[Rain Dance VS Sandstorm]
Unlike Rain Dance and Sunny Day, which can coexist with certain weather effects, sand is completely different. The moment it comes into contact with water, it becomes wet and heavy, causing it to rapidly fall to the ground.
Facing Pikachu's Rain Dance, which had reached Grandmaster proficiency, Tyranitar's Sandstorm was only at the Proficient level. The instant the two weather effects collided, Tyranitar's Sandstorm was immediately suppressed and was soon completely dispelled.
...
Before long, the Sandstorm sweeping across the battlefield died down and vanished without a trace. In its place, heavy gray clouds filled the sky, their leaden weight hanging low overhead as a fine drizzle began to fall steadily.
The once fierce and imposing desert tyrant, Tyranitar, was soon drenched from head to toe. In mere moments, the mighty Pokémon had been thoroughly soaked, looking like a miserable drowned rat.
"Damn it! Tyranitar, use Earthquake!!"
Seeing that Tyranitar's Sandstorm had been effortlessly broken by Ash, Ashtwo shouted his next command in frustration.
The instant Ash heard Steyn order Tyranitar to use Earthquake, the corner of his mouth suddenly curled upward, and a bright, radiant smile appeared on his face.
At the same time, Giovanni, who had temporarily taken on the role of referee at the center line outside the battlefield, couldn't help but frown.
Over the past six months, Ashtwo had gone through countless battles while training and raising his level. Throughout those fights, he had always displayed remarkable calmness and intelligence.
But now, facing the real Ash himself, he was behaving unusually impatiently and impulsively.
That was something Giovanni had not anticipated beforehand.
And judging from Ashtwo's current reaction, Giovanni was far from satisfied.
Ash, however, couldn't care less about why Steyn was becoming so anxious and agitated.
At this moment, Steyn's unstable state had given him an opening.
And Ash naturally had no intention of letting such an opportunity slip away.
"Pikachu, stick your tail into the ground. Then maintain that position and use Thunder directly!!"
Ashtwo ordered Tyranitar to launch another attack, while Ash immediately gave Pikachu its countermeasure.
Pikachu was a small and extremely agile Pokémon.
To deal with—or even counter—fast and nimble Pokémon like Pikachu, there were generally two choices: use a control move with a high chance of hitting, or unleash a wide-area attack capable of covering a large portion of the battlefield.
Ground-type moves were super effective against Electric-types.
In his previous battles, Ash had encountered plenty of opponents who deliberately used Earthquake to target Pikachu.
And when it came to Earthquake—a powerful Ground-type move capable of covering the entire battlefield and delivering tremendous damage—Ash naturally had his own method of dealing with it.
That was to make use of Pikachu's spring-like, zigzag-shaped tail.
By driving its tail into the ground, Pikachu could use its spring-like tail as a buffer when the seismic waves spread through the earth.
With the tail absorbing and dispersing much of the force, the damage Pikachu suffered was practically negligible.
Ground-type moves counter Electric-types. Over the course of his previous competitions, Ash had encountered many opponents who used Earthquake specifically to target Pikachu.
And against a powerful Ground-type attack like Earthquake, which covered the entire battlefield and dealt explosive damage, Ash naturally had a solution.
He simply had Pikachu use its spring-like tail as a shock absorber.
Once Pikachu inserted its tail into the ground, the moment the seismic waves propagated through the battlefield, the spring-like tail acted as a buffer.
As a result, the damage Pikachu received was almost negligible.
Earthquake had a base power of 100, making it an extremely powerful Ground-type move, and using such a technique consumed a considerable amount of energy.
Yet Pikachu could effortlessly neutralize it with a simple trick—Tail Stand.
One had to admit that seeing such a powerful attack completely nullified in this manner could drive an opponent absolutely mad.
Fortunately, only Pikachu could pull off such a ridiculous counter.
Of course, that statement wasn't entirely accurate.
Spoink, Grumpig, Glameow... Pokémon that, like Pikachu, possessed spring-like tails could also imitate Pikachu's method of using its tail to counter Earthquake.
"Rumble...!!"
Tyranitar stomped its feet and unleashed Earthquake.
The once smooth and solid battlefield instantly began to crack apart. Huge fissures spread across the ground as the entire arena shook violently, breaking apart under the overwhelming force.
