Pokémon: Master System.

"The Salt Stone Giant has lost its ability to fight!"

"Xia Yu actually won?" Cheng Taiheng still couldn't believe it. "He Zhizhou's ace Pokémon actually lost the match like that. It's too surprising."

"Xia Yu was very well prepared today. Facing the powerful Salt Rock Giant, he chose to use the Toxic move to get off to a good start. If he can defeat two more Pokémon, Xia Yu will qualify for the National Finals!"

…………

"Go, Grimmsnarl." He Zhizhou remained calm, seemingly unaffected, and immediately dispatched the second Pokémon, Grimmsnarl.

Xia Yu was filled with vigilance towards the mischievous, hairy troll.

"Provocation, you long-haired troll!"

"Provocation, Buzzing Bat!"

Xia Yu and He Zhizhou gave the order almost simultaneously, and both chose to have their Pokémon use the Taunt move.

The Nodding Bat emitted sound waves from its purple ears, with Dark-type energy spreading along with the sound waves. Even so, the speed at which it released the move was still not as fast as the Taunt move cast by the Grimmsnarl.

As the top-tier ability, Mischievous Heart almost always guarantees the first move when using a status move at the same level.

The long-haired troll's dark energy surged from its body, almost instantly covering the Nombat and interrupting its Taunt skill!

This was the first time Xia Yu had encountered such a situation. Although the Buzzbat could use sound waves to perform a taunt skill that was similar to the effect of Prankster, it was not the real Prankster and was no match for the Hairy Troll.

"Say something tough, Longhair Troll." He Zhizhou's voice rang out, and Longhair Troll once again released Dark-type energy, which attached itself to the Nombu.

With its Attack and Attack reduced, the Grimmsnarl returns to its Poké Ball and swaps with the Pokémon on its back.

"Go, Insect Armor Saint!"

"Buzzing Bat, turn back at top speed."

Xia Yu suddenly felt that the situation was getting out of his control; everything had just happened too fast. From He Zhizhou switching players to the release of two consecutive skills, only a dozen seconds had passed.

However, in this short period of time, Buzzbat's attack power decreased and its transformation moves were sealed, so Xia Yu could only let Buzzbat use the Rapid Return move to switch out.

He Zhizhou, on the other hand, switched to Bug-Armor Saint, thus making all three of his Pokémon available for display.

Saltstone Giant, Insect Armor Saint, Hairy Troll.

Looking at the Insect Armor Saint, Xia Yu's eyebrows twitched, and an ominous premonition rose in his heart.

"Holy Insect Armor! Prayer for Resurrection!"

It really is the Prayer of Resurrection. The signature move of Bug Beetle and Babuboo can revive Pokémon that have lost the ability to battle and restore some of their HP.

With the prayer of resurrection, the Salt Stone Giant regained some of its strength, and the advantage that Xia Yu had painstakingly built up crumbled in the blink of an eye, forcing everything to start all over again.

The only good news is that the Insectoid Archmage's Prayer of Resurrection can basically only be used once per match. It requires a long break before it can be used again.

However, this Insect Armor Saint is somewhat unusual. This match is much more difficult than Xia Yu had imagined.

The Nobbat successfully executed its Rapid Return, crashing into the Bug Beetle and causing minor damage before returning to its Poké Ball.

Xia Yu sent out Charizard!

Chapter 255 Disgusting Tactics

"Come back, Insect Armor Saint!"

After releasing the Prayer of Resurrection, the Insect Armor Saint had completed its mission.

"Charizard, clear the skies!"

Xia Yu still had Charizard activate the weather first, while He Zhizhou switched to Insectivor and brought out Salt Giant.

Xia Yu was extremely cautious when facing the Salt Stone Giant.

A Gym Leader-level Saltstone Golem using its own Rock-type move would absolutely cripple Charizard, which is four times weak to Rock, and could even KO it in one hit.

Although Charizard has the powerful Grass-type move Solar Beam to counter Salt Giant, it's still best to be careful.

However, Xia Yu was clearly overthinking things. Facing Xia Yu's Charizard, He Zhizhou's voice rang out again: "Saltstone Giant, use Explosion!"

Upon hearing He Zhizhou's order, Xia Yu's pupils suddenly contracted. Recalling the skill pool of the Insect Armor Saint just now, Xia Yu had already guessed He Zhizhou's tactics!

"Charizard, fly into the air and get out of the way!"

"boom!"

A powerful shockwave swept in, and even though Charizard had already flown into the air, it was still engulfed by the shockwave from the explosion, causing it significant damage and leaving it severely injured.

"What's going on? Player He Zhizhou actually had the Salt Stone Giant, which had just been resurrected, use Big Bang!"

"To be honest, I don't understand He Zhizhou's tactics either. You have to know that of He Zhizhou's three Pokémon, only one is a core Pokémon, Grimmsnarl. The rest, Insectivora and Grimmsnarl, are support-type Pokémon."

"Without the Salt Stone Giant, it will be very difficult for He Zhizhou to defeat Xia Yu."

…………

Just when everyone was confused by He Zhizhou's command, He Zhizhou switched to Insect Armor Saint again.

"Go, Insect Armor Saint."

"Charizard, Burst Fire!"

A look of seriousness flashed in Xia Yu's eyes. He immediately ordered Charizard to unleash its maximum power, Bursting Burn. He had to break through to the Insect Armor Saint level to have even a sliver of hope for victory.

