Chapter 3

The Fire Devil Slayer.

"Gray Fullbuster?" I frowned recounting the name that the demon had said. "I...think, you have the wrong person." I pointed to myself. I could see heat waves coming from the giant turtle monster.

"Enough talking," the turtle demon raised its fist. Then like some car, the holes on the back of its shell started to fire. He skidded against the ground at an alarming speed, shattering the ground we stood on.

"S-shit." I lifted my arms, stopping the blow, at least that is what I would have said if my feet didn't start skidding against the ground. I winced as the sole's of my shoes were ground down. "Do you know how expensive these shoes are?" I gritted my teeth, trying to force the creature back.

"Hmm, you weren't burned? Are you perhaps using your ice magic to protect yourself," the giant turtle said as he lifted his arm, preparing to slam it into me.

I sidestepped the attack. The creatures jet-propelled fist hit the ground, causing it to rumble. A line of fire trailed from its knuckles, hitting a nearby building nearly causing it to collapse.

I froze. "I...can't fight here." We were in the middle of a crowded town. The amount of destruction he would cause probably wouldn't be appreciated by the city's residents.

Still, how would I even go about moving a giant tortoise demon out of town?

"Stop spacing out!" The creature snapped swiping at me, forcing me to duck.

"Pick him up and throw him!" I heard Lamy call out to me still wrapped in the hotel sheet.

I wanted to ask why, but it didn't seem like a bad idea. While the creature was tall and imposing, I couldn't imagine it being heavier than a car, something that I had lifted before. I dashed behind the demon, wrapping my fingers around its food before attempting to lift.

"H-heavy..." I grunted before putting more strain on my body. Despite putting my all into trying to pick up the demon, he wasn't budging.

I didn't even have time to react as I felt something hit me, on the top of my head, causing me to groan. "Gah!" I held my skull, noticing the tortoise's tail twitching. "What am I doing listening to Lamy for fighting advice?" I grumbled dodging another tail swipe.

"I thought the famed ice devil slayer would be more impressive," the fire demon sighed reeling his fist back. The moment he brought them forward, a wave of flame was fired towards me.

"It's been a while since I've done this." I took a deep breath before opening my mouth. Despite the flames being mere inches away from me, I didn't move from my spot. Instead, I inhaled a second time consuming the fire that was meant to burn my skin.

"W-what?" The turtle demon lowered his arms while I wiped my mouth and coughed.

"Geez, at least I can eat your flames unlike Megido's..."I waved away the smoke that was still coming from my mouth.

From there, the tortoise demon and I glared at one another. I dared not make any sudden movements, that was until the creature let out an odd screeching sound before stomping his feet like a child.

"Damnit! This wasn't a part of the plan! I was supposed to be fighting an ice mage. Where the hell did this fire bastard come from? Was the information that bad?" The demon then blew fire into the air, like he was shouting at an invisible god.

"Ah, well..." I scratched my cheek. "Do you want to talk about it?" I didn't know why I said that, but it seemed appropriate given the situation.

"No, I do not want to talk about it!" The demon snapped before smoked escaped his nose, and the holes in the back of his shell. "I guess it doesn't matter if you are a fire mage or an ice mage. Neither of those elements can ever defeat me!"

Once again streams of fire escaped out of the demon's shell propelling it towards me. This time, however, the creature was going for what I assumed was a shoulder tackle.

This time, however, I decided to match the demon. I was preparing to set my feet ablaze before stopping myself. "W-wait, I can't do that, it'd ruin my shoe-" At that moment I was struck being stuck on the demon's shoulder.

I winced as the demon grabbed me with one of its gigantic hands before wrapping both of his fist around me.

"Got you now!" The tortoise laughed, attempting to squeeze me.

I, on the other hand, frowned before wiggling ever so slightly. The grip was solid, not the type one could get out by pure physical force. Despite that, I held my breath before slipping out clutches.

"Eek, you used my curse!" Lamy let out an excited squeal.

When demons make pacts with a person that human gains access to their curses, a bit a weaker version. I rarely ever used Lamy's curse, mostly because I just preferred using my devil slayer magic. With that said, it would have been a lie to say it didn't come in handy.

