The preliminaries were scheduled to take place over the weekend, lasting two days and culminating with the Conference’s opening ceremony on the night of the second. The actual tournament for the Conference itself would take place over the coming week, serving as a series of battles that would push each proceeding competitor daily.

  At least, that was how Sam assumed it would work.

  There was a bit of a mystery regarding the Conference’s setup this year, as its exact schedule was yet to be announced. The only thing that had been hinted at was the number of competitors moving on, a massive two hundred fifty-six, which was a far greater sum than the Silver Conference’s usual forty-eight.

  Given that “only” four hundred trainers had registered for the Conference itself, a trainer had roughly even odds to make it in—but that was only when ignoring all other factors. Since Sam had won, he felt good about his chances, and since Redi had won her match as well, both were confident they would make it into the first round.

  Redi’s battle had been just as one-sided as Sam’s. Just like how Gengar had swept through Edgar’s team, Redi’s Porygon2 had done the same to her opponent. It turned out, people had very few ways to deal with a Porygon2 sitting in the air with Magnet Rise. The strategies that they did have would fail to get past Porygon’s Charge Beam, and then, scarily enough, a boosted Hyper Beam was enough to outright eliminate any opponent in one move—which was what happened to her opponent’s final Pokémon.

  Yet there was more to this tournament than just their battles, and as much as Sam celebrated with Redi after their victories, there was still the rest of the tournament, too. His mom sat with him for a little while before heading out to see what else Silver Town had to offer. She made a promise she would support him in his upcoming matches, but she had only just arrived here yesterday.

  Sam spent a long time on his own, just watching the preliminary battles and writing notes in a newly purchased journal with the logo of the Silver Conference on its front cover. He carefully observed every match that occurred over the weekend, and most importantly, he learned.

  Familiar trainers were here. Sam caught sight of Xavier. Eliza. That one Gible trainer from Blackthorn—Terry, he was pretty sure. The Dark Type trainer from both the Beginners’ Tournament and the Violet City Tournament, Victor, was here. And, to Sam’s surprise, Preston made it. Though Preston’s plans to catch a Dragon Type had fallen through, he had pushed past his loss of Dreepy to earn himself his final two Gym badges.

  Good for him.

  Despite this only being the preliminaries, the quality already demonstrated by the present trainers was immense. The Silver Conference wanted over two hundred powerful trainers, and it was clear that it would get its two hundred powerful trainers.

  Just with the people he recognized, Sam watched Xavier’s Donphan use its armored, wheel-like body to crush every opponent sent its way, and a purposeful switch by Xavier into his Poliwrath saw his final opponent fall in seconds. Meanwhile, Eliza took a different approach, using her Steelix and Lapras’s wide-ranging attacks to effectively take control of the entire field at once. Even trainers who had to struggle to get through their matches did so with their all. Terry’s team might not have dominated, but the ferocity of his Gabite saw it never give up, and it proved to be a powerful companion to the fierce physical attackers of his Hitmonlee and Hitmonchan.

  And then there were the outliers. The people who... probably shouldn’t have been here.

  Sam could immediately identify those trainers every time they walked up to the field. They were either far too nervous or far too cocky in the wrong way, and each and every one of them tended to wear a Trainer School’s uniform.

  People who graduated from a Trainer School and passed an elite-level test were given the right to compete in that year’s Conference. They didn’t need the experience of earning all eight badges, but they needed an intense amount of knowledge. Sometimes, those graduates were truly dominant in their field, with Hoenn’s Roxanne being a prime example of that. But even though graduating from a Trainer School and passing that test was only done by the best of the best, the vast, vast majority of graduates just simply didn’t have the battle experience.

  They were people who could state just about everything known about Pokémon, but their studies often saw them fail to put in the appropriate amount of needed time to train their teams.

  Though all of them were essentially summarily crushed, it wasn’t like those trainers walked away from the field disappointed. They had lost in the preliminaries and were unlikely to move on, but they had still made it to the preliminaries. They had their knowledge and skills, and they would eventually go on to serve as the backbone of society. These people would work as League analysts, Gym staff, and other critical Pokémon workers.

