"Zancrow, I will be assigning you to Ultear and Kain for your next assignment. Do not fail me."

"Understood, Master Hades." I acknowledged as I turned around and walked out of the bridge of the airship where Hades is sitting on his throne. I closed the door of the room behind me and walked along the empty corridors towards the meeting room.

Five years. It has been five years since Mum and Ria had been killed by this wretched man in his twisted and insane quest to get his hands on Zeref.

When I first regained consciousness after the attack on Azalea, I was in Grimoire Heart's airship, lying on a bed covered in bandages. Hades was sitting on a chair beside my bed reading a book, eyepatch over his right eye, my sister's eye, and it took every ounce of self-control right there and then not to try and outright kill him. Thankfully, I managed to control myself, and Hades attributed my weird behaviour to a panic attack when I found myself in an unfamiliar environment.

Not that I could harm him anyway. Not even now. I am still too weak.

Hades spun a very well-crafted lie. He told me that he was passing by my town when it had been attacked by a dark guild and that there were no other survivors. He was about to leave when he sensed my presence underneath the rubble and brought me back with him due to the amount of potential I showed. He probably didn't lie about the potential part. According to him, I have very huge magic reserves for a child. He invited me to join Grimoire Heart, whose goal is to attain and understand the "Essence of Magic" and create a better world for mages.

Inwardly, I seethed in rage and disgust at how he can outright lie to me without guilt nor remorse with my sister's eye sitting in his head. Outwardly, I played the part of an ignorant child and feigned ignorance to the concept of magic and asked him if magic is able to bring back the dead, a fake excuse that I thought up on the spot. Joining Grimoire Heart is the only way I can think of to get my revenge on Hades. I need power, fast, if I want my revenge. Joining Grimoire Heart is the best way to do so. It's not like I have a legitimate reason to refuse him considering my circumstances. At that point I am a seven year old with nowhere to go. Even if I told him I don't want to join, he will probably just kill me without a second thought and find the next best candidate to recruit into his little merry gang. However, I need to mislead him on my real reason in joining Grimoire Heart. Bringing someone back to life sounded like a believable reason in joining a dark guild. Hades told me that with the "Essence of Magic", nothing is impossible, and that I can see my family again as long as I helped him in his quest to find Zeref.

It's true that Zeref managed to successfully revive the dead, but Natsu nearly turned into a demon as a result of that. As much as I missed Mum, Ria, and even Dad, the dead should stay dead. Nothing good comes out of trying to play god and interfere with the natural cycle of life and death.

More importantly, I don't want to taint my memories of them even further with dark magic. I want them to be as pure and untainted as I had remembered them.

Hades took away the only people I held dear. He made me an orphan again. He made me all alone and forced me to experience the feeling of loneliness and the lack of a sense of purpose again. I will kill Hades. I swear on it. I will not rest until I retrieved Ria's eye out of his skull and burn him alive. I will punish him for tainting Ria's magic, which was so beautiful and full of life, into something horrendous. I will see to it that Hades dies in agony, many times worst than what he made Mum and Ria experienced.

But until I am strong enough to do so, I need to play the part of being Hades's hunting dog.

After successfully misleading Hades that my reason for joining him is to revive and see my dead family again, he began to teach me about magic. I am unsure if Hades knew that the eye he stole belongs to my sister or whether he knew that I saw what he did that fateful day. Ria and I looked a little alike with our eyes and hair, so he might have made the connection between us, but if he did, he gave no indications about it. Despite my hatred for that bastard, even I have to admit that he is a very good teacher when it comes to magic. It only took him a single day to help me unlock my magic when I had been trying for years since I know I am the Zancrow from the Fairy Tail verse. Similar to canon, he taught me Fire God Slayer Magic using an ancient tattered tome he found from somewhere and I spent most of my free time honing my newfound magic powers.

I have an old fossil to kill. Time spent idle is time I rather spend on devising ways to kill him. To this date, I haven't seen him using the magic derived from my sister's eye, but I knew he has to be practicing on how to properly use it. I have no doubt that he will corrupt my sister's Eye Magic with dark magic of his own, just like how he corrupted every other type of magic he used with dark magic. The thought of that infuriated me. It spurred me to train even harder than before.

When I agreed to join Hades, I told him that I will join on the condition that I will get to choose who I kill, giving me some freedom in choosing the assignments that he assigned to the members of the guild. Maybe it was because he was feeling a little guilty, maybe it was because he still had a tiny shred of compassion that remained after he became Hades of Grimoire Heart, I don't know and I will never find out, but Hades relented and agreed to my request after much arguing on my part.

