Although this is difficult to comprehend today, when Garchomp, Salamence, and Dragonite are common sights on television in elite Pokemon battles, there was a time when most dragons were as rare as they were feared. The great exception to this were Axew, who were popular pets and farmhands, and their evolved form of Fraxure, who were trained in battle and were frequently used in the timber industry.
While the temperament of Axew has always been extremely agreeable to humanity, Fraxure are far more territorial creatures whose rivalries can cause their owners difficulties. Unovans who saw the fierce way which Fraxure battled each other for dominance – even when belonging to the same master, or working on the same project – imagined these ferocious fights as something darker in their draconic psyche, akin to the battles against legendary heroes of old. In truth, it was nothing of the sort; most dragon pokemon, although willing to commit violence against a great many species, shy away from battling other dragons for fear of severe injuries.
This, however, meant little to the Unovans, who would dress Fraxure up in suits of pokemon ranging from Zweilous to Druddigon and film their plays accordingly; the most frustrating part of these dramas was the instinctual Fraxure tendency to try to fight with tusks stuffed deep inside their costumes. Some skeptics have even seen in this pokemon the source of Unova's legends of Reshiram, Zekrom, and Kyurem, and claimed that even if Unova's true gods were dragons, they eschewed divine conflict like most mortal dragons, and the stories to the contrary were simply Fraxure inspired myths.
Perhaps this is why so many skeptics were surprised recently, when Reshiram and Zekrom were summoned to do battle once again – although to be fair, their fight looked nothing like Fraxure's.