And I have returned with another chapter my loyal readers! Didn't take too long, right? Anyway, like before I haven't really gotten much feedback from the last chapter. Not really surprised, but it still sucks. Still happy that people read my stories at least. Anyway, here we are with another chap that I'm sure some people have been itching for. Although there isn't much excitement, like all the other chapters. Oh well. XD

- And remember that any reviews/private messages that are questions will be posted on each chapter so everyone can get an answer!

FWI, I plan on adding some filler chapters after the end of Promise Me. Probably battles or scenarios that people want to see. Hopefully I can fit them in right.

(Also, I'd still highly appreciate it if people create fanart of King for me XD Like I said before, just picture Mega Charizard X's body and colors mixed with Y's ragged wings and spiked tail! If someone makes some fanart, I'll link it on my page for everyone to see!)

Now let's get down to it!

"So, this is it then?" - Human Speech

'Wow, I expected something... more.' - Human Thoughts

"Ready for the worst mistake of your life?" - Pokémon Speech

'I'm itching for a fight you little shit!' - Pokémon Thoughts

Disclaimer: I don't own Pokémon, except my Mega OC!

Chapter 6: Blessed

It was… a rough start to say the least.

But King would be lying if he said he didn't enjoy it.

With Iris, he found having a roommate to be quite entertaining and helpful whenever he wanted to chat.

Although not everything was fun. At least not to King after he started to worry about Iris being involved in any dangerous situations.

Even after Sophia, the elder, gave her word that Iris was allowed to stay with him in the forest, King's head had always been filled with doubt of Iris' safety. It was this or that, anything he looked at was to be considered a danger to her health and King did everything he could to keep her away from harm.

The drop to the forest from the cliff in front of his cave was an obvious hazard, so the first rule had been stated that Iris always gave him the heads up when she wanted to leave the cave.

The second rule was another obvious one; don't wander outside when the sun was setting.

Those were the first two logical rules, but after that, King couldn't stop himself from limiting Iris' activities like an overprotective parent would've done. And of course even Iris eventually grew fed up with King's 'laws' and attempted to talk to him about changes.

Only Sophia's advice about 'children who learn from mistakes helps them reach maturity faster' was enough to convince King to change his overprotective attitude.

And ever since then, things couldn't have been better.

Like Sophia promised, she had told the villagers about Iris' choice to live with King.

As expected, King learned that there was a group that tried readying themselves to barge into his cave and 'rescue Iris from the monster'. But after using her title as the village elder, Sophia's demands for peace were obeyed until she said otherwise.

Still, it took a while for some people to cope with one of their own living in the wildlife instead of their own little home in the fields.

Although, King couldn't care less about their opinions, that much was sure.

All he cared about was the possible threat of someone being stupid enough to actually challenge him and attempt to take Iris away.

Because of that, he'd been on guard for weeks, not letting himself fully sleep at night to keep an eye out for anything. Human, Pokémon, it didn't matter. He had made a mental promise to keep Iris away from harm or anything that forced her to do anything she didn't like.

It took days of reassuring from Sophia that nothing would happen with her villagers.

And days for word to spread throughout the forest Pokémon; that the 'Pyro has a kid and will murder anything that harms her'.

After the warnings were done and over with, King had finally allowed Iris more freedom and increased the joy of living with him. And he started it off in the best way he could think of.

Flying.

Even with all the excitement Iris expressed when King suggested a ride on his back every day, the girl herself was absolutely terrified of the risk of falling off. Plenty of reassuring words that he would never let her fall later, King soon convinced Iris to give it a single try. And she did.

All it took was the feeling of wind against her face and the thrill of seeing the forest itself from a sky-view to seal the deal on daily flying. Afterwards, Iris had been so into it that she wanted nothing more than to fly through the air for nearly an hour more. Of course King was capable of flying for such a period of time, but he didn't want to risk getting tired enough to drop her and be unable to catch her in time. So it was given a time schedule. Every morning, an hour after waking up, Iris deemed it the 'perfect wake-up call' to get her up and moving each day.

That was one of the main things that happened in the first few weeks of Iris' new home.

The next was making more friends.

As it would seem, because of King's reputation, the forest Pokémon were too afraid to even play with Iris. After a lot of begging and using of her 'puppy eyes', Iris had managed to convince King to travel into the forest for an hour each day and attempt to interact with more Pokémon.

"One step at a time." Was Iris' go-to motto for friendship.

King had never felt more awkward and embarrassed each time he was pulled into the forest with Iris' hand clamped around one of his large fingers. It wasn't something he was used to. Having years of being the 'Champion Pokémon', the most ruthless fighter and having a menacing appearance, it didn't exactly mix well with a little girl holding his hand and pulling him around like he was a child.

Although he would hate to admit it; he kinda was.

