Having listened to Fang Yuan's description, Rocco and Darkrai nodded their heads.
Although they were not clear about what Fang Yuan was plotting, since he had chosen to challenge, he must have his own ideas.
"Alright, let's not talk about this anymore, the tournament is about to start," Fang Yuan said.
In the first round of this Fang Yuan tournament, the splendid performance competition was to showcase combination skills.
During the preparation phase, each of Fang Yuan's seven main Pokemon received his guidance and developed new one-hit kill techniques that they could use under their current conditions.
Now was the time to verify those results.
There would be nearly two more months to perfect these results because the Road of Champions wouldn't start until around September.
This period was Fang Yuan's time to enhance his strength.
...
Nine o'clock in the morning.
The seven participating Pokemon had completed the drawing of lots.
Their order of appearance would be Venusaur, Gengar, Dragonite, Self-detonating Magnetic Monster, Monferno, Milotic, and Eevee.
The spectator seats were filled with Ditto, Klink, Rock Puppy, Rocco and the last to arrive, Gengar, all holding juice and Energy Blocks, ready to watch the show.
In the judges' seats, Fang Yuan and his team were more serious and solemn; as judges, they could not afford any mistakes.
The fairness and smooth operation of a grand competition depended greatly on the judges.
"Number one, Venusaur," Fang Yuan called out from the temporary judging platform.
"Venus!" With his voice's cue, the large Venusaur, stepping heavily, walked onto the central stage.
Facing gaze after gaze, it took a deep breath, and the air around it immediately began to stir.
Before joining the world competition, Venusaur's strength was only mid-level Master class, but after such a long period of training, especially since Fang Yuan had prepared seeds of Top-Level Fruit Trees for Venusaur to transform the Sun and Moon Forest, its progress had been significant.
Its strength was gradually approaching the top-tier domain.
"Venus!" As the first to perform, Venusaur showed no hint of nervousness, standing as firmly as a mountain.
With a roar, a fierce sharpness burst forth in its eyes, like a flash of a sword. At the same time, around its body, twenty-four sword-shaped leaves imbued with impressive strength appeared.
The leaves were a vibrant green, surrounded by a glowing aura, clearly enhanced by growth moves; each leaf sharp enough to cut through steel.
"He has already reached this step?" In the audience, Rocco slightly smiled upon seeing this, proud of the Venusaur he had taught.
The twenty-four long leaves seemed to be the initial technique of Frenzy Plant, but the number of leaves was too small, making it look somewhat different.
These twenty-four long leaves hovered around Venusaur, almost forming a large array. Just as all Pokemon were curious about what Venusaur was going to do next, a buzzing sound emerged, and a pale blue wave motion formed on the twenty-four sword-shaped leaves; the wave then took the shape of swords.
It was indeed Swords Dance.
When Pokemon use Swords Dance to boost their attack power, blue swords swirl and gather around them. At this moment, Venusaur was doing the same, but its Swords Dance was flawlessly integrated with the twenty-four long leaves it had conjured previously.
"Venus!" With another roar from the Venusaur, the long leaves became as solid as steel, humming with sword energy. In an instant, twelve of those sword leaves plunged into the ground, causing a massive energy fluctuation that cracked the earth. The emerging energy wave pulverized stones, while the remaining twelve leaves rose slightly higher. The earth- and sky-bound swords seemed to form an array that enclosed both ground and air.
At that moment, all the sword leaves vibrated—or, more accurately, danced. With a thought from Venusaur, the twenty-four sword leaves began to switch places instantaneously, those on the ground shooting towards the sky and those above falling like blades of light. The alternating dance of the swords quickly spawned a storm: starting slow, then speeding up, until it was so fast that it dazzled the spectators, yet there was a gratifying thrill to it. Each spectator could feel the destructive power within the Sword Leaf Storm.