To date, I only go on missions where I do not need to kill innocents. The reason I gave Hades was that I don't want anyone else to experience what I did back at Azalea and I don't want to be the reason why innocent people are dead even if I am now a member of a dark guild. That's the only truth about myself I ever told him. Hades begrudgingly accepted my reason, he knew my motivation in joining him (or so he thought) and I was proving myself to be a valuable member of Grimoire Heart by being a skilled collector of information, information that the guild relies on to make their decisions. Over the years, I have trained myself to be a spymaster, and my spy network had brought valuable intel for the guild together with many job postings, jobs that would not be posted to legal guilds simply due to the fact that these jobs are illegal. Grimoire Heart had a wide variety of missions that were posted to our guild from the underworld of Fiore. Assassinations and outright murder were common jobs for us. Due to my agreement with Hades and my known dislike for needless killing, he sent me out for mainly reconnaissance missions or bodyguard missions for the VIPs of the underworld where the chances of me needing to kill anyone are at the lowest. I have never needed to kill anyone on such missions before.

It is also on such missions that I had trained myself to collect information from all sorts of people at any kind of place. Over time, I had slowly crafted a unique place for myself in Grimoire Heart. They cannot simply get rid of me when I am now their eyes and ears, and I can choose what kind of information I want to feed them after I had gained their complete trust. It is another form of power I need other than magical strength. The power of secrecy and information is equally important, especially when you are dealing with members from a dark guild.

In this horrid environment, you can never fully trust anyone.

The only time I have killed, and willingly killed, is when there are missions to exterminate other dark guilds or whenever I know that my target is some scum that is a waste of space and the world is better off without them. It is only on such missions that I truly gave in to my bloodlust and massacred people without mercy. The drawback of God Slayer Magic is that it causes the user to experience constant bloodlust in varying degrees. It kind of explains canon Zancrow psychotic behaviour, Orga's lust for battle, and Sherria's slightly crazed personality during her fight with Wendy during the Grand Magic Games arc. I am able to control the bloodlust to a certain extent, although there is always a possibility that I may lose control once I am engaged in battle. Thankfully, that possibility has been reduced to a minimum and the likelihood of me going berserk is minusculely small.

The underworld is a chaotic place where only the strongest survives. There are many spats between dark guilds and it isn't uncommon for dark guilds to band together to massacre another dark guild, only for the alliance to dissolve shortly after and the previously allied guilds to tear at each other's throats the moment they have no need of an alliance. The Balam Alliance had not been set up yet, which is reasonable since the key players of Oracion Seis and Grimoire Heart are not yet old and strong enough to contribute to their guild's strength, but it will not be long before said alliance will be set up from how things are playing out.

In my opinion, every dark guild should be vanquished. The Fairy Tail manga and anime had heavily censored the griefs and deaths that dark guilds brought about with them. They are merciless and will kill for literally anything. The Magic Council and the royal family is also equally inept at solving this issue, and thus the civilians had took it into their own hands to post mission requests to legal guilds to solve the dark guild problem. It's more efficient that way.

What a sad reality.

When the government fails to do its duty, the people suffer. The fact that a large amount of dark guilds running rampant across Fiore is the most accurate reflection of the crisis it is facing. It is probably why people allowed problematic guilds like Fairy Tail to continue existing despite the huge amount of property damage they caused. Fairy Tail's efficiency in clearing out dark guilds and their success rate is renowned even in the underworld. Buildings destroyed can be rebuilt, but lives lost cannot be revived. The citizens of Fiore prefer to rebuilt the buildings destroyed by mages from legal guilds than to lose their loved ones to dark mages. It is a trade they are willing to make.

"Zan...Zan...Zancrow...We are...goingonamissiontogether!" Kain said to me the moment I appeared in the meeting room. He have a speech disorder and is constantly nervous about everything, which he tries to curb by eating large amounts of food and is the main reason why he is obese. Despite how he looks, Kain is strong. Lucy and Natsu got incredibly lucky in how they defeated him on Tenrou Island.