As much as he hated to think about it, he didn't know how old he was when he died. So he literally had to start at age 0 once he woke up as a Charmander. Now, as a fully grown Charizard, he could consider himself nearly Iris' age. Maybe even younger…

King made sure to never mention his real age around Iris. It wouldn't be good if she realized she was the real 'adult' between them.

But it didn't matter who was older when Iris had literally demanded that he tried to make more friends anyway. She would never take a no as an answer.

Which ended up with King sitting in the middle of a grassy field while Iris roamed around, in his field of vision, calling for her friends. So far Iris hadn't stopped calling for 30 minutes and both of them knew the forest Pokémon were somewhere close, but were too afraid to come out.

Until Iris nearly started to cry.

That's when a Drilbur took the time to quickly pop his head out of the ground between them. Iris was first he looked at in an attempt to cheer her up, but then he nearly ran when he spotted King behind him. It took a strong amount of Drilbur's own will to listen to Iris' pleas to stay. It was a rocky start when King tried to talk without making the tiny Pokémon pass out in fear. It took quite a while before Drilbur started to see King as another friend.

But it was a start. Better than making no progress at all.

Especially since other Pokémon that were watching in secret saw that King wasn't as evil as they spoke of. One by one, they all started to introduce themselves to King, who returned the favor by personally greeting of them with a kind smile.

Now, it can never be said that Iris didn't help King with his popularity problems.

A few months later, Sophia had sent a message to King for him and Iris to come back to the village to celebrate Iris' 9th birthday. While Iris had been absolutely ecstatic about returning home for one of the biggest celebrations she's ever been to, King wasn't entirely comfortable walking around the villagers. Especially the ones who were disturbed by him the most.

Although, while it was a good thing most of them didn't hate or fear him like some of the others, King still wouldn't be able to enjoy celebrating Iris' birthday the way he wanted to. He had been forced to keep his English a secret and had to be extra careful not to break anything with his size or accidentally set anything on fire. Any sort of mistake that could ruin the celebration could end up with villagers having a reason to dislike him even more.

That and he didn't want to embarrass Iris on her special day.

So King did what he could. Quietly standing on the sidelines away from flammable objects while the villagers and Elder herself did most of the activities. But that didn't mean King didn't have fun interacting with some wild Pokémon who lived in the village. And surprisingly, he also got the chance to interact with some of the human children as well, who seemed to like him because of his dragon appearance.

Finally, when the party had come to an end and most of the villagers went back home to rest, Sophia had met with Iris and King before the two could fly back home. She had given Iris a gift, the best one the girl could ever ask for.

A Pokémon egg.

Since Iris was nearing the natural age to become a Pokémon trainer, Elder thought it would be best to give Iris some early experience with raising a Pokémon.

And being a Pokémon himself, King had seen enough of Unova to learn what the egg would be after hatching. But he decided to leave the surprise for the birthday girl.

After another round of thanks for the gift, Iris had gone back home with King and her new egg. It took nearly a week for it to hatch, meaning Sophia had been watching over it for a while before giving it to Iris. Nevertheless, Iris was too excited to care, especially once she learned what Pokémon the elder gave her. It was a newborn baby Dragon Type, an Axew. The happy squeals Iris let loose in the cave was enough for King to hear a high pitched ringing for a few seconds, but it was worth seeing his best friend/roommate so excited.

Since there was a new member to join their little family, King realized he had to gather more food and teach Axew how to defend himself like he had to do as a newborn Charmander. Although the training did take a while since Axew was still too young to understand most things, but he eventually picked up on King's teachings and learned how to use his tusks as a weapon for self-defense and battling.

It didn't take too long before King decided that Iris was ready to build up her own team.

And Iris lived up to her promise for creating bonds before catching Pokémon.

The search had begun with one of Iris' forest friends, those she knew the longest. The first Pokémon to join her team was Drilbur. It wasn't a surprise that the ground type was quick to accept Iris' offer to travel with her. Although King did make jokes about Iris using non-Dragon Types to become a Dragon Master. With each joke, she would respond with "Friends are friends, regardless of type."

She was learning to accept every Pokémon for their worth.

And King was proud of that.

It was a spark in the right direction.

More time had passed since Iris had started her team, a couple of weeks after Drilbur had joined.

Iris, still being young at heart, had complained about all her failed attempts at 'catching' more Pokémon. It was no surprise. Most of her friends had been born and lived long enough in the forest to accept wildlife over the battling kind. Unlike Drilbur, who was one of the very few who actually challenges others in make-shift matches.

The rest being Pokémon who were the typical forest 'bullies', such as Druddigon and the other aggressive fighters.

If it weren't for the fact that King absolutely despised them for being alive, it was still unlikely for them to join Iris on her future journey. Being Pokémon who grew strong on their own, Druddigon and the others would refuse to believe a child would help them excel in battling.

