The Chronicles of Black.

"Here's the 'but' to that," Lee says with a smirk. "The ebb of her fire was not synced up to her breathing. It was close, but there were distinct points where she was inhaling and the flames would grow, or exhaling and the flames would shrink, usually right at the end of her breaths. That's why I think the legend holds water."

Birch's eyes widen a fraction. "Truly? Could the breathing be just a placebo for Vulpix then? If she is able to actually manifest fire regardless of body movements to control it..."

"She could cast attacks with zero warning," Lee finishes with an excited grin. "But if she really can freely control fire like described, then she can control any fire and manifest it from anywhere."

'Fire attacks against her would be worse than useless. She could shoot attacks from any direction, or even manifest it right on her target with no travel time. Hell, with skills like that, no Fire move would be outside her reach. She might even be able to make new moves.'

The professor's jaw slowly drops, the implications are not lost on him. Vulpix likewise looks at Lee with wide eyes before looking away and furrowing her brows in thought.

"So I need to look up the mechanics behind some Fire moves and see if Vulpix can remotely manifest them. Something on the simple side to start..." Lee mutters out loud.

Day 16 "Don't force it, love. Rome wasn't built in a day."

Vulpix growls and closes her eyes as yet another tiny fireball fizzles out before it can leave her mouth. She leans her head back and opens her mouth as a tiny, flickering candlelight of fire is born between her lips. The little flame wavers as it shakily tries to hover away, but it flickers and dies in a flash hardly an inch into its travel. Vulpix opens her eyes again and looks at the grassy ground with a smoldering glare that Lee didn't expect to see on her usually aloof self.

Lee sits off to her side with his notebook in hand, jotting everything he watches down. When he sees her staring a hole into the ground, he sets his notebook aside and scoots closer, tenderly placing a hand on either side of her head and lifting so their eyes meet. "Hey, no need to look so frustrated. This is a whole new thing we're trying here. Your moves seem so easy because they're instinct. This? This is totally unexplored territory that we're working with," the man quietly murmurs, petting his vixen's cheeks gently. Vulpix slowly melts into his touch as she listens. "You've already made incredible progress. Just making flames at will with no move being used first is great. Now we just have to practice. Let's take a breather to clear our heads for a moment, yeah?"

Vulpix sighs. "Vullll. Vulpix, vul." "Four days of no progress is good?" He can practically hear, but she closes her eyes in contentment and nods into his hands.

'She's so much more reasonable than a lion,' Lee thinks fondly as Vulpix crawls into his lap and nuzzles her head to his stomach with a smile. She opens her eyes to reveal them glowing. He then feels her fledgling psychic powers touch his mind for a moment, just long enough for a burst of raw gratitude. 'She lets me get away with so much.' Lee picks his notebook back up and looks over the corral with a smile. The gentle sea breeze from the south drives away the sun's oppressive heat and makes the short grass of the corral roll in mesmerizing waves. Pokemon of all sorts lounge and play in the field, and an uncountable number more watch and rest in the shade of the forest where the corral fence vanishes into the treeline. The breeze, the rustling of the distant leaves, and the happy calls of all the pokemon mingle into a tranquil background noise There's not an ounce of conflict to be found.

'How strange it is to think any one of these adorable things could rip me in half,' Lee muses, idly stroking Vulpix's back all the way down to her tails. He notices a black spot on the edge of his vision and looks over.

In the grass just in front of the depression where Vulpix was seated previously, there's a small burnt spot. The grass is limp and blackened, but not ash, like it was only exposed to a flame for a moment.

'But Vulpix didn't let any of her flames touch the ground. Hell, she hasn't even faced the ground in the last two hours besides...' Lee furrows a brow. 'Besides when she got frustrated and glared at the ground.' He stops petting the vixen as he thinks, making her whine and paw at him.

"Are we going about this the wrong way?" the man thinks aloud, making Vulpix open her eyes and look up at him. "Vulpix, let's try something else. We might be doing this wrong."

The vixen reluctantly extracts herself from his lap with a full-body stretch and a jaw-cracking yawn. "Pix..." she murmurs, standing ready.

"Alright, let's try this," Lee begins, opening his notebook and ripping a page out. Vulpix looks on with a raised brow as he holds the paper up. "Now, no more meditation or all that jazz that Medicham suggested on this. I want you to focus on this paper as hard as you can. Focus on seeing it go up in flames. All you want in the world is for this paper to burn because it's wronged you, so you give it more focus than anything in the world has ever gotten."

Vulpix gives Lee a dubious look, but focuses on the paper intently. She narrows her chocolate eyes and flicks her tails in concentration.

Several long minutes pass with nothing happening. The only movement is from the rolling grass and the swap of the paper in the wind. Lee's arm begins to grow tired, and his cross-leg seated position makes his legs fall asleep, but he dares not move least he spoils Vulpix's concentration. Vulpix begins to grit her teeth, her frustration beginning to surface again. Slowly, the middle of the white paper begins to darken and smoke, and the sun's rays grow a little hotter.

Lee looks between his almost-snarling pokemon and the sheet of paper in his hand. "You want the paper on fire more than anything, Vulpix," he whispers just loud enough to make her twitch an ear. "It wrongs you, mocks you by existing. Take your feelings and show it who you are. You are Vulpix, the one who will one day be the strongest Fire type-no, the one who will one day be the strongest pokemon. Take all that passion to grow and succeed, and show everyone you have what it takes to master fire!"

Vulpix growls and her eyes glow faintly. The sunlight becomes so hot that Lee's burns tingle in pain.

The paper bursts into flame, making Lee yelp and drop it. For a moment, both trainer and Pokemon stare at the paper in open surprise. When it burns down to naught but ash and blows away in the wind, Lee can't help but grin and snatch up Vulpix in a hug.

"You did it! You actually did it!" Lee says with a joyful laugh and a beaming grin. "I know you could do it. You have no idea how proud I am of you! We've been here for like, what, two weeks and we're already pushing limits and breaking rules? You're the best, love."