  Still, that group was only a small subset of the total potential competitors here, and as the day went on, the matches progressed, and Sam recorded notes on everything he could. He supposed he could have joined his mother and Redi as they explored the Conference’s festivities, or he could have returned to his Pokémon Center room. There, he could have used the provided computer to watch the recorded battles on the League’s archives. It took only minutes for a preliminary match to be uploaded, and he could have used that to replay the battles over and over again.

  But he purposefully stayed in the arena since he preferred to watch these matches in person. He sat high up enough in the stands so that shadows from the wall surrounded him, and his Pokémon would phase in and out behind him to whisper their observations and point at the challengers who stood out.

  Hours passed. His mother came and went, and so did Redi. Eventually, the first day of the preliminaries ended, his friends and family retired for the night, and Sam went for a late-night walk on his own with his team.

  With so many people attempting to compete, the first day of the preliminaries had only ended once it was late into the night, and the streets were lit up by streetlights. Most of the vendors’ stalls had closed, and the Conference’s upbeat music was eerily absent. A few people milled about, a handful of trainers explored, and a constant presence of Ace Trainers patrolled the place and made sure no one would get up to trouble.

  This late-night walk was a curious thing to experience, because even with such a boisterous festival going on, Sam still caught sight of wild Pokémon out and about. Rattata and Raticate would stalk the streets, ever present, and the occasional Meowth watched Sam with eyes that shone in the darkness, keeping an eye on him before moving on with whatever mischievousness they had planned.

  Genuinely, after spending so long in the Ilex Forest, it was nice to be back in civilization. It was also nice to have a bit of downtime with his team, as short as he planned for this walk to be.

  ...But for all of his time on his own watching others compete, Sam couldn’t forget that he wasn’t the only trainer here. He also wasn’t the only trainer out this late, and as he walked down the street, a voice suddenly called out behind him.

  “Sammy!”

  Only one person has called me Sammy, and my mom doesn’t sound that young.

  Trying to keep his expression level, he turned to see a pink, frilly dress run up to him, and eyes made smooth via blue contact lenses bashfully fluttered their lashes.

  However, the disturbing nature of that gaze could not hide the amused smile that appeared at his tense reaction, and Cassandra quickly laughed.

  The last time Sam had seen her had been all the way back during the Dragon Type Trials in Blackthorn. He knew she was smart, and he knew she was a competent trainer, but some of the things she said had been... unpleasant.

  “Oh, Sammy!” Cassandra said, clasping her hands together. “You’ve made it! But of course, you would make it. I mean, was there any other outcome after all of the time we spent together?”

  She went on to giggle, and Sam forced himself to not groan. It wasn’t that he had anything against her, but when it came to the Fairy Type—

  “No, no. Don’t give me that look! I’m a Normal Type specialist. I’ve already told you that! Just think of me as the same kind of trainer as your friend!”

  “...Right,” Sam grumbled. “You made that deal with the Blackthorn Clan.”

  “What deal?” Cassandra said innocently enough.

  She tilted her head to the side, but despite the innocence she tried to present, Sam felt as though her gaze was appraising. They hadn’t really talked since the Blackthorn Clan’s Dragon Type Trials, but he had a feeling her presence here wasn’t an accident.

  “I knew I’d find you out and about so late at night,” she said carefully. “A strong, powerful Ghost Type specialist like yourself? Of course, you’d enjoy the darkness.”

  “Of course,” Sam repeated.

  She opened her mouth as if to continue, but she went stock-still when her eyes flicked down. The contact lenses she wore made it hard to see where she was looking, but Sam could tell she had noticed the dozens of red eyes that had opened up under his feet. They all glared at the effective stranger who had all but interrupted their quiet time under the moon.

  “Oh, um, hmph. Well!” Cassandra hurriedly cleared her throat. “I wanted to get to you first, because I’ve seen a lot of other trainers doing things like this. Basically, I have a little get-together planned two nights from now, and I’m trying to invite as many people as I can!”

  “Two nights from now? During the full moon?” Sam asked, remembering what Redi had mentioned.