But that didn't matter once Iris accepted that fact. She already knew most of them wouldn't go with her so willingly. But that only meant for a better team. Iris believed that those who join her would form a stronger bond than those who only accept battling more than anything. Loyalty and friendship is what Iris sought, the most important piece to make a strong team. That's what she wanted most.

King was most certainly proud when he heard that.

Proud enough to help start her battle experience.

By battling him.

Iris was very much against the idea the very second the words left King's mouth. Before Iris could go on about something going wrong, King had been quick to remind her of his years of battle experience and extraordinary durability. He'd make sure not to take things too far, that he'd make sure training would be completely safe. But Iris still wasn't up for it. Not until King made a solemn vow not to seriously harm Axew or Drilbur and that each battle would have him mostly blocking attacks.

When Iris finally agreed, King had told her to not worry about hurting him. "It's best you take this training seriously or you'll never improve." He advised her.

For Iris, it was a strange experience that left her confused for the most part. But after receiving tips from King on trusting her partners and what to do in a match, Iris soon learned to battle like an actual trainer.

Drilbur had been the one to improve the most. Mostly because he fought with his sharp claws and was great at evading attacks by digging into the ground. Although, it was also because of Drilbur's digging that King had to make sure they had their matches outside of the cave to avoid risk of some sort of cave-in.

And Axew? He wasn't the best fighter, King wasn't afraid to point it out to them (Gently, mind you), but Axew was getting there. Albeit slowly. Even as a baby, Axew had shown signs of little improvement on how to react on King's slowed movements. It wasn't much, but Axew had potential. Something King saw immediately through his determination.

All the while, while the two have been improving, Iris as well in battle smarts, King had definitely lived up to his promise on keeping them safe in their training. He started off the first few weeks with them in basic close-combat; aka them charging and attacking while he either dodged or blocked. And after the two young ones learned the basics, King decided it was time to work on their reflexes.

Like he said, King had inflicted no damage during mock-battles. He made sure to lower the temperature and output of his flames just in case either of them didn't avoid in time. Especially for Drilbur. Being a Ground Type, he wasn't as resilient against fire as well as Axew was.

"Alright, we're done for the day." King advised, looking down with an amused smirk and saw Axew punching his gut with his tiny hands. The bigger dragon picked up the smaller dragon in his claws. "That's enough, champ. You'll leave a mark if you keep that up." Axew happily yipped in response, something him and the others learned to be his laughter.

He was a tiny bundle of energy, that's for sure.

"How did I do, King?" Iris asked as she and Drilbur walked up to him.

The ground type had already gotten through his session with King with an earlier match, which tired him out more than anyone expected. But he decided to watch Axew's training instead of resting in a Pokéball. Drilbur, making the smart choice, knew it was important to watch others to help improve his own performance.

"You did great today." King praised with a thumbs up. "You managed to predict the pattern of my Ember attack and got Axew into a perfect rhythm to avoid each burst without wasting too much energy." He pulled the girl into a hug. "And I must say, you're getting better yourself, ya know." He ruffled Iris' hair, who giggled at the gesture. King turned to look at Drilbur and saw that he was awaiting his inspection. "Don't think I forgot about you, kid. Those claws of yours can pack a punch. I'm lucky my scales are so strong or else I'd have to deal with bandages."

Leaving Drilbur to gush over the compliment, King used a claw to point back to the mountain. "Alright, time to get a move on. We need to head back before it gets dark."

"If you want us home before nighttime, then how come we have to walk back home? It just wastes more time." Iris whined after she saw the distance between them and the mountain. Even from their location, they could see the cave opening not too far from the mountain peak. It was one thing to enjoy being outside, but it was another thing to walk back after a day of training.

"Oh stop." King rolled his eyes while Iris' cheeks puffed out in an adorable pout. "It's not like you were training like these two." He said, gesturing to the two smallest of the group. As if on cue, Axew let out a small yawn while Drilbur just shrugged with tired eyes. King grinned. "You still need exercise yourself, so I don't want to hear anymore whining. Maybe if you were Pokémon who spent their time battling, we wouldn't be having this talk. Now, let's get going."

After calling Drilbur back into his Pokéball and watching Axew climb onto King's shoulders, Iris was left crossing her arms and mumbling to herself as they started their journey back home. She said something along the lines of "I run around with Pokémon every day though…"

Although, her grumpy attitude didn't last long.

By the time they had even reached the base of the mountain, Axew had already fallen asleep and King had been forced to carry him. Then it was Iris' turn when she had started to get sleepy just as the sun began to set.

Not wanting to force her to endure any more traveling, King had scooped her up into his arms and held Axew in his tail before he finished the travel back home via flying up the mountain's side.

