"I've got no problem. When do we start?"
"We'll start right away, but first let us deal with the 'heretic' in this meeting room. How long do you plan to keep lying there!"
As she said this, Joy gave Jia Qiong's leg a nudge with her foot, signaling for him to stop fooling around on the floor.
"You know the procedure, so you take him over there. The floor is pretty comfortable here, I'm going to lie down a bit longer."
"You can't possibly... not be able to get up, do you?"
Joy and Jia Qiong had both been working with the Varsity Team for several years.
Although the Joy Family was known as a family of doctors, Joy's workplace wasn't limited to Pokémon Centers, nor was her job limited to just treating Pokémon.
Patrolling the surrounding environment, providing Pokémon in place of Professors in cities without a Pokémon Research Lab, serving as judges in various competitions; these were also part of the duties of the Joy Family.
And in such a large family, there would always be some who chose different paths.
When it came to recklessly touching other team members' Pokémon, Jia Qiong had plenty of "experience."
Getting paralyzed by Mareep, put in a cross arm lock by Machamp, burned by Rapidash...
Now, he could add being thrown over the shoulder by a Meowscarada to the list.
"N-Nonsense! How could a student's Pokémon throw me so hard I can't get up! It's just that it's too hot; the floor is nice and cool!"
Joy didn't respond. She merely looked in silence at the air conditioner set to 17 degrees celsius nearby.
Perhaps feeling that he had lost face, Jia Qiong propped himself up on a nearby chair and pretended that nothing had happened.
"Nekomi, you... didn't actually hurt him, did you?"
"Meow... meow? (No way, he's so sturdy, a fall like that should only sting. Could he be all show?)"
Thankfully, Jia Qiong couldn't understand what Nekomi was saying. Otherwise, his breakdown might have been even worse.
"Qing, you go ahead and take them over. I'll tidy up the meeting room."
Qing Joy—"Joy" was merely the family name; this was the full name of the Joy from the Varsity Team.
But most of the time, people couldn't tell the Joys apart, so they defaulted to addressing them by their surname.
This time, Joy said nothing, simply leading Rowan and Old Liu toward the grounds outside.
Once he saw they had truly left, Jia Qiong shut the meeting room door and collapsed over the desk to recover.
"No good... I need to get a hip pad too. Just wearing knee pads and a chest guard isn't enough…"
"The Pangoro Academy Cup is divided into three parts: individual singles, team 6v6, and rental 6-pick-4 doubles."
On the way out, Joy explained the competition format to Rowan.
"Singles is the easiest to understand—one person, one Pokémon. Whoever wins advances.
Team 6v6 is similar. Each team member sends out one Pokémon, forming a full team for the match. But once the initial lineup is confirmed, it can't be changed. That lineup has to be used all the way until the finals.
Rental 6-pick-4 uses Pokémon provided by the organizers. Each team chooses six Pokémon, then selects four from those six to battle in each round of doubles.
Singles results account for 20% of the team's total score, and the other two each account for 40%."
At this point, Joy stopped and looked toward a few people who were resting on the training ground.
"Han! Come over here for a sec!"
A girl with a single ponytail, whom Rowan wasn't unfamiliar with, walked over. She was the one who broke the pogo stick and came in last place.
She hadn't stuck around after the competition either and had returned straight to campus.
"She's the Varsity Team's Data Analyst and Logistics Officer. I'll let her tell you about our past competition results."
"Hi, sorry about earlier. Everyone was really curious about who got parachuted into the team, so I took a picture of you."
"I'm Li Han, but you can just call me Han, or Brother Han—Sister Han is fine too."
Although she was also technically a student competing alongside Rowan, she had been helping out the Varsity Team for a while now. Now in her third year, she was set to graduate and would be staying on to work directly with the Varsity Team.
Since she was relatively young and got along well with everyone, most people just called her Brother Han.
"No worries, I didn't really mind."
Rowan replied casually, but for some reason, he suddenly got the feeling that there was something off about this Varsity Team.
The team doctor, the coach, the data analyst—everyone seemed to be juggling multiple roles, giving off the impression that if this place didn't produce results, no one would even bother coming here just to pad their resume.
And after seeing the reports on Li Han's computer, Rowan felt like his suspicion might be pretty accurate.
The two formats that truly tested the strength of the contestant's own Pokémon—1v1 and 6v6—had yielded poor results in recent years, ranking in the lower-middle tier.
Fortunately, the Varsity Team members had solid theoretical knowledge. In the rental 6-pick-4 format, they performed relatively well, even taking second place twice. Once the strength of Pokémon was leveled out, their skills were still up to par.
But after the scores for that segment were averaged out, their overall ranking only fluctuated around the middle tier—landing them in the most awkward position.
People remember first place and dead last, but they always forget the ones in the middle.
In fact, Rowan had guessed correctly. During the tenure of the former president, because of Varsity Team's consistently mediocre result, it was no longer a priority program.
It was only after the new president took office and made bold changes that this place was revitalized, which was exactly why Old Liu was so invested in it.
"So..."
"Ahem, how should I put it... If you can take first place in singles, and the others don't choke in the 6-pick-4 battles, we've got a pretty good chance of finishing in the top three."
"And if we can do a bit better in the 6v6, we might actually be able to bring the Academy Cup home. But no one really knows you! Sure, we've seen the video of your Gym Battle, but we'd still like to see you battle a few of our top-ranked people…"
Before Li Han could finish, she suddenly noticed that Meowscarada had already wandered off toward the training ground on her own. As she walked off, she even waved back at Rowan, saying something nobody quite heard.
"Meow! Meow!"
When Nekomi reached the rest area of the training ground and saw the dozen or so other Pokémon, she put her hands on her hips and started saying something.
But whatever it was clearly didn't sit well with the other Pokémon. One after another, they stood up.
"Did she use Taunt?"
"Meowscarada doesn't know that move… but the effect's basically the same."
It was like a newly recruited soccer player walking up to the team, covering their mouth and saying, "Wow~ you guys are so weak~"
The Pokémon affected by the "taunt" all stood up, clearly riled. Nekomi then snapped her fingers toward them.
Petal pink blossoms burst from the hidden flower bud on her body, quickly forming whirlwinds of pink across the training ground.
With a sweep of her arms, countless petals surged outward from her position, whipping across the ground in a rare flower storm.
Under the onslaught of petals, the Pokémon who just moments ago wanted to prove themselves were all knocked out one after another, buried in a sea of flowers after losing their ability to battle.
In the end, only a Farigiraf managed to use Protect in time, a Gengar slipped into Farigiraf's shadow to hide, and a Charizard, thanks to its quadruple resistance to Grass-type moves, was left clinging to a sliver of HP.
But the attack didn't stop—the petals hadn't disappeared, continuing to pile up on the ground.
Nekomi didn't spare them another glance. Instead, she confidently turned back and walked toward Rowan. With each step she took, the sea of flowers beneath her swept forward again, swallowing the remaining Pokémon before dispersing into flickers of energy and fading into the air.
"Meow~ (Petal Blizzard• Duet, done~)"