Flames shot into the sky, instantly engulfing the entire area and engulfing the Insect Armor Saint in flames.

Charizard's STAB move, combined with Sunny Day, Solar Power ability, and double type advantage against Bug/Hyperbolic attacks, would be an absolute 100% KO in the game.

But this is reality, unlike the game. In addition, He Zhizhou's Insect Armor Saint is a specialist in both defenses, only undergoing physical strength and energy resistance training, and has hardly been trained in offensive aspects.

In short, this is a Pokémon that has lost its offensive capabilities and is purely a tank and support Pokémon. With its strength at the level of a Gym Leader, Bug-type Pokémon actually withstood this attack.

Seeing that Insect Armor Saint had actually withstood this attack, Xia Yu's expression was quite grim. He really hadn't expected that Insect Armor Saint could actually block it.

Compared to Xia Yu's shock, He Zhizhou remained quite calm.

Others only saw the glamorous side of his Insect Armor Saint, but they didn't see the silent efforts behind the scenes. Day after day of physical training and energy resistance training were what forged the Insect Armor Saint's exaggerated fleshiness.

"Insect Armor Saint, use Sleep!"

"Insect Armor Saint, talking nonsense!"

He Zhizhou's voice slowly rang out. Sleep and sleep talking are undoubtedly a very classic skill combination. The Sleep move is a Psychic-type status move that can put a Pokémon into a sleep state, while restoring all of its own HP and curing all other status conditions.

The Sleep Talk skill can only be used while sleeping. It will randomly select one of all learned moves. Because the move is randomly selected and can only be used while sleeping, the Sleep Talk skill is quite useless in most cases.

After all, randomly selecting the move you want from the dozens of moves a Pokémon can learn is quite difficult.

However, in a few cases, the skill of sleep talking can produce unexpected results.

That is, Pokémon forget the moves they don't need and only keep the core moves, so that the moves they use in their sleep are always very powerful.

For example, He Zhizhou's Insect Armor Saint has not learned any other skills besides sleeping, sleep talking, and resurrection prayer!

It's obvious that He Zhizhou's Insect Armor Saint had deliberately forgotten its skills, leaving only these three core skills, with the aim of continuously casting Resurrection Prayer through sleep talking.

Of the three skills, excluding sleep talking, the chance of Insect Armor Saint casting Resurrection Prayer is one in two. Although it is one in two, this probability can be increased through continuous practice.

For example, He Zhizhou's Insect Armor Saint, through long-term training, has a 70% chance of casting Resurrection Prayer when using sleep talking.

He Zhizhou's voice rang out, accompanied by a surge of normal energy. Insect Armor Saint successfully cast the Resurrection Prayer skill, and the Salt Stone Giant, which had just used the Big Bang, was resurrected and recovered most of its strength.

The Prayer of Resurrection, which could originally only be used once, became infinitely usable through the combination of sleeping and sleep talking. Paired with the Salt Stone Giant's massive self-destruction, this formed He Zhizhou's self-destruction tactic.

"So that's the tactic!"

"Genius, simply a genius idea."

"Have the Bug Beetle use the Sleep and Sleep Talk moves to continuously cast Revive Prayer, then have the Salt Rock Giant perform infinite Self-Destruct, and finally add a Prankster Pokémon to prevent the opponent from using Taunt to lock down the Bug Beetle's moves!"

"He Zhizhou is truly a battle genius!"

Everyone gasped in amazement, astonished by He Zhizhou's genius. Regardless of victory or defeat, He Zhizhou's unique tactics alone would make him famous throughout the world.

"I have to say that this generation of young people are really creative and have unique ideas." Cheng Taiheng said with emotion, "I remember in our time, very few people used status moves. When we played, we would just use whatever moves were the most powerful. As soon as the two sides entered the field, they would unleash their moves and bombard each other with various skills. If one lost, they would switch to the next Pokémon. Unlike now, which is all flashy and complicated."

“My lord, times have changed.” Jiang Yao, standing to the side, also joked with a smile.

…………

"Come back, Charizard. Go, Sceptile."

Xia Yu changed his Pokémon again. It was obvious that He Zhizhou was about to switch to Salt Rock Giant to launch a self-destruct attack on Xia Yu's Pokémon. Therefore, Xia Yu decisively chose to switch his Pokémon to Sceptile to withstand Salt Rock Giant's explosion.

Xia Yu had no choice but to accept the second explosion, as the heavily injured Charizard couldn't withstand it.

If you choose to replace it with a Buzzbat, the Saltstone Giant can use its self-regeneration ability to restore itself to full health, and the Buzzbat, whose transformation abilities are sealed by Taunt, poses no threat to the Saltstone Giant.

Therefore, Xia Yu only had one choice: to send out the Lizard King.

The situation was becoming increasingly unfavorable for Xia Yu, but it wasn't entirely without a chance of winning.

The three Pokémon—Giant Saltstone, Grimmsnarl, and Grimmsnarl—are linked together. If any one of them is eliminated, He Zhizhou's tactics will crumble on their own!

"Come back, Insect Armor Saint. Charge, Salt Stone Giant!"

He Zhizhou changed his Pokémon again, switching to Giant Saltstone, which immediately used the Explosion move upon entering the field.

"Lizard King, use Leaf Storm!"

This time, Xia Yu attempted to have Sceptile take advantage of He Zhizhou's switch Pokémon to defeat Giant Saltstone with Leaf Storm!