This will be my first story and I hope that I can be a good writer such as digemsmack who has always made my day with an update. If there are mistakes forgive me I am on mobile and don't really know what I'm doing. Please review whether it's good or bad I need the feedback and it will help me grow and give the readers something to look forward to. Also for the sake of this story the Daphne arc happened after the edolas incident but before the Tenrou arc.
Chapter 1: Trade Mistakes (I'm a probably use song titles for my story titles)
"Why am in this stupid machine",thought our resident fire breather as he was currently being drained of his magic.
It has been a few days since the end of the whole nirvana ordeal and things were going back to normal. Until Gray had a great idea. Gray's idea was to hand Natsu over to a psycho dragon obsessed women to help him remember a promise he made when he was young.
Let's start at the very beginning. Here we see a 11 year old Natsu Dragneel wearing a pair of yellow knee length shorts, red long sleeved shirt, and of course his trademark white scaly scarf that Igneel gave him. He is currently in an abandoned village which seems to be at the bottom of a canyon (I'm sorry I don't really remember this arc). While he is looking through some red worn clay pots he suddenly hears a voice.
"Hello there young one",said an elderly voice not to far from Natsu's left.
"Who's there?! Why can't I smell you?!",said a startled Natsu since his nose didn't sense anyone him.
"It's okay I don't want to hurt you. I'm on the wall to your left", said a voice with a regal tone.
When Natsu looked up and to his left all he saw was what he thinks was a man's shadow. Suddenly multiple shadows began to appear on the buildings around him. Not knowing what to expect he got into a fighting stance and decided to inspect his surroundings. When he looked around he saw about 20-30 shadows of different sizes and shapes. Some shadows looked like children, some like adults, and some even looked like elderly people.
Not knowing what else to do Natsu decided to ask these shadows what they wanted.
"Who are you and what do you want", Natsu asked calmly as to not aggravate these unknown beings.
The lead shadow who under closer inspection seems to be wearing a top hat and holding a cane."We don't want to hurt you we seek your help", he said.
Natsu slightly let his guard down but still kept his guard up." What do you need my help with?", asked the son of igneel curiously.
The shadow man with the top hat went on to tell Natsu about how Daphne cursed the village for not believing that she saw a dragon when she was young. At this piece of information Natsu felt a bit sympathetic because he knew how awful it feels to tell someone of something that you KNEW was real only to be mocked and called a lier, much like what happened when he used to ask around for a big red dragon named Igneel.
"How long has your village been this way?",asked Natsu with a slight tilt of his head.
"We have suffered as shadows for what has seemed to be forever it is hard to tell time when all you can do everyday is wait for the sun to set",replied a voice that seemed to belong to an elderly woman.
As this information processed in Natsu voice his determination to free these people bore fruit as well. "I promise that I will free your village and it's people" replied Natsu with a look of determination in his eyes. The conviction in his voice also helped to flare hope into the people of this shadow village. The flare revived the very hope that faded as the days passed by the helpless villagers.
The man in the top hat seemed a bit hesitant to take Natsu's words to heart because he had heard this promise many times before but, no one has ever completed their promise."Are you sure that you will be able to keep the promise that you are making here today young one", asked the shadow to the slayer.
As a dragonslayer Natsu took slight offense to the shadows doubt but he could relate to their feeling of caution about waiting for someone to return only to be disappointed. This only helped fuel the slayers determination to help this village, "I'll promise you as a dragonslayer that I will return to help you guys", said Natsu with his trademark toothy grin.
This helped to ease the shadow man's doubt because this boy seemed to have something about him that made you believe in him.
Unknown to the salmon haired boy Gray had followed him on his mission to make sure his rival didn't mess it up too much. Gray also happened to ease drop and hear the promise made from the son of Igneel to the shadow village.