I then slipped between the demon's legs, grabbing his tail. I then yanked it with all my might, it might not have been possible for me to have lift him, but maybe tripping him was another story.

"B-bastar-" The demon didn't finish his statement as his feet slid against the ground before falling face first into the street. Without missing a beat, I jumped on his shell, lifting both of my fists.

"Zenith Flames!" I pressed both of my fists against the demon's back, shooting out a torrent of flames. The fires had enough force to crack the surrounding stone while kicking up dust.

My vision was blocked entirely, but I could still sense that the demon was alive. Which made sense, I wasn't planning on killing anyone, be it demon or human.

Once the flames and dust had cleared, I felt something heating up beneath me. The holes that were on the demon's shell started to light up, and in an instant, I was ejected off of the tortoise's back.

I landed on the ground, noticing Lamy peeking from the corner.

"You got him on the ropes!" The bunny eared demon cheered, causing me to stand back up.

I looked at the tortoise as he stood up. Despite being a direct hit, it was clear he didn't take too much damage from my attack. "I've underestimated you. It looks like I'm going to have to start putting in a bit more effort." The holes on his body started to flare up as I lifted my arms.

I was prepared for another attack before something strange happened. All the fire that had surrounded the demon was put out, almost like someone was raining on him. Then in an instant, he was trapped in an orb of water.

"Are you alright, Gray's cousin?" I looked over to see Juvia holding her hands up.

"You could at least try to remember my name," I said.

Juvia glared at the strange demon who returned her gaze.

"I honestly thought you were a wimp when you showed up at the guild, but I didn't expect you to be a slayer..." Another voice entered my ear as I noticed the metal head from earlier walking onto the scene. "So, why did this guy attack you?"

"You're asking me that?" I sighed trying to think of a good reason for why a fire tortoise

Juvia's expression darkened the moment I even mentioned Gray's name. "He was after Gray?"

The demon grumbled as the jets in his body ignited. The water that had trapped the creature started to bubble and evaporated into creating a mist. After a second, the demon was free.

He landed with a tremendous crash, his gaze scanning the three of us. "It seems that I miscalculated a bit, no matter. Next time we meet Gray, I will have your necklace!"

"I'm not Gra-"

I couldn't finish my statement as the demon tucked his limbs into his shell. Flames then started to spray out of the openings allowing the creature to spin like a top, somehow that allowed the demon to fly away.

"W-what was that all about?!" One of the civilians in the area shouted.

"W-was that a demon from hell?" Another barked.

"It must have, there is a naked gremlin hiding!"

They were probably talking about Lamy. My suspicions were confirmed when Lamy walked out of her hiding spot, her face a bright red.

"Who's the bitch that said that!" Lamy shouted, the bed sheets covering her nearly floating away in the breeze. I noticed the short demon woman trying to inch her way closed to me only to stop when she saw Juvia and the metal-head.

"Hey, is that..." Juvia pointed to Lamy before tilting her head innocently. "Ah, I think she is a waitress at the nearby cafe."

"I am not a waitress!" Lamy cried out before grumbling. "D-did the original Lamy leave that little of an impact?"

"We should probably have this conversation somewhere..." The Metal-head frowned looking around the destroyed street.

"H-Hey, is it okay for us to leave like this?" I looked at the giant hole and the hotel along with the wrecked street and cracked buildings.

I knew I technically was the one who caused it, but I felt weird to leave everything messed up and broken. At the very least I should explain to the hotel owner what happened so he wouldn't think that a random meteor destroyed his building.

The Metal-Head sighed, rubbing his chin. "Don't worry about it; this sort of thing happens a lot."

"R-really?" I stuttered. I had to wonder what kind of place Magnolia town was for this not to be too uncommon.

"Juvia thinks we should head back tot he guild-hall."

"No, no, no!" Lamy cried, finally getting the bright idea to tie the sheets properly. "We can't go there. I refuse!"

"Who is this Gray's cousin?"

"Stop calling me that!" I snapped before I glanced over to Lamy. "She's my..."