  Cassandra nodded.

  “Yup! Though, it’s a bit before that. Still! I hope you can make it. Like I said, I really hope you come. I’m trying to invite as many people as I can!”

  “...As many people as you can?” Sam repeated slowly. “Or are you just inviting the trainers you think are threats?”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  For the briefest of moments, her innocent grin grew sharp, and somehow, her eyes almost seemed to shimmer.

  “Clever. You’ll appreciate the get-together. Take this—show it at the door, and you’ll be able to join us in the back room I reserved.”

  Sam wanted to say he might be busy that night—Redi likely had her plans—but he was left bewildered and speechless when he saw that the card she presented had nothing more than an address and a cartoon version of her face printed on it.

  When he looked up, Cassandra was already absent, off skipping away in the distance.

  He then breathed out, pocketing the note and continuing down the streets. Now that he had experienced that himself, when he saw the occasional group of trainers talking, he recognized they were making plans just like Cassandra had done just now.

  Seems like strategies involve more than just what’s on the battlefield.

  He had known there’d be meta-strategies applied for a week-long tournament, but he hadn’t expected people to take actions like these.

  On the second day of the preliminaries, Sam was never called up for a second match, and neither was Redi. Given that they had both won with only a single Pokémon on the first day, they took that as a positive sign that their placement didn’t need any more judging.

  Everyone who had registered for the Conference had already taken part in at least one battle on the first day, so the second day’s battles were primarily just for confirmation. The judges and referees presiding over the tournament had to decide which trainers would be involved. Due to the smaller number of battles, the second day’s schedule was more lax, but people were still being called up for battles every so often.

  The overall result saw the final preliminary match take place mid-afternoon. The next step, the opening ceremony of the Conference itself, was scheduled to take place that night.

  But the moment the preliminary matches ended, trainers were summoned by an announcement that had echoed throughout the entirety of the Conference’s grounds. Hundreds of people filed into the main lobby of the primary Pokémon Center. The room was large enough to fit a standard battlefield two times over, but it now felt like that wasn’t possible given the sheer number of tournament hopefuls.

  Half a dozen nurses worked at the center of the room, managing Pokéballs and paperwork and other tasks behind a large, circular counter. Enormous screens hung above their heads and faced out in every cardinal direction. No matter where someone stood, they could see the display. Normally, those screens just stated the names and numbers of people awaiting healing or chats with the nurses, but right now, they displayed the logo of the Pokémon League.

  This was probably the most important moment to take place throughout the entire Conference.

  Soon, those screens would show the names of everyone approved to move on to the first round—the people competing in the Conference itself.

  “Nervous?”

  Redi pushed through the crowd to walk up to Sam, having temporarily split just so they could explore and privately train with their teams. Sam wasn’t against a wall like usual, but he was leaning against a table. Nearby, a group of trainers animatedly spoke on a set of couches, and other groups throughout the room spoke of their hopes and dreams and worries, giving the lobby an air of desperate excitement and tension.

  Everyone wanted to see if they had truly made it in.

  “I guess I am a bit nervous, but not really,” Sam said, crossing his arms as he stared at the logo of the Conference being displayed on the screens. “We’re here. My team is here. We actually made it to the Conference. We have eight badges, and we’re so close!

  “Even with so many fights left until the finals, we’re practically at the top, and that means we’ve finally reached everything we’ve been—”

  “So you are nervous,” Redi quipped with a smile as she leaned against the table next to Sam. “I get it. And part of the reason you’re tapping your feet is because you didn’t get yourself a nice, shadowy corner to brood in, am I right?”

  ...I’m not tapping my feet.

  Sam looked down.

  He was.

  He went on to shoot Redi a glare, but she just snickered in reply.

  (Sure, Sam liked being in the shadows, but that was just so he could better speak to his team. Unfortunately, with the several hundred trainers here, basically anywhere with even a hint of darkness to it had already been claimed by someone else before he arrived.)

