Now that the quarter-finals are right around the corner many casual fans are also visiting Sinnoh, these people are not hardcore pokemon fans, they are only interested in the final matches that will be held in the grand stadium.

Like always Julian woke up early and took his pokemons for their normal training and some mock battles between them. ​​

The quarter-finals are the day after tomorrow and the trainers are training really hard so they can advance further into the competition.

Julian is not worried but he is waiting for the quarter-finals as he wants to see who will come out on top, Ash or Paul.

Two days passed in a blink of an eye and the whole Sinnoh is excited about today's event, the runner up of the Ever Garden Conference Ash and his opponent Paul, they are facing off against each other in the first round of the quarter-finals.

Since Julian doesn't have a battle today, he decided to watch the match in the VIP room with Cynthia by his side.

People are starting to gather up and sitting down on their seats as they wait for the trainers to arrive and start their battle.

After half an hour the announcer takes his position and starts to introduce the contenders of the first match, as Ash and Paul walk out of their respective waiting room as the crowd cheered for both of them with everything they got, the loudness of these cheers could be heard all across the Lily valley.

As this is now the quarter-finals all the battles from now on will be six on six.

With both trainers ready to battle the referee started the pokemon battle as both Ash and Paul sent out their first pokemons, Paul sent out Drapion while Ash sent out his Floatzel, both pokemons clashed with each other while using devastating moves, watching the battle everyone in the crowd was roaring and supporting their favorite.

Even Julian is impressed by how good this first exchange between these two rivals have been, after several exchanges it was clear that both pokemon were equally matched in strength and power, seeing this Paul called his Drapion back to its Pokeball and sent out Aggron, Ash sticks to Floatzel and continues the battle.

This time Aggron gets a slight edge during their exchange due to it being more powerful than Floatzel and lands a powerful Thunder Punch right on Floatzel's back and knocks it out, with this Ash takes his first loss as he now has 5 pokemons left while Paul still has 6.

Ash then sends out his Gliscor, this time the battle is completely on Ash's side as Gliscor dominates the battlefield and knocks out Aggron and once again both rivals tie with 5 pokemons each.

Paul sends out Gastrodon as his third pokemon but it also meets the same fate as Aggron and gets destroyed by Ash's Gliscor.

Seeing this Julian is really impressed by how powerful Ash's Gliscor really is, with this Ash is on the lead with 5 pokemons while Paul has 4.

Paul then sends his Drapion again while Ash recalls his Gliscor and lets it rest for a while before it goes to battle again, Ash then sends out his Staraptor.

As the battle between Staraptor and Drapion begins it is clear that Drapion is at a huge disadvantage, and in the wild, there have also been sightings of Staraptor preying on Drapions, but as Ash was about to finish this round by using Brave Bird, Drapion suddenly caught Staraptor with its pincers right out of the air and blasted it with Toxic Spikes and knocked Staraptor out.

It is a tie again and the tension in the air is getting thicker, both trainers are acknowledging each other skills as they continue their battle.

Paul calls Drapion back to its Pokeball and sends out his fourth pokemon Ninjask, Ash sends out his Infernape, during their exchange Ninjask is clearly the faster pokemon while Infernape is the stronger one, Ninjask is able to land more hits on Infernape while the hits landed by Infernape are devastating to Ninjask.

Ash and Paul decides to end this by calling out their best moves, Infernape used Flare Blitz and Ninjask used Giga Drain, both of them clashed and created a massive explosion, luckily the stadiums are protected by a forcefield which protects the audience from the powerful explosions, as the smoke cleared up the winner is seen by everyone, it is Infernape but the recoil of the Flare Blitz takes effect and Infernape gets damaged a little again, Ash calls Infernape back to its Pokeball and looks at Pikachu who is standing by his side and sends him to the battlefield

Paul calls Ninjask back to its Pokeball and sends out Froslass, the battle beings with Froslass using Hail and with its ability Snow Cloak it started to fade away from Pikachu's vision and is able to land some successful hits on him but Ash doesn't seem to be bothered by it and asks Pikachu to use Discharge, Pikachu blasts a wide area lightning strike and it successfully hits Froslass and gets exposed while falling on the ground, using this opportunity Ash finishes this match with a powerful Volt Tackle from Pikachu and knocks out Froslass, Pikachu takes recoil damage from the use of Volt Tackle.

As the Hail clears up Paul sends out his Drapion once again while Ash calls back Pikachu to rest and sends out Gliscor again.

The battle starts and both pokemon exchange moves after moves but Gliscor manages to land another powerful hit by using Giga Impact and knocks out one more pokemon on Paul's team, the star of this battle is clearly Gliscor as it manages to take down three pokemon from Paul's side while it is still going on.

Ash is clearly leading with still four pokemons to go but all of them are not in full health while Paul's last pokemon is still not been seen till now.

Paul sends out his final pokemon Electivire, seeing its Electivire Ash decides to continue with Gliscor as it is immune to Electric-type attacks, the battle starts once again and Ash decides to weaken Electivire from the get-go as he knows that Paul's Electivire is strong, he tells Gliscor to use Giga Impact, Electivire just crosses its hand and tries to block the Giga Impact, once Gliscor connects Electivire is pushed back as it tries to dig its legs into the ground and stop Gliscor and it is successful, as Gliscor is surprised by this and its move comes to a halt, Paul makes his move and tells Electivire to use Ice Punch.

Electivire lands the Ice Punch right on top of Gliscor's head and knocks it out cold.