"I am his super sexy wife!" Lamy interrupted, causing Juvia to cover her mouth.

"W-wife?"

"She's not my wife. She's my friend!" I quickly corrected before pressing my hand against my head. "Anyway, is there any other place we can stop by before we head to the guild?"

Like I said before if Lamy didn't want to go to the Fairy Tail Guild Hall I wasn't going to make her. Plus Lamy needed new clothes considering I had a feeling her old ones were probably scorched.

"We could always go to Gajeel's place!" Juvia said, causing eyes to narrow.

"Don't just invite people over to my place without even asking."

I scanned the man named Gajeel. There was a certain air to him. He looked like the type of person that would stay in some garage or something.

"Juvia, don't you have a place?" I asked bluntly, noticing Gajeel's eye twitch.

"You think my place isn't good enough for you, don't you," Gajeel growled, forcing me to avert my gaze.

"What? No way, I'm not saying that..." My lips twisted into a frown. "E-either way, me and Lamy need to get to a clothing store, we can't have her walking around naked."

Plus I needed to buy myself a new pair of shoes. I looked at my expensive Dream March shoes. The price wasn't the issue, rather how rare the shoes were. They weren't something I could just buy.

Gajeel grumbled. "Do you have to do something stupid like that? The girl can borrow some of Juvia's clothes."

I looked over to Juvia. She was dressed rather well, most of her outfit complimenting her blue-hair and eyes, but...

"Those clothes don't match Lamy at all. She'd look weird in them," I said.

"Who cares! It's just clothing, who cares what she wears for a few hours!" Gajeel had a point; it's not like Lamy was going to wear the clothes forever.

"I guess it's fine," I replied. I knew I was being the weird one being so hung up on some clothing.

Lamy quickly nodded. "Yeah, let's hurry up so I can put something on!"

I avoided pointing out that it was her fault that she was in that situation even if it was sort of funny, in a kind of strange way.

With that, we went back to the metal-head's home. It looked how I expected it to, though it was slightly cleaner. At first, I thought he was a sort of mechanic with all the scrap metal hanging around the area, but it didn't seem to be the case.

"Panther Lily is still at the guild-hall," Gajeel pointed out. "I didn't think things would get this complicated."

"Hey, where are my clothes!" Lamy snapped, looking around, prompting Gajeel to point to a nearby room.

"Levy left some of her clothes here the other night. You two look about the same size."

"I-Is that okay Gajeel? Won't Levy be upset with you if she finds out that you let another woman wear her clothes?" Juvia closed her eyes.

Gajeel faced twisted for a moment as he shook his head. "Don't be stupid. I'm pretty sure she'd be even more upset if I let another woman walk around my apartment, half-naked!"

Lamy didn't need to be told twice as she quickly slipped into the next room, closing the door.

"So, to get back to the topic...that demon was after Gray, right?" Gajeel went straight to the point causing me to nod.

"That is what he said. He also said something about wanting Gray's necklace," I said. I had a feeling the necklace was valuable. What I didn't expect was for demons to be after it.

"That means Gray is in danger!" Juvia stated the obvious though it did bring up an interesting point.

My mother told me that my and Gray's necklaces went together, meaning whoever was going after Gray would probably go after me next once they realized my necklace was also apart of the set.

"I should probably head home and tell my mother about the situation," I said. "To tell you two the truth, I don't know much about these necklaces."

It became clear that the situation has escalated to the point where I probably wasn't equipped to handle it. The best thing to do was to tell my mom and let her take care of it.

Then again, considering the type of person my mother was, she might have been just as hard to find as Gray was.

"Tsk, I still don't know if I should trust you or not, but considering you seem to be a slayer like Gray, there might be some truth to your words." Gajeel then placed his feet on the table. "Either way, we don't have a ton of information on where Gray would be at the moment."

"That's fine, even if you guys can't help. I'm sure my mom will know something..." I said, causing Juvia to bite her thumb ever so slightly.

"S-so, you are going to go after, Gray?" She asked one more time, forcing me to scratch the back of my head.

