Trainers have the ability to withstand sleeplessness for days on end, thanks to their physique. It's all a matter of the mind breaking away from the sleep cycle developed over a lifetime as a normal person. Once the mind adapts to the lack of sleep, the body follows. Hence, Alex hadn't had a wink of sleep over the past week, and yet he was still doing fine.
So, he was already prepared and shouting orders as he felt the aura of a Master rank radiating from the portal.
"Gardevoir! Master cage. Lyra, Mika, get your Pokémon out of the formation and flank the portal, make sure we have space to fight. Sable, stabilize the ground as much as you can," Alex shouted as he took out Stormline.
Gardevoir relayed orders, calling all of Alex's Pokémon to the center, while Lyra and Mika's Pokémon split to the sides. Sable's Pokémon joined her and tunneled underground to stabilize the platform.
Alex's Pokémon formed a crescent formation, with Togekiss, Alcremie, and Frosmoth at the center, while Alex stood off to the side, Stormline in hand and ready to fire.
Right as the Snorlax burst out of the portal, Togekiss used Follow Me, yanking its attention his way. He positioned himself in the center of the formation, far from the portal, giving Lyra and Mika the space their Pokémon needed to continue fending off the flood.
The hulking beast, easily twice its normal size, lunged forward with an unnatural speed for something so massive, its arm drawn back as it prepared to strike. It landed in front of Togekiss hard enough to split the ground, then swung a haymaker with a fat fist glowing with Normal type energy.
Alcremie, standing in front of Togekiss, immediately used her Effect Up +2 Protect, intercepting the overwhelming Giga Impact. The fist struck the barrier and stopped cold, but the sheer force of the swing, combined with the initial charge, cracked the ground and blasted a burst of wind that nearly blew away the crescent formation surrounding them.
"Now!" Alex shouted as he opened fire with Stormline, aiming at Snorlax's head.
What followed was a barrage of status moves and concentrated special attacks, beams and bursts of color lancing in from every angle as they hammered Snorlax. The trio at the front stayed safely behind their barrier, untouched by the barrage even as the onslaught debilitated and wounded the massive Pokémon.
Unable to move after exhausting its stamina with Giga Impact, Snorlax took the full brunt of the assault. Most of their attacks were ineffective, given that their opponent was two ranks above them. The status moves in particular did the least, barely having any effect, while the special attacks seemed to dissipate the moment they touched Snorlax's thick fat.
Still, quantity made up for the lack of quality as the bombardment continued. A few statuses finally started to stick, such as Burn, Paralyze, Poison, and several stacks of attribute reductions. As for the damage, they slowly worked their way through the Pokémon's massive health pool.
Ready to use another move, Snorlax tried to use Rest to recover but found itself unable to stop repeating Giga Impact. It had been hit by Gardevoir's Effect Up +2 Encore.
It attempted to target other Pokémon who posed more of a threat, but it couldn't look away from Togekiss, who kept spamming Follow Me. Trapped and unable to resist the effects controlling it, Snorlax had no choice but to pull its fist back and harmlessly punch Frosmoth's Protect barrier.
Unfortunately, despite the overwhelming position Alex and his Pokémon held in this battle, other complications soon emerged.
"Alex! The platform can't take any more of this! You need to bring it down fast!" Sable shouted.
The trouble with this Master ranked Snorlax wasn't its powerful punch. It was the way it delivered it, specifically, the step that thundered through the ground and cracked their platform.
Even if they were guaranteed to win this battle, it would be pointless if they were thrown into the abyss, so Alex had to think of a way to take down this Snorlax with as little collateral damage as possible.
'Should I take this fight to another platform?' Alex considered before shaking his head. The only thing that would change was him and his Pokémon taking the risk rather than everyone else.
BOOM!
Another powerful stomp from Giga Impact slammed into the ground, spreading and deepening the existing cracks.
"Alex!" Sable shouted, urging him to stop the Snorlax.
'If only I can stop it from moving,' Alex thought, before realizing he already had a move for that.
"Gardevoir, use Hypnosis! Put it to sleep! Crobats, go help!" Alex commanded.