  “I just want to see my placement,” Sam huffed, brushing past Redi’s comments, much to her amusement. “My team and I listened in on a few conversations here and there. People think names are going to be listed in order of strength. So if you're first, that means the judges thought you were the strongest, and that means all of the people favored to win the Conference will probably be higher up than others.”

  “Scouting the competition?” Redi asked.

  “Kind of. I also want to see—”

  “Exactly where you stand?” she finished for him.

  Sam nodded silently. He would have been lying if he said he wasn’t interested. If trainers were going to be ranked, then of course he wanted to know where he would place.

  ...Of course, being at the top wouldn’t be the best for his team strategy-wise, as all that would do was put a target on their back. Still, he wanted his Pokémon’s efforts to be recognized. Just like every trainer here, deep in his heart, he wanted to see his name appear first.

  “As much as I want to be first, the best placement is probably somewhere in the middle,” Sam went on to say. “I don’t want to look weak ‘cause that might put off sponsors, but I don’t want everyone breathing down my neck to figure out my strategy, either.”

  Redi hummed in agreement.

  “But I’ve also been watching the fights,” Sam continued. “I don’t even know if my team can be that high up. There are some really strong trainers participating this year—and some of them are probably even holding back. And then there are other trainers who are, well...”

  He trailed off. He didn’t want to be rude.

  “Hah!” Redi threw back her head for a single laugh. “I heard about that. You saw the guy who used a Bellsprout against a Rhydon, didn’t you?”

  Sam snorted.

  “Yeah, I did. I can see what he was trying to do by using Vine Whip to trip it, but a Bellsprout? Against a Rhydon? Really? Sure, Type advantage is a strength, but the difference in strength is just too much. There was no way an unevolved Pokémon could get past a Rhydon’s defense.”

  “And they were wearing a uniform, weren’t they?” Redi pointed out.

  “Yup. Of course they were,” Sam said casually.

  He leaned back to sit on the table instead of just standing against it, and Redi hopped up and joined him in watching those hanging screens. However, it didn’t seem like she was truly watching them. Her gaze went a bit unfocused, and she seemed to stare off into the distance.

  “It’s funny,” she said, her voice just barely audible above the general noise of the room. “Back home, everyone would praise Trainer School graduates, but none of them ever really got past the preliminaries. One of the biggest Trainer School academies was pretty close to my home, and there were these girls who—”

  She stopped herself, going quiet with a small shake of her head.

  “I think what they said bothered me for a while, but I’ve realized that what they think doesn’t matter. Nothing they did mattered,” she said, gaining a small smile. “I’m here now despite what they said. I even bet the girl that I’m thinking of is still so proud of that Cubone of hers. Even though a year has passed, I bet it hasn’t improved at all!”

  Redi’s smile turned into a sharp grin, and Sam could tell that she was picturing a defeated look on someone’s face. Right now, there was a true confidence to her, not one that was feigned. Though no placements had been confirmed, it was like she somehow knew that her name would show up at the top.

  And then, the soft sound of a chime pierced through the air.

  Above their heads, the screens shifted so that the League logo faded into the background, and a nurse grabbed a microphone to send her voice echoing throughout the room.

  “Hello! Thank you so much for your patience. Our judges have finished making their decisions. Please remember that even if you don’t proceed, it does not diminish your accomplishment in the slightest. Know that just getting here is a victory in itself.”

  The room was dead silent. Every trainer listened to the nurse’s words.

  “Soon, the names of every trainer moving on to the first round of the Conference will be displayed on the screens above my head. Out of the roughly four hundred of you competing this year, two hundred fifty-six will be participating in the first round,” she said. “Upon seeing your name, please make your way out of the Pokémon Center and to the arena itself. You will have forty-five minutes to arrive in the same room you were told to wait in for your preliminary battles, and the opening ceremony of the Conference will take place an hour after that.”

  When she finished her explanation, a second chime rang out, and the screens started to change once again. The click of her microphone turning off echoed throughout the room, and everyone held their breath as columns of names slowly appeared.

  Sixty-four names to a page. Only a fourth of the proceeding trainers would be displayed at once. As the text became legible, Sam searched, but he didn’t see himself in first.