"I'll try, or at the very least, I'll try to pass him the info that someone is after him."

Even if I never met my cousin, I wouldn't feel right just leaving him to be attacked by random demons.

"If that's the case, then Juvia has to take care of something," the blue-haired water mage stood up causing Gajeel to raise a brow.

"What's wrong with you?" The pierced man asked as Juvia quickly shook her head.

"N-nothing, Juvia just needs to be on her way."

With that, Juvia left Gajeel's place, leaving me with the strange looking man.

In an instant, the situation grew awkward. Lamy was still switching on clothes, and Juvia was the only one keeping the scene from getting too...tense. Perhaps it was because Gajeel honestly looked pretty intimidating all things considered.

"..."

"..."

I had to say something. It was just too awkward for me not to. "So, I see you got a lot of metal hanging around your place. Do you build stuff?"

"...I eat it," Gajeel said, causing me to grow a bit pale.

"O-oh, I guess that's one way to use it..."

"I'm a slayer, you idiot, don't think I'm just some freak that eats metal!" Somehow Gajeel seemingly read my mind since he was so quick to point that out.

"Do you eat your element in your free time?" The concept seemed odd to me. I usually only ate my element when I was fighting or when I wanted to show off.

Cuivre was the same, though she'd go so far as not to eat anything below the grade of silver. Despite being able to eat all types of metal, she outright refused to eat anything she would consider low quality.

"There is nothing wrong with eating your element in your free time! I'm an Iron Dragon Slayer, so I should eat iron. It makes sense!" Gajeel snapped, making me pray for Lamy to finish changing.

"Done~."Lamy opened up the door revealing her makeshift outfit. "You were right. Your girlfriend is the same size as me!" Lamy then twirled, giving me a wink.

I held back a sigh before standing up. "We should probably be on our way." I laughed, I didn't want to linger any longer. Besides, we got all the info that we could get from Fairy Tail. "We'll stay in town until tomorrow morning, so if you need us, we'll probably be in one of the other inns."

I grabbed Lamy's arm, preparing to escape the situation.

"H-hey, you better return those clothes as soon as you can. Levy would kill me if she found out I let someone else wear them," Gajeel sighed.

With that, Lamy and I were back on the streets of Magnolia town. To say that our trip hadn't gone as planned would have been an understatement.

"I guess the first thing to do is buy you some new clothes," I said, placing my hands on the back of my head.

"Eh, maybe I'll steal these. I look way too cute in this shirt to just give it back!" Lamy swayed her body back and forth, causing me to sigh.

I wanted to point out how wrong it was, but even I was guilty of keeping things that I was only supposed to borrow.

"Let's not do that. I want to keep my decent first impression."

At least I assumed I made a decent first impression. Even if I had no interest in joining their guild, I still didn't want to get on their bad side. My cousin was a part of their guild after all, so I could be nice at the very least.

"Alright, but they have to be expensive clothes this time!" Lamy pouted.

"Fine, just don't go stripping them off and losing them again," I said, causing Lamy to laugh.

"Deep down you love it!" Lamy flashed me a smile.

After that, we went to some clothing stores to buy Lamy a new outfit and me a new pair of shoes. The more I thought about what had happened, the more irritated I got. Less about being attacked and more about how my shoes were ruined.

People underestimated the value of clothes a lot of the time. Even though they were the primary way we expressed ourselves to one another.

When you wore something, it told the world the type of person you were, even in passing.

Either way, the day quickly passed by, and before I knew it, it was time for me and Lamy to leave Magnolia town and head back to the house.

"Did you have to return the clothes?" Lamy pouted sitting in the passenger seat.

"You got a new outfit because of it." I pointed to Lamy's clothing. Despite all the time we spent picking out clothes, she ended up creating only a slightly modified version of her usual outfit.

The only significant differences were the lack of her signature tie and opting out of stockings.

"I know...ah, Lation, you're the best!" Lamy quickly wrapped her arms around me, pressing her cheek to mine.

With that, I started the I slipped on the strap connected to the magical vehicle and began to drive out of town. I had a feeling that Cuivre would be a bit pissed considering that we were supposed to