"Kain." I replied curtly in greeting. I don't talk to the other Grimoire Heart members often even if they are the future members of the Seven Kins of Purgatory. Most of Grimoire Heart members are crazed murderers or outlaws who had nothing else left to lose. Most of my time is spent alone and honing my magic, reading on books that ranges from magic to history, music, and pretty much anything under the sun. I don't care what I do as long as it allows me to interact with the people here at the bare minimum. I don't want to associate myself with them at all if possible. The only reason I am staying is the possibility for revenge.

Ultear walked in shortly after. She is the de facto leader in Hades's absence and is a good few years older than me. I think our age gap was at about 5 years if I remember it right. If Hades had assigned her to this mission, then this mission is more important to him than I give credit for.

"On time as always, Zancrow." Ultear commented as she sat on a chair and lazily rolled her orb that she is always carrying around with her along her outstretched arm.

I grunted and nodded in acknowledgement. Even when I knew from my prior knowledge that she will turn out to be repentful for her sins, right now, Ultear is a psychotic murderer just like anyone else. I don't want to speak with her more than is strictly necessary.

"Still a man of few words as usual, I see." Ultear commented as she tried to make small talk with me. Hades is planning to form a small and elite group within the group. He hasn't named the team and the members yet, but I know the team he is planning to construct will be the future Seven Kin of Purgatory. Ultear is a shoe-in for one of the spots in the team and everyone knows her strength. There's no doubt that she will be the one leading the team given her status in the guild as the second-in-command. As one of the eldest member of the future Seven Kins of Purgatory, she had made it her job to get to know everyone in the guild, especially the more powerful members. Apparently, I am one of these "stronger members" in her eyes and one of the more likely candidates to be part of the elite group Hades is planning to create. I had displayed what I was capable of. Fire God Slayer Magic is very, very destructive.

The destroyed mountain top of one of the mountain near the north of Fiore is proof of it. It was where I had fought against three S Class threats from an alliance of five other dark guilds and won without suffering more than a slight case of magic exhaustion. I had single-handedly annihilated that alliance, and that event let the name of our guild spread like wildfire among the underworld. The whole world now knows our strength.

"Just get on with the briefing, I have training to get to." I replied, not caring if I sounded rude. None of the people here are important to me, I will get out of their lives and they will get out of mine the moment I had my revenge on Hades. I don't care about canon or the main storyline unless it affected me in my quest for revenge. I have decided to live my life quietly in some unknown place when I finally had my vengeance in the very unlikely case that I survived my battle against Hades. Zeref and Acnologia can come and wreck as much havoc as they want as long as they don't implicate me. Fairy Tail have some serious plot armour protecting them anyway, they are nigh unkillable and I have no doubt they can save the world no matter what is thrown in their way. I don't care much about what happens next after I had my revenge. I will have lose my purpose to live after getting my revenge anyway. I don't care if I will live in solitude or whether I will live on some remote uninhabited island or get mauled to death by some unknown beast. Maybe I will get out of Fiore and travel to other countries to help fulfill Ria's dream to travel the world. Even if I die in my quest for revenge, I don't care. If my life is the price for revenge, then so be it. I have already lived once, living a second time is a bonus in itself.

In fact, I am almost certain that I will die in my quest for revenge. I just have to drag Hades down with me when that happens.

It's easy to ask others to put down their hatred when you do not experience it yourself. When the same circumstances happens to you, all talks about putting down their weapons and forgive your enemy will be thrown out of the window. Talk is cheap. Even till now, I am unable to put down my quest for revenge.

Revenge is all I live for now.

"Tut, tut. How rude." Ultear playfully waved a finger at me in disapproval and I barely held myself back to set her alight in flames from sheer annoyance. Ultear had been purposefully trying to get on my nerves for the five years that I have been here and I am getting really irritated by it. I averted my eyes away from her and stared outside the window, the glass panes partially reflecting the light and showed my reflection as I gazed at my current appearance and at the clouds outside. Despite being only twelve years old, five years of rigorous training had made me grow like a weed and earned myself a toned body. I looked more like a 15 or 16 year old teenager than a 12 year old child. I am almost reaching Ultear's height despite my young age. I had also let my blond hair grow, and I am starting to look like canon Zancrow minus the crazed expression and his horrible taste in clothes.

No way I will dress up like canon Zancrow, that guy had very bad fashion sense.

"Wha...What are...Whatisthemissionweareassignedto?" Kain asked nervously.

Ultear's attention was brought back to Kain as her orb projected a detailed map of a town up on the screen in the meeting room for all of us to see. Ultear's eyes narrowed as she spoke her next words.

"We are going to obtain the final key to unseal Zeref."


