The tournament took place on Heles Beach. The vast expanse of sand stretched from the west of Rondo to the Goldeen Strait and was filled with marquees and roped off battlefields. The opening ceremony on the main stage had officially kicked off the league year and taken far too long and involved thanking far too many sponsors. Nerves, which had been present from the start, had truly kicked in halfway through and I separated myself from the group early to take a breath of air where there wasn't thousands of people crowding around. I’d hugged Mareep for a good fifteen minutes finding immense comfort in her wooliness.

  I came back in time to catch the exhibition match. Elaine flew in on her Volcarona and faced off against Ren, last year’s Nocturne Conference finalist and a ground-type specialist. They exchanged a few lines, which Elaine had previously complained to me were scripted, and then the match began. Ren’s Hippowdon was fierce. He forced Volcarona onto the ground by summoning a powerful sandstorm and proceeded to attack her with localised Earthquakes. Volcarona fought back by taking using Sunny Day, dissipating the sandstorm and allowing her to attack from the sky. Hippowdon, despite its bulkiness, dodged easily by remaining below ground. The battle favoured the Pokémon that had greater control over the weather at any given moment so that was where they spent their energy, rather than with direct attacks. The fight seemed even for a while, but as it went on, an early burn Volcarona had inflicted on Hippowdon with Will-O-Wisp began to show results. Clearly tired, he let his guard down for a moment and got directly hit with a Solar Beam, finishing the match.

  Elaine didn’t stay to entertain the crowd. She shook hands with Ren and flew off home as soon as it ended. After, I waited with Godfrey, Darren, Sunny, and Joey – who had finally come out of his self-imposed isolation – but, beyond Darren and Godfrey cracking a few jokes to lift everyone's spirits, we barely spoke during the hour before we had to separate to go to our respective arenas.

  My battle was one of the first on my assigned battlefield. I walked up to it, jittering, unable to hear what the announcer was saying due to the rush in my brain. The whistle blew and I brought Mareep’s pokeball to my lips before throwing it out onto the pitch. It was a habit I’d picked up from Elaine. I’d seen her make the same gesture when both releasing and returning a Pokémon and, because I was far too easy to influence for my idol, I thought it looked cool and tried emulating it. After doing it a couple of times I realized it was a little freaky to copy her like that, but by then I was already performing the action automatically. Happily, I don’t think she’d noticed.

  Mareep burst out onto the field and glared at her opponent. I was facing an older man, dressed in a suit and carrying a cane, despite the outfit being totally unsuited for the beach. His choice of Pokémon was a Staryu who spun enthusiastically at first, but then faltered after seeing the sparks coming off Mareep. I managed to relax a little. We had a good match-up. The first round of the tournament was a one-on-one battle. For every round an additional Pokémon could participate, with the obvious limit of six. For the Newbie Tourney specifically, Elaine had told me, it was rare to get a full team fighting even in the last round, and when they did, the strength of the individual Pokémon tended to be weaker.

  “Staryu, use Water Gun,” said the old man.

  The Staryu dug its lower two, stubby limbs into the sand and bent the top one forwards. Then it blasted a stream of water at Mareep. She didn’t dodge. She had been Charging since before she had hit the ground. The water barely tickled her.

  “Swift,” called out the man.

  “Thunder Shock,” I said in reply. My voice quavered as I spoke and for a moment, I was worried that Mareep hadn’t even heard me. She knew what to do regardless. A torrent of electricity collided with the oncoming stars and immediately overpowered them. Staryu tried to leap out of the way but it was too late. It got hit, square, by the move and was thrown backwards raising a cloud of sand. Mareep began to Charge once more as we waited for our opponents' retaliation. As the view cleared, I realized it was unnecessary. Staryu laid out flat on the ground, the light in its gem gone out. The arbiter called the match in our favour and before I knew it, I had my face buried in Mareep’s wool.

  “I’d say it was a good battle, but I don’t think I managed to put up much of a fight,” said the man. Staryu was already returned, and he walked up to me, his hand outstretched.

  “It was a bad matchup for you,” I said, shaking it.

  “I get the feeling there’s more to it than that,” he said. “Pokémon training is a young man’s pursuit after all.”

  “Is this your first time competing?” I asked.

  “Why yes. Staryu is my first ever Pokémon too. I never had much of an interest in this whole thing when I was your age, but since I retired last year, I thought I might as well give it a shot. Anyway, don’t mind me. I have to bring Staryu to a nurse. Keep it up young lady, you’re doing well.”

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  “Thank you.”

  I was on quite the high as I left the battlefield, one arm around Mareep, the other hand stroking Comfey. My little fairy was moody that she didn’t get to heal Mareep. It was something she had been looking forwards to.

  I walked over to Godfrey who had been spectating, and he pulled me into a hug, saying that he was proud of me. I let him fuss over me until Mareep nipped at his sleeve, drawing his attention to her.

  “I’m very proud of you too, Mareep. You did great out there,” he said. She raised her head smugly.

  Unfortunately, Godfrey had to leave to do some college work or something, but he promised to invite us all for dinner that night to celebrate the first day of the tournament, and my first official win.

  My emotions settled and I had to admit to myself that the battle had been pretty anticlimactic. I wasn’t complaining, but I had been expecting more after the despairing spars Elaine put me through. She called them spars anyway. I saw the more as a way for Mareep to either continually bash herself against a wall or run from sadistic nightmares depending on whether Elaine wanted to train her in attack or defence. That Glimmora of hers was especially frightening. When she curled into a ball, nothing Mareep could do could scratch her, and when she decided to start firing it was all Mareep could do to jump out of the way of Flash Cannons that left craters on the ground. To be honest, I wasn’t sure Elaine’s training was all that effective. It was true that Mareep looked spryer and more confident, but I was certain that had more to do with having seen Silín’s best in action, rather than her own capabilities. Though, upon consideration, that was valuable in its own right.

  “Well Mareep,” I said. “Our first official battle is a win.”

  She maaed and nuzzled my palm. I patted her head and surveyed Heles Beach, taking it in properly for the first time now that I wasn’t a mess of nerves. To say the beach was big was an understatement. Both the city and the sea were far enough in the distance that I had to squint to make them out clearly. The festival took up all of the space. It wasn’t just the main battlegrounds, the beach was also dotted with food stalls, market stalls, nurse’s tents, information tents, stages where bands would be playing during the evening, and Arceus knows what else. There were also cameramen and reporters from every channel I knew and more running around. I hadn’t been paying attention to whether there had been any during my match and the thought that there might have been brought a flush to my face. I wondered if my parents saw me. I banished the thought.

  Besides the main tournament matches, there were also different categories of battles being fought. Double battles were the most popular, and while it didn’t contribute anything to the league standings, there was a hefty prize for winning. One other section of the beach that particularly interested me was the casual battlefields where trainers had friendly spars unrelated to the official matches. Godfrey had said they would be mostly taken over by the more experienced trainers who were restless from not being able to enter the tournament. First though, I had to meet up with my companions.

  I found Joey in the middle of his match. Espurr was toying with a Shuckle, throwing it around the place while barely looking at it. It was frankly pitiful. The battle lasted a long time due the Shuckle’s ridiculously high defences, but eventually it collapsed without ever managing to get a hit in. The trainer looked distraught after the humiliating match and Joey’s dismissive attitude didn’t help. He either refused to shake his opponent's hand, or possibly didn’t even notice it outstretched, and the only acknowledgment of the battle at all was a muttered “Good fight,” as he left the field. I had my serious doubts about his spatial awareness, because apparently, he didn’t notice me either, even though I put in the effort to wave at him. Grumbling, I caught up to him and gave him a light tap on his shin with my boot.

  “Ow! What was that for?”

  “Just making sure you knew I was here.”

  “You could have just said something.”

  “This was easier,” I said and after a brief hesitation added “Congratulations on your victory. It was a clean win.”

  “It was a boring win,” he said. “Barely a fight at all. How did you do?”

  “Truthfully, a bit the same. It was over a lot quicker, but it wasn’t exactly exhilarating.”

  “Tomorrow’s matches should be better. The people not taking this seriously will be rooted out by then.”

  “We’ll see.”

  We found Darren not long after. Auri had her chest puffed out and scratches all over her rocky exterior. Comfey, eager to finally have something to do, hopped over to her to heal them. This enraged Auri who snapped at her. It turned into a weird tussle where Auri tried to bite Comfey, and Comfey dodged while healing her wounds.

  “How did it go?” I asked.

  “Pretty good,” said Darren. “We fought against a Grotle. It was a tough match-up, but Auri pulled through. How did your matches go?”

  “Nothing exciting,” I said. “They were both pretty easy.”

  “Lucky you. Auri, stop showing off your scratches. Let Comfey heal you. We got to be in tip-top shape for tomorrow too. Have you seen Sunny?”

  “Not yet. Do you know where her battle was taking place?”

  “Hang on, I’ll text her in the group chat.”

  It took a good ten minutes before Sunny replied. She said she was over at the east end of the beach, between a candyfloss stall and a nurse's tent. We found her sitting on the sand, clutching Coral to her chest. Her hands where still trembling and there were traces of tears around her eyes. I knelt beside her and gave her a tight hug.

  “You know, I don’t mean to say it was unfair, but...” she said.

  “What happened?” asked Darren.

  “I was up against a trainer from Unova. He either didn’t know, or didn’t care that this was a tournament for new trainers. He had a Serperior, and it had obviously had a lot of experience. Coral put up a brave fight, but I still forfeited early. I didn’t want to see her get hurt.”