Ash Ketchum, Pokemon Master By ZaneT69

Chapter 21

The pre-party for the Lumiose Conference was somewhat interesting. Ash had managed to gather info on his possible future opponents and had confirmed that Alain was here and was likely the biggest threat to Ash's victory. Ash wasn't dismissing the others, but Alain was simply the biggest obstacle.

After this conference Ash would train for a year, challenge and defeat Arius, and build a family and love and actually be around for them, which meant that he would have too settle down for at least eleven years. Ash was gonna defeat Arius and become the Kanto Champion and further reinforce his Master rank. Ash was even considering winning the Johto championship off of Lance sometime.

And then there were Ash's secret plans... which he believed everyone would enjoy once revealed.

After an announcement from the lovely Diantha, the match-ups were announced and Ash would face Titus first.

Unfortunately Titus would prove unchallenging for Ash and he would be defeated with laughable ease. Astrid would soon prove just as disappointing for Ash, but he was looking forward to battling Sawyer.

The battle started and Sawyer sent out his Slaking and too everyone's surprise Ash sent out his Aegislash. They doubted his wisdom at first, but Ash quickly reminded them all why he was a five-time champion... Aegislash used Toxic, Attract, Destiny Bond, and then he barraged Slaking with Sacred Sword and Brick Break... poor Slaking never stood a chance.

"Slaking is unable to battle! Sawyer send out your next Pokemon!" The referee commanded.

"Go Salamence," Sawyer said.

Sawyer quickly ordered Salamence too use Incinerate, but Aegislash used Protect and then followed it up with Shadow Sneak and Head Smash, causing Salamence to crash into the ground.

"Salamence is unable to battle! Sawyer send out your next Pokemon!"

Next Sawyer chose Slurpuff despite its disadvantage and had it use Flamethrower, which was stopped with Aegislash's Protect and then Slurpuff was hit with Toxic and Iron Head.

"Slurpuff is unable to battle! Since Sawyer has had three Pokemon defeated there will be a short break."

Ash got a sip of water and returned Aegislash to rest.

When the battle restarted Sawyer chose Clawitzer and Ash chose Delphox, surprising everyone once again.

Sawyer ordered Water Pulse, Ash had it redirected with Psychic and had Clawitzer hit with Will-O-Wisp, restrained with Psychic and then defeated by a Solar Beam.

Sawyer was in a difficult position, Ash had calmly defeated his Pokemon and seemed to predict which Pokemon Sawyer would choose. Sawyer's chances of victory were almost non-existent now. Even worse, Ash Ketchum was either a Move Tutor, knew one, or had just bought a lot of TM's.

Sawyer was still somehow surprised when Ash's Delphox defeated his Mega Sceptile and his Aegislash and was only half listening as the referee proclaimed Ash the winner.

Ash simply left, already planning for his battle with Alain for the conference championship. It was quite sad that someone so overly reliant upon Mega Evolution was his biggest obstacle, but such power helped those less skilled compensate for lack of skill, knowledge, and experience. Alain needed to learn and be forced to develop greater levels of skill because his Charizard was an underdeveloped paper dragon; chubby, short, lots of experience and power, but no noteworthy physical conditioning to fully develop its potential. If Alain had trained it properly then it could be near equal to Ash's own.