Present time
"This remains me of edolas all over again", thought the slayer to himself. From his position in the belly of the beast quite literally he was currently located in the giant mechanical dragon's stomach. The beasts belly also happens to be the source of the slayers greatest pain. Unlike edolas where his energy was being sucked and stored he was currently being used as a battery. The pain he was feeling now is nothing compared to what he felt in edolas. In edolas it felt like he was being pricked by needles everywhere on his body at once repeatedly, while the pain he felt now was soul crushing. This is what he assumed dying was like slowly he was starting to lose conciousness, until he heard a voice from outside his steel prison.
Outside the steel prison
Currently we see all of fairy tail excluding Master Makarov and Gray as they were having a discussion in the guild hall. "Natsu!",exclaimed the mighty Erza Scarlet who is currently in her Black Wing armor trying to deal damage to the slayer fueled contraption. The Titania had a great idea that she knew the others would catch on to her play so she began with her plan.
"Natsu how could you be contained by this fake dragon I thought that you were stronger than that", yelled Erza in a disappointed tone. When Titania's words registered with the rest of the guild the guild decided to assist her.
"Yeah Natsu maybe I should call Gray to come save you he was always stronger than you", hollered Lucy while sounding a bit ashamed of him.
"Aye sir I can't believe that my dad is such a loser", said Happy while adding faux(fake) tears.
"Natsu isn't a man" , "Maybe I should look up to Gajeel from now on" , "Guess we know who the strongest dragonslayer is now" and other comments like these were thrown around for the imprisoned Salamander to hear.
Inside the abomination
At hearing the words that his friends were saying Natsu was beginning to become bitter and angry. When Lucy said that gray should save him though he became bitter and couldn't help but to think this was all Gray's fault. "Gray is the one who went to this crazy chick anyway it's his fault I'm in here , I'll be damped if that traitor saves me",thought Natsu bitterly as he was furious and was seriously contemplating whether or not to kill his riv...the traitor after all of this is over. As Natsu anger grew so did his magic power his power caused the giant mecha to overload and to explode revealing the pissed slayer. Natsu slowly exited the wanna be dragon's chest with his hair shadowing his eyes and his magical pressure fluxing around him in the form of flickering flames.
Natsu's P.O.V
As I exited the hell hole that Gray put me into I started to scan the members present ignoring all the cheering and calls of joy. Right now I couldn't care less about the party and happy faces all I was looking for at the moment was the man who caused me to relive the worst day of my life only worst. Yes the edolas incident hurt me a lot more than Igneel's disappearance because I thought that I was going to lose the last of Igneel that I had, his magic. As I walked up to Erza I tried to keep my magic from lashing out too much but it was a tougher than I could imagine.
Third Person P.O.V
As Natsu walked over to his guild mates they could feel something was wrong either the slayer which was quickly proven by how the slayer wasn't celebrating with them. With a bit of caution Erza approached to out of character fireball.
"Natsu what's wrong are you hurt", asked the Titania sceptically not believing that anything can bring the hyperactive and boisterous slayer down. Natsu just stayed silent scanning the crowd. At the lack of response Erza wasn't pleased and when Erza isn't happy bones crack and children are scarred. When Erza was about to give Natsu his punishment Natsu decided to ask for the person that he was looking for.
"Hey Erza"
"What Natsu?"
"Where's Gray?"
I know that this doesn't have much to it yet but if you could drop a review it would be great I don't care that it's negative as long as you tell me what's wrong like if I need to assist more detail somewhere or should explain something more. I don't know how to open a poll yet so I will ask for votes in your review. So the choices for Natsu's mate(s) if enough people vote or popular demand:
Yukino
Kagura
Meredy
Ultear
OC
Aries
Or any other ships you might want in the end I'll make the choice to see what kind of story this will be because I have a lot of ideas and am very excited to write my first story. I will not abandon this story and will try to update at least every two weeks probably quicker but I want to give myself breathing room anyways please review and vote which girl you want to be with Natsu and check out digemsmack of you haven't yet all his stories are amazing but I highly recommend Dragneel a Fairy No More and Master Dragneel