18 attributes, after which the thirty-two teams will enter the championship finals together.
Once the grouping for the regional preliminaries was over, the registration phase came for the General Series and Flying-type events of the 18 attributes entertainment competitions.
The situation was quite awkward for China, as none of the five Champion Four Heavenly Kings had cultivated Normal type Pokémon. Xie Qingyi did have a Snubbull which is Normal and Fairy Type, but its power was only at the professional level; it wasn't cultivated as a main contender.
Therefore, for the first General attribute event, China directly gave up, but for the Flying-type event, many were able to participate. Besides being a Dragon Type master, Yun Kai was also a Flying-type master, with both Dragonite and Blood Wing Dragon at his disposal.
Xie Qingyi had Pixie, Jiang Li had Wind Following Ball, and Su Shu had Nature Bird. Except for Xu Haoran, the other four could participate. At this time, old Xu was wondering whether he should cultivate a Hawlucha.
The registration and lot drawing segments were bustling. Fang Yuan also represented China's Second Team to draw lots and encountered representatives from the other fifteen countries. Fang Yuan didn't recognize any of them, so after quickly getting the results, he returned.
"How did it go?"
```
When Fang Yuan returned, Shang Ren, Tang Xinlan, Mu Fan, and Zheng Hongyi quickly asked.
"It should be Egypt's team," Fang Yuan said.
As the words fell, the 3D screen hanging in the air of the venue had already swiftly updated the draw results, causing a stir among the attendees as the results were revealed.
Fang Yuan and his team's eyes accurately landed on the matchup table for the seventh division…
"The first match in the seventh division is ours. How strong is Egypt's first team?" Tang Xinlan asked.
With over a hundred countries participating, Tang Xinlan and others only had a general understanding of the strengths of the world's leading nations; they were not very clear about the other countries.
"A year ago, the second team's Trainers had an average strength of professional level, with the strongest ace being a Master level spirit of quite ordinary power. I've heard that the captain is very likely to move up to the first team. Now a year has passed... maybe their first team could bring out a few nearly top-level powers?" Fang Yuan muttered.
Anyway, Egypt is not weak by any means, and for those countries in Africa, they are quite strong, but unfortunately, when compared to Hua Nation, they are on a different level entirely.
But we can't be careless," Fang Yuan thought to himself, almost leading by bad example. "You can't be arrogant, you can't be arrogant, you must take every opponent seriously."
"Oh," hearing Fang Yuan say this, the other four nodded slightly. It seemed this match was in the bag.
Fang Yuan: "..."
.....................
After the opening ceremony, grouping, draw, and registration ended.
All that was left was to wait for the competition tomorrow.
At that moment, in the Egyptian players' village, a tactical meeting room.
Members of both the first and second Egyptian teams, along with a Trainer leading the team, were having a very serious meeting.
The draw for the Egyptian team could be said to be downright terrible. The first team was up against China's second team, and the second team in another division was up against Spain's first team.
This signified... they were at great risk of a quick exit from the World Tournament.
"Apart from Fang Yuan and Zheng Hongyi from the China team, the data on the other three are relatively clear. According to our information, this Shang Ren is very tough, a former Heavenly King of Hua Nation. Only Saeed, you are likely to defeat him 100%," said Aria, the leading Trainer of Egypt to the Champion among the Four Heavenly Kings.
Saeed said nothing; he was well aware of the difficulty of this match.
"However, this Shang Ren cannot possibly be the strongest person on the China team, after all, Fang Yuan is the captain... In addition to being the team captain, he has another identity, that of the recipient of this year's Ron Prize. The significance of the Ron Prize... you should understand, its value rivals a group of top Trainers. He can't be weak," Aria said, almost in despair.
Why couldn't this Shang Ren be the captain? Instead, there was a monster like Fang Yuan with such a terrifying status?
What a bizarre international joke for a World Pokémon Doctor to participate in Pokémon battles.
"This Fang Yuan... I've battled against him once," one of the first team members, the newly appointed Heavenly King, Cairo, looked at Fang Yuan's familiar profile on the screen, feeling awkward.
Several members of the second team felt equally distressed upon seeing Fang Yuan's profile.
Back when Fang Yuan swept through Combat City, Cairo, as the then captain of the second team, symbolically left a message: "I hope to meet and battle you again at the World Tournament."
And now, they had really met. Talk about jinxing it.
Just uncertain was, with Fang Yuan who brought out two Master-level Pokémon a year ago, how strong had he become now.
```