Mental Battles -Pokemon-

Chapter Sixteen- Not a Tropical Paradise

The journey to the unnamed islands in the Kimandra region was uneventful, besides the constant bickering between Lucifer and Kiari. For once, it wasn't Lucifer rand I, right? That's a first.

Kiari was making points as to why Lucifer could be the masked man, and Lucifer argued back without the logic Kiari had. So, of course, the argument ended with Lucifer crossing his arms angrily and ignoring Kiari, with Kiari smirking triumphantly. I guess being around us is making Kiari act a little more 'human'.

After a while of awkward silence between arguments, I watched Kiari for us on Lucifer and glare at him. Probably still angry and suspicious. Lucifer was absentmindedly petting his Deino, so he didn't notice. I really had nothing better to do when we were in the boat, as all my Pokemon got extremely motion sick. That's why I'm just watching these two.

Suddenly, Kiari's eyes widened, and she covered her mouth to stifle a gasp. She looked away from Lucifer wide eyed, and but her thumb as she thought long and hard about something. She said she couldn't read Lucifer's mind, so maybe she just thought of something. Meh, you never know.

After that incident, Kiari didn't say a word to Lucifer, even after we had gotten off the boat. It was still morning when we arrived at the islands, since the boat ride was about two hours long. I healed my sick Pokemon, then headed straight to one of the only seven buildings on the islands-the Pokemon gym. The gym leader was a fire type trainer by the name Matthew or Matt, probably because of all the active volcanoes on these islands.

"Maybe I can finally prove to a certain someone that I'm not some masked murderer dude that can fly," Lucifer grumbled as we entered the gym.

"Oh my Arceus, it's hot in here..." I mumbled as the heat of the gym hit my face like a wall. Seriously, it had to be at least one hundred degrees in there!

"You'll have to withstand the heat if you want to defeat me!" A brunette on the other side of the battlefield shouted. The shirtless teenager stared at me boldly, waiting for me to reply.

"Oh, okay. But once I win, I need to tell you something really important," I explained.

"Sure thing! Our battle will be four on four, triple battle!" Matthew replied, sending out an Infernape, Camerupt, and a Flareon.

"An Infernape... Did you just find a Chimchar in the wild?" I asked, sending out Pachirisu, Gible, and Litleo.

"Nope! Just like you, Professor Acacia once chose me to go on a journey. Infernape has been with me the whole time. Where's your starter?"

"He's a Turtwig, I didn't want to pit him against three fire types," I explained. "Anyway, Pachirisu, spark! Gible, earthquake! Litleo, tackle! Aim for the Flareon first!"

"Protect Flareon!" Matt exclaimed. The Infernape hit Litleo away with a fire punch, but the spark hit the Camerupt straight on. It did nothing at all, as he was part ground type. Gible centred the earthquake on Flareon, but everyone got hit, including my Pokemon. I didn't think that one through enough...

His Pokemon took a lot of damage, but nothing crazy.

"Infernape, fire punch on the Pachirisu! Camerupt, use eruption on Pachirisu! Flareon, Toxic on Litleo!" Matt shouted.

"Dodge, Pachirisu and Litleo!" Pachirisu bounced on her tail to jump above the fire punch, then she darted to the right the moment she landed on the ground to dodge the lava flying towards her. It hardened quickly, making that portion of the battlefield rocky and harder to navigate.

Litleo ducked below the darts of venom soaring towards him then instinctively used tackle on the Flareon and bit her. Survival habits from being a wild Pokemon, I guess.