Gardevoir, along with the Crobat couple by her side, used Hypnosis all at once but discovered they had missed. More accurately, their attacks dissipated before they could even reach Snorlax's eyes. It seemed the rampant energy from the bombardment was interfering with their moves.
BOOM!
In a bold attempt to follow her trainer's orders, Gardevoir commanded the Pokémon to stop all attacks before racing forward to the center of the crescent formation with the Crobat couple.
They stood around Togekiss, who had Snorlax's full attention, before their eyes glowed with the pink light of Psychic energy. Pulses of light radiated outward, bathing Snorlax's head. Its eyes grew heavy, its rage abating, until finally the comforting pull of sleep took it.
With a gentle thump, Snorlax's body leaned back and hit the dirt before snoring noises sounded.
"Phew," Alex sighed with relief. "Excellent work, Gardevoir, Crobats. Stay there and knock it out when it wakes up while the rest of the Pokémon continue their attacks."
With a nod from Gardevoir, the battle continued, this time with a knocked-out Snorlax.
Suddenly, a Snore rippled from Snorlax's mouth as a sound wave, honing in on Alex. As far as Snorlax was concerned, his greatest threat since the beginning was this stubborn human and his continuous attacks. He might have dealt insignificant damage, but thousands of rounds had been sent his way, and now Snorlax was holding a grudge.
Aegislash popped out of Alex's shadow and blocked the attack with King's Shield proving time and again how important a guardian Pokemon was to trainers.
'Shit! I forgot Snorlax learns Snore,' Alex thought, then he remembered another sleep-related move Snorlax naturally learns, but it was already too late.
The bombardment continued, chipping away at Snorlax until a peculiar snore erupted from its mouth. Snorlax, still asleep, suddenly stood and charged toward Alex's direction, covered in powerful Ground type energy. The earth tore apart, deep cracks splitting the ground as it raced toward him, with chunks of dirt and stone heaving up in its wake. Snorlax had used High Horsepower through Sleep Talk.
Since Aegislash was still recovering from using King's Shield, Ditto transformed into a second Aegislash and blocked the attack with a weaker King's Shield. Unfortunately, Ditto's King's Shield was only at Basic Proficiency, so it was unable to contend with a Pokémon two ranks above it.
As expected, the barrier shattered, dealing heavy damage to Ditto while knocking it, Aegislash, and Alex back from the explosion of Ground type energy. They soared through the air before landing near the edge of the platform, with Alex ending up closest to the edge.
"Alex!" Sable shouted, both out of concern for his life and for the state of the platform. One more solid hit, and it would likely destabilize.
Fortunately, Snorlax was finally taken down when Arcanine and Hydreigon rushed in, combining Close Combat and Draco Meteor to finish off the sleeping behemoth.
Alex heaved a sigh of relief. They had finally taken down Snorlax. He was also elated at his and his team's first Master ranked conquest.
Remembering where he stood and how precarious his position was, Alex slowly stepped away from the edge of the platform and made his way to their prize.
"Great work, guys," Alex said. "We'll be eating well when we get back to the base."
He briefly considered the possibility of bonding with it or selling it but pushed those thoughts aside to focus on what mattered most, his Pokémon's strength. This meant he would have to kill, purify, and then butcher the corpse to feed his team. With such a large body, even if the League took half, his Pokémon would be eating well for quite some time.
He stored the Snorlax in his Pokéball and then put it in his bag before running back to the center of the platform with Sable.
"How's the platform?" Alex asked.
"Not good. That last attack from Snorlax nearly unraveled everything. One more hit like that, and we would have been sent flying into the abyss."
They were currently at the edge of the sphere controlled by the League. Once they were sent off in the wrong direction, even if they somehow landed on another platform, they would be lost with no search party sent after them. Apparently, this was included in the contract they were supposed to sign.
"Alex!" Lyra and Mika shouted in fright as they ran toward the camp while their Pokémon slowly retreated. "There's a Champion ranked Electrode that just came out of the portal. We need help."
Suddenly, a massive explosion rocked the platform, sending tremors shaking everything around them. Cracks began to spider across the surface, widening with every passing second.
Then the platform split apart, hurling everything and everyone on top of it into the void.
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