Adventures Beyond!

Chapter 72: Qualifiers II- Encounter!

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Ionic Stadium, Sinnoh

Through a small river within the Ionic Stadium, a school of fish swam their way through the mostly clear water with the current coming from behind them. They continued to swim down the river in search of food for the day.

Little did they know, though, they were going to be the food.

Before the school of fish could go any further, two of them were impaled by a wooden spear, the sharp item puncturing their bodies before landing in the soil beneath the river. The fish impaled by the spear squirmed in place for a few seconds before the movement of their bodies slowed to a stop, their bodies now still.

Landing on the grass beside the river was a Snivy, who stared at the wooden spear in the water for a few seconds before nodding to herself. Success. Walking over, she reached over the small river and lifted the spear up. The two fish were still there.

"That's breakfast taken care of," The Grass-Type began making her way back to a clearing in the forest, which had a campfire still burning hot in the middle of it.

On either side of the campfire was a y-shaped stick driven into the ground. She put the wooden spear in the divot of both y-shaped sticks over the campfires before walking off to a tree and sitting beneath it, putting her back against the trunk and closing her eyes.

She could feel the exhaustion of the past twelve hours catching up to her. Thanks to the lack of a time limit, the prelims had gone far into the night, and went beyond the night. She had come up with the strategy of stealing headbands while everyone else went to hunker down for the night and get some rest. Because of that, she had managed to get her hands on two headbands other than her own. Green and red. That only left her to find a yellow headband, which she wasn't able to find during the night.

She could deal with that later, though. For now, she needed to get some rest while her fish were being cooked by the fire.

"Goooooooood morning, competitors!!" A familiar voice coming from the loudspeakers jolted Sophie up from her sleep, prompting her to quickly stand up and raise her guard. Once she realized that the voice had come from the loudspeakers, she groaned, rubbing her eyes.

"What now...?"

"I hope you slept well, 'cause I sure did if I say so myself!" The old-timey voice exclaimed, making the Snivy groan, "This competition is shaping up to be the bee's knees, I say I say! I'm ecstatic to announce that ten competitors have already qualified to the next round! That leaves ninety spots remaining, with only forty competitors before the sudden death begins!"

Sophie's now bloodshot eyes narrowed. Only ten? It had been at least twenty hours since the Ion Cup began, if she was going off when the competition started at noon the previous day. How have only ten Pokémon gotten the four headbands that they needed?

The Snivy soon stood to her feet, using the tree to help herself up. That didn't matter. All that mattered at the moment was that she made it to the next round. She hoped her friends would be able to do the same, but there wasn't any time to ensure that. She would just have to trust that their training was enough to get them through the preliminaries.

Yawning, the Grass-Type sauntered over to the campfire, where her fish were still in the process of being cooked by the flames. She was glad that her travels since leaving Casteel City improved her wilderness survival skills. If she had been in such a competition before her travels, gathering food would've been a serious issue.

After a few seconds of waiting for the fish to cook, she suddenly caught the sound of one of the bushes behind her beginning to rustle and shake. Her eyes widened as she glanced over at the bush. The first thing she thought to do was to remove the spear from over the fire, so the fish wouldn't end up overcooked. Next, she swiftly used Dragon Claw to latch herself to a branch of one of the nearby trees, using it to swing herself up into it. She soon landed on the branch, wincing as she looked at her right hand, which was covered with scales. She shut her eyes tight, straining to make them fade once more.