Throughout this process, Venusaur resembled a sword saint controlling a sword formation, with an overwhelming and surging momentum that seemed to climb without end. The wild aura spread wave after wave through the Sword Leaf Storm, with Venusaur's own strength being magnified by Swords Dance.
Eventually, the twenty-four sword leaves combined in a continuous sequence to form a single massive sword leaf, which, like the light of a sword piercing through a storm at dawn, concluded with a powerful upward thrust that pierced the clouds, incredibly potent!!
Boom!!!
In the eyes of the watching Pokémon, it was as if they saw a streak of blue light, flashing into the sky and wreaking havoc on the cloud layer.
At that moment, when the Pokémon looked back at Venusaur, its energy had reached its peak, and the area around it was a complete mess, filled with the marks of the Sword Leaf Storm's attacks.
"Incredible, incredible." Gengar couldn't help but exclaim upon realizing the Garden Keeper Venusaur had such a powerful technique and asked Rocco, what is this?
"I call it the Immortal Slaying Sword Formation..." Rocco said calmly...
Immortal Slaying Sword Formation, my ass... Eevee scoffed upon hearing this, it's clearly the game skill Ghostly Sword Art, Storm Style!
"Frenzy Plant, Growth, Swords Dance combination skill..." Regardless of what the audience or contestants thought, it was time for Fang Yuan and the other two professional evaluators to score Venusaur's performance of the combination skill.
Handsome, beautiful, cute... these attributes could not only add points to Milotic's beauty but also to other attributes.
Venusaur's Sword Leaf Storm could be considered quite handsome. Within the sharp blue-green sword formation, even the air around Venusaur vibrated with a buzzing sound, and it itself was like a divine sword ready to unsheathe and pierce through the void, its coolness reaching the extreme.
This move combined attack, defense, and enhancement in one, with a fairly good tactical effect. As for the difficulty of coordination, Venusaur used the General Series moves Swords Dance and Growth, as well as its own type's great move Frenzy Plant, which was decent.
General Series moves and Strengthening Moves are the easiest skills to coordinate into attack moves. If the attributes are the same, coordination is even simpler; if not, it becomes more difficult. Venusaur completed the Sword Leaf Storm with a combination of two attributes and three moves, which was a passable performance.
At least Rock Puppy had its eyes captured by this handsome combination skill, eyes shining with interest.
It wanted to do one, too!!
A perfect score is 30 points, with each evaluator contributing 10 points. Begin scoring.
Darkrai: "8 points, too little variation."
Rotom: "7.5 points, too many flaws."
Fang Yuan said, "…7 points, jack of all trades and master of none."
Despite combining attack, defense, and enhancement in one, it was too easy to counter, and every aspect was very average, none reaching the extreme.
In a combination skill, rather than covering all bases but lacking intensity, it would be better to focus on enhancing a particular quality to the limit for maximum effect.
It's worth noting that the passing standard for the first evaluation was to use "Top-tier Coordinated Deathblow Skills" as a baseline, which requires that at least one of the powers contained within the combination skill be of a top-tier grade, and Venusaur clearly didn't qualify.
Integrating high-intensity energy that has transformed through coordination into a combination skill is what really counts.
In other words, Venusaur's strength was not enough; the energy level it commanded was too low. It barely passed, and the score of 22.5 was given considering nearly-top-tier standards.
Of course, if judged by Professional level or Senior level standards, Venusaur's scores would have been higher, even perfect, but unfortunately, in this Fang Yuan conference, its opponents were all of top-tier monster class, so the requirements could not be lowered.
22.5 points?
Upon hearing this score, Venusaur felt deflated.
Rocco was also stunned, how could this be, such a handsome Immortal Slaying Sword Formation. Even though a single Explosion could burn it up, the score was still too low...
Venusaur: 〒_〒 Oooh, that's too little, if I'd known, I wouldn't have practiced this and instead focused on Divine Tree Descendant Thousand-armed Avalokitesvara.