It only took a little while before King had set up the cave for bedtime. A small flame to give Iris some more warmth as she slept and a patch of new leafs to make sleeping comfortable. Axew on the other hand didn't need much. With his thick scales, he found sleeping on the ground comfortable enough and he didn't have much need for the fire. But that didn't stop King from caring for them equally.

Just as King laid Axew down on a separate patch of leafs, he went to set Iris down as well, but the girl woke back up just as King gently dropped Axew from his tail.

"King?" Her eyes were unfocused and her words were a little slurred. "Are we back home?"

"Yeah, we're back. I was just about to put you in bed."

"Oh." Since Iris looked like she was trying to stay awake, King slowly set her back on her feet.

Seeing her wobble a little bit and yawn, he placed a hand on her back and arched a scaly brow. "You still seem tired. Why don't you lay down and head back to sleep?" He suggested as he gently helped Iris down on her bed.

"No… no not yet…" Iris mumbled. "I need... I want to ask you something King..."

"What is it kiddo?"

"… Can I call you dad?"

The question definitely caught the fire/flying type off guard. For a moment, King thought he heard incorrectly and for a split second, the image of him running with the little boy in his first life flashed through his mind. After a few seconds a silence, King looked down to Iris for an answer and after seeing her eyes closed, he thought she fell asleep. But when King went to walk away to lay down, Iris used her hand to lightly tap his leg. She wasn't asleep. Yet. "... C-Can I?" She repeated quietly.

So he did hear her correctly.

King coughed to himself, suddenly feeling a bit uncomfortable. "Mind I ask, why?" This wasn't right. Why would she even ask such a thing? He was a Pokémon, she was a human!

"Well," Iris stopped talking for a moment to let out another yawn. Once she found her voice, Iris continued speaking, but looked down to the side with nervous eyes. "you have always been there for me, even more than Elder. And you're always caring for me, Axew and Drilbur too. And, and you used to be a human so that must mean you're an adult too, right?"

'... For a sleepy girl, she's more aware than I thought.' Still, it wasn't like she wasn't smart to begin with. But to connect his past with their present like that? Perhaps if he told him that she was in fact older than him, she'd reconsider... He shook his head. 'No.' King took in a slow breath before laying down next to her, covering her with a wing. He couldn't resist smiling when she snuggled against his wing, like she always did. It still warmed his heart no matter how many times he witnesses it. But still… "Are you sure kid? Won't it be weird to call a Charizard your dad?"

"If you don't want me to, I won't…"

"That's not it. Just tell me, how long have you been thinking about this?"

"A few weeks after the night you rescued me."

"Why wait so long to ask me?"

"I thought you'd mock me if I asked you." She replied meekly.

"You know I'd never do that." King lightly scolded, feeling a bit insulted that she would even consider that a thing. Lowering his head down, King lightly nuzzled her cheek and whispered reassuringly. "You can tell me anything, you know that."

"I know... I'm sorry for not trusting you, King."

"It's ok." King sighed. It wasn't really anyone's fault. "Now I'll ask you again. Do you really consider me as your father?"

"Yes."

"Then it's perfectly fine to call me dad." King said slowly. Half of his brain told him this wasn't natural and Iris would be ridiculed for it. The other half was filled with the joy of knowing how important he was to Iris, that he should simply allow it. Of course the latter won. "If it makes you more comfortable, I'm okay with it. That alright with you?" The second he finished, he found two arms wrapping around his neck and pulling him into a hug.

Iris had pulled him closer with a tired smile and nodded. "Thank you… papa."

'Right off the bat, huh?' King mentally joked as he smiled at the new title and felt his heart swell with a special kind of warmth.

Not too long after, he heard the light snoring and felt Iris' hold begin to loosen. Gently lowering her down so she wouldn't bump her head, King stopped to look at Iris' sleeping face. Chuckling at realizing how tired she must've been to just fall asleep so quickly, King lowered his head to the ground. But he didn't close his eyes, not when his mind was still going over everything that just happened.

Iris sees him as a father.

He was now something more than a roommate, more than a best friend.

He mouthed a silent prayer.

"Thank you, Arceus... for giving me another chance..." King's eyes slowly closed as he put his mind to rest.

"... for blessing me with another child..."

This was a role he wouldn't take lightly.

Good? Bad? This chapter kind of ended in a pool of feels, but it was the good kind of feels! Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and I'll update soon! It won't be too long before the end!

REVIEW OR PRIVATE MESSAGE me any questions regarding the story!

But still, seriously. REVIEW PLEASE!

And remember, if anybody has found or made any type of fanart of King, please don't be afraid to tell me! I'd love to see it! (Mega Charizard X's black/blue colors and body mixed with Y's ragged wings and spiked tail!)

Stay tuned for more!

REVIEW PLEASE!