Yet such a spectacular and terrifying attack was effortlessly countered by Pikachu's single Tail Stand.
Pikachu planted its tail firmly into the shattered ground, balanced its body on it like a one-legged bird, swayed twice with the shaking earth...
And ultimately, nothing happened to it.
"Damn it..."
Sure enough, seeing this scene, Ashtwo was both furious and frustrated.
But while he was still fuming, Pikachu had already followed Ash's command and launched its counterattack after completely neutralizing Tyranitar's Earthquake.
"..."
"..."
"Pika...chu!!"
"..."
"..."
At that moment, Pikachu stood on the shattered battlefield with its tail firmly planted in the ground, performing its peculiar version of a one-legged stance.
Having suffered no damage whatsoever from the Earthquake, Pikachu spread its arms toward the sky.
A golden bolt of electricity shot upward from its body.
The golden lightning that Pikachu fired into the heavens seemed to trigger a chain reaction.
"KRA-KOOOM!!"
The bolt of lightning pierced directly into the rain clouds.
The next instant, an even thicker and more violent bolt of heavenly lightning suddenly descended from the sky.
BOOM!!
It tore through the clouds and came crashing straight down toward Tyranitar.
"Tyranitar, get out of the way!!"
Only moments ago, Ashtwo had still been immersed in his anger over Earthquake being effortlessly neutralized.
Now, seeing Pikachu launch such a fierce counterattack so quickly, he was startled badly.
He hurriedly ordered Tyranitar to dodge.
However, Tyranitar was a huge and heavy Pokémon whose movement speed was already relatively slow.
On top of that, it had just finished using Earthquake and was currently in the brief interval between exhausting its previous strength and gathering new strength.
Pikachu's Electric-type attacks, meanwhile, were naturally extremely fast.
And under rainy conditions, Thunder possessed a locking, targeting, and tracking effect.
In rainy weather, Thunder could practically be regarded as an attack that was guaranteed to hit.
Tyranitar had almost no chance of dodging it.
Ordering Tyranitar to evade at this moment was simply unwise.
Instead of attempting to dodge, it would have been far better to use a defensive move and withstand the attack head-on.
"KRA-KOOOM!!"
"Tyranitar—ROOOAAR!!"
Sure enough, Tyranitar had barely begun to move after receiving the command to dodge when the heavenly lightning descended from above and brutally struck its body.
The thunderbolt slammed into Tyranitar with terrifying force.
The mighty Pokémon immediately let out a deafening, agonized roar.
Tyranitar was a dual-type Rock/Dark Pokémon.
Because Tyranitar's first two evolutionary stages possessed the Ground type, many people instinctively assumed that its final evolution was also a Ground-type Pokémon.
But that was not actually the case.
After evolving into Tyranitar, most of the Ground-type power within its body had already faded away.
Although a faint resistance to electricity still remained, it was extremely weak.
Electric-type moves had neither a weakness nor a resistance relationship against either Rock or Dark.
In other words, they dealt their normal ×1 damage.
And whatever small amount of resistance Tyranitar still possessed toward electricity became even less meaningful after it was drenched by the rain and its body became highly conductive.
At this moment, Tyranitar had no way to resist.
It was forced to take the full force of a high-level Electric-type move, Thunder, with a base damage value of 100 multiplied by the rainy-weather enhancement of 1.3–1.7×.
For a moment, even Tyranitar struggled to withstand the attack.
Over the past six months, Tyranitar had relied on the overwhelming power of its pseudo-legendary body to crush opponent after opponent during its training battles.
It had charged forward in an almost unstoppable winning streak.
Perhaps throughout all those battles, it had never suffered such a devastating blow.
"Tyranitar...!!"
Ashtwo's anxious cry rang across the battlefield.
But Ash paid no attention to his junior disciple's frantic voice.
He had already decided that he was going to teach Ashtwo a painful lesson about the realities of battle.
And he naturally had no intention of breaking his promise.
"Pikachu, continue using Thunder!"
"..."
"..."
"Pika—chu!!"
Following Ash's command, Pikachu immediately prepared another attack.
Two more bolts of lightning burst from its body and shot toward the rain-filled clouds above.