  ...As silly as that was, he was disappointed that he wasn’t at the very top, even though he had already known that wouldn’t be the case.

  Still, he scanned through all of the listed names, searching for where he would be placed. He saw Xavier in the low twenties, and off to the side, someone cheered—they had found their name in fourteenth place.

  So it really is a ranking. These aren’t alphabetical; Xavier would have been further in.

  As he read through, Redi suddenly spoke up next to him.

  “There,” she breathed. “I’m forty-first!”

  This was the first set of four out of two-and-a-half hundred, which meant Redi was rated to be solidly in the upper twenty-five percent.

  Except, even though she was there, someone else was missing.

  “I don’t see me.”

  No matter how hard he searched, Sam failed to find his name.

  “Wait, that can’t be right,” Redi said, hopping off the table to better search. “I hate to say it, but Gengar was more impressive than Porygon. If I’m up there, you should be at least around where I was placed!”

  Sam narrowed his eyes, and Redi did the same as she increased the ferocity of her search tenfold.

  Yet, there was nothing.

  “But I’m not,” Sam said.

  The screen changed. They both found that his name was absent from the second page as well.

  When the third page hit, Sam’s heart started to thunder in his chest. His name wasn’t showing up. So many other people he recognized were all up there. Xavier was in the early twenties, as he had already noticed. Victor, surprisingly, was in the high thirties. Meanwhile, Eliza was in the nineties, and other familiar names like Terry and Cassandra were toward the middle of the third section.

  But Sam’s name?

  Absent.

  It didn’t make sense. He should have been there.

  A little voice in the back of his head started to whisper to him that he didn’t make it, that Gengar had won far too easily to demonstrate anything impressive, and that the judges had been disappointed.

  Finally, the last page showed up, and the remaining sixty-four names appeared. Right away, Sam found he wasn’t at the top here; he wasn’t one ninety-third, nor was he one ninety-fourth.

  ...Or one ninety-fifth. Sixth. Seventh. I’m not anywhere near the top rows.

  His heart sank. He started to feel his stomach churn.

  But Redi suddenly shouted out next to him, giving his arm an excited shake.

  “There. There! You made it! See, I told you that you would! No sense in doubting yourself; your name is right there!”

  “...Where?”

  Sam couldn’t find where he was listed.

  Redi tugged at his arm again.

  “It’s right there. At the very end!”

  And he finally saw the words he was looking for.

  “...Samuel Greyson,” Sam said as he read it out loud.

  His name being present was proof of his team’s achievements, but yet...

  “You weren’t kidding,” he said. “I’m at the very end. With that placement, that means I'm... two hundred fifty-sixth.”

  In other words, dead last.

  He had shown up in the absolute final slot.

  “Huh,” Redi said next to him. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  No kidding.

  His placement was off to the point that it was suspicious. Sam even knew something wasn’t right because Edgar, the trainer he had defeated, had been placed a single rank above him in two hundred fifty-fifth.

  He heard the Poison Type specialist’s voice echo out as his cheers muffled the lamentations from everyone who didn’t place. A sharp, almost mocking look was then sent to Sam from across the Pokémon Center’s floor, but Sam didn’t care in the slightest. He refused to pay it any mind.

  “There’s no way your team was that weak,” Redi said, whispering to him.

  “No,” Sam agreed quietly. “It's wrong. There’s definitely something off about this.”

  Something had to have happened for him to be dead last. Trainers that he knew struggled in their battles had been placed above him, which didn’t line up with reality. Either the rating system was completely off—which he doubted given Redi and Xavier were so high up—or something else had gone on.

  His theory? Someone had done this. Someone important.

  Someone had made sure his name appeared last.

  ...But Sam had no idea who that might have been, and he had no idea why.

  However, despite the mystery going on with his placement, he didn’t exactly have the time to dwell on that thought. It lingered in his mind, but people were already rushing out of the Pokémon Center to reach the arena, trying to get to the opening ceremony on time.

  And Redi practically hopped after them, picking up speed and all but dragging Sam to get him to head out.