Tch, murdering innocents again. Just how many will Hades kill until he is satisfied?

My job in this mission is relatively simple. Kain and Ultear will handle the killing, I will handle any outside interference if anyone else do make their appearance to stop us. Usually these people are Rune Knights or some random mages that passed by although I am lucky enough to not run into any of them so far when I am on lookout duty during extermination missions to obtain Zeref's key. Only half an hour had passed and it seemed that Ultear and Kain are already finishing up. Seeing that no one is coming to save this town, I went to find Kain. I dislike Ultear and have no wish to spend time beside the cunning woman unless it is required.

"Zancrow?" Kain's eyebrows shot up in surprise when he saw me approaching me. His usually nervous behaviour is gone after entering combat. "Gimme a while more, I still have one more to kill before calling it a day. She ran over to hide in the building over there earlier." Kain pointed at a partially destroyed building and I nodded in acknowledgment.

We both walked towards the building and turned around the bend. It was then I noticed a little girl cowering in fear and crying. Her entire body is caked with dirt and dust, making me unable to see the true colour of her hair and skin. She had not noticed our presence yet.

My fingers twitched in agitation at the sight of the young girl. This isn't the first time I witnessed the death of a child, but these children were dead even before I arrived after the massacre when we do the cleanup. To witness another child fall prey to the senseless killings Hades made us do leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

To make things worse, she is about the same age as Ria too when Ria died. Well, this girl is definitely a little older than Ria when that happened, but the similarities in the situation is uncanny. Visualising her getting struck down by Kain brought unpleasant flashbacks on how Ria was killed and how helpless I was to stop things from happening the way it did.

Kain lifted a hand and my body acted on its own even before I can think about the consequences.

"Zancrow?" Kain rose and eyebrow and questioned my action. I had grabbed onto his arm to prevent him from striking down on the girl.

"Leave it. We had killed enough. Hades won't notice if there is a soul less, the soul of a child won't be of much help anyway." I tried to remain calm as I bullshitted a story on the spot, even surprising myself at how legit the bullshit lie sounded. "Can't you feel it? The kid has a lot of potential to be a mage. She would be a great addition to Grimoire Heart."

Crap, what am I spouting?! How did my bullshit lie turn into a recruitment talk to convince crazed psychopaths to recruit a child into a dark guild like Grimoire Heart?!

Oh well, I have dug myself a pit. Might as well jump in it.

Letting go of Kain's arm, I walked to stand in front of the girl and knelt down to her level. She looked up in fear at me, but I merely brushed off the dirt and dust clinging onto her face, revealing the pale skin underneath all the dirt.

"Hey." I said as I patted her head. "Everything's fine now. You don't need to cry anymore."

"Woo-wee." Kain said as he made his appearance known to the girl while licking on a huge cone of ice cream he procured from somewhere, probably a requip space of his own. "C'mon, stop those tears. You can have the ice cream if you stop crying, woo-wee."

Huh, so even Kain have a little bit of compassion in him. Unexpected.

"What's going on here?" Ultear walked up to us through the debris, looking spotlessly clean despite the extermination she had just done.

"Found a kid crying in the midst of all the destruction." I replied as I turned to look at her. "She will live on." I said as I purposely stressed on the word live. There was a flicker in Ultear's eye and I spotted her hesitation. She had also gotten the hidden meaning behind my words. By telling her that the girl will live on, I basically told them that if they dare to even harm even a single hair on the girl's head, I will come into blows with them, consequences be damned. I'm famous for my short temper back at Grimoire Heart. Combined with my magical prowess, there are very few in the guild that is willing to cross me.

Ultear stayed silent for a short while before turning away and walked back to the direction of our pickup point.

"Fine. The child has a strong flow of magic in her anyway, Master Hades will probably accept her into the guild."

Kain looked at us skeptically, but he followed after Ultear the moment she disappeared round the corner.

The girl looked at the disappeared members of my team before looking back at me in bewilderment. I piggyback her and began the long trek back to the pickup point with my guild mates. Our airship should be arriving anytime soon.

"What's your name, kid?" I asked as I walked at the back of the group a fair distance away from the other two, trying to ease the tension she is feeling. The kid turned her head away shyly before replying in a whisper.

"Meredy."

I somehow managed to keep my poker face on as I processed the words I just heard. Two words kept ringing in my head as I tried to reconcile the fact that the girl I just helped saved is the Meredy.

The fuck?!