  “Come on. Let’s go!” she yelled.

  The flow of trainers from the Pokémon Center to the arena itself was almost a procession or even a parade. The crowds parted before them, and people watched and clapped. The path opened up for every trainer making their way toward the arena where they would soon compete.

  Upon arrival, exhausted-looking League staff gestured to a room in which all of the competitors would wait, and the many, many trainers squeezed into that tight space that probably shouldn’t have fit so many people at once.

  From there, they were given an overview of how this was all going to work, and by the time they were sent out, it was already past dusk.

  Stepping out onto the arena floor, an absolutely packed crowd roared to greet their entrance. There, the true start of the Conference, the opening ceremony itself, took place under a bright, starry night.

  I wanted to include the full opening ceremony in this chapter, but I struggled to include it in a way that didn’t cause the chapter to drag on. I'll be including it at the start of next chapter, but the next chapter will also include the entire first round battle. As a result, expect Chapter 158 to be long.

  Sam’s Team:

  Badges Earned: 8 (Mineral, Fog, Plain, Hive, Zephyr, Rising, Glacier, Storm)

  Approximate Team Strength: 8 Stars

  (Fire / Ghost Type, Female, Timid Nature +Spe/-Atk)

  Abilities: Blaze

  Held Item: Charcoal

  Moves: Tackle, Leer, Smokescreen, Ember, Flame Wheel, Curse, Will-O-Wisp, Incinerate, Detect, Quick Attack, Swift, Flame Charge, Flamethrower, Double Team, Infernal Parade, Confuse Ray, Hex, Shadow Ball, Night Shade, Shadow Claw, Agility, Blast Burn

  (Fighting / Ghost Type, Male, Impish Nature +Def/-SpA)

  Abilities: Vital Spirit

  Moves: Scratch, Leer, Low Kick, Karate Chop, Fury Swipes, Assurance, Ice Punch, Fire Punch, Cross Chop, Curse, Brick Break, Rock Smash, Rock Slide, Bulk Up, Rage, Rage Fist, Close Combat

  (Ghost / Poison Type, Male, Naive Nature +Spe/-SpD)

  Abilities: n/a

  Moves: Hypnosis, Lick, Confuse Ray, Spite, Mean Look, Hex, Shadow Punch, Night Shade, Acid Spray, Ominous Wind, Shadow Ball, Dream Eater, Nightmare, Curse

  Mismagius (Ghost Type, Female, Hasty Nature +Spe/-Def)

  Pokéball: Friend Ball

  Abilities: Levitate

  Moves: Growl, Psywave, Astonish, Confusion, Confuse Ray, Mean Look, Night Shade, Shadow Sneak, Shadow Ball, Nasty Plot, Psybeam, Will-O-Wisp, Psychic, Hex, Power Gem, Pain Split

  Trevenant (Ghost / Grass Type, Male, Quiet Nature +SpA/-Spe)

  Pokéball: Moon Ball

  Abilities: Harvest, Frisk (Developing)

  Held Item: Sitrus Berry

  Moves: Horn Leech, Tackle, Confuse Ray, Astonish, Growth, Ingrain, Leech Seed, Forest’s Curse, Shadow Claw, Phantom Force

  Drakloak (Dragon / Ghost Type, Female, Serious Nature, +-n/a)

  Pokéball: n/a

  Abilities: Infiltrator (Developing)

  Moves: Astonish, Infestation, Quick Attack, Bite, Lock-On, Agility, Double Hit, U-Turn, Phantom Force, Take Down, Dragon Pulse

  Dreepy (Dragon / Ghost Type, Male, Rash Nature, +SpA/-SpD) [Partnered with Drakloak]

  Pokéball: n/a

  Abilities: Clear Body (Developing)

  Moves: Astonish, Infestation, Quick Attack, Bite

  Auxiliary Pokémon: A gathering of , a handful of

  At Home (non-battlers): ,

  At Carl’s Ranch: (more than twenty), (Annihilape’s brother)

  Pokémon included in this chapter:

  Bellsprout

  huge thank you to everyone reading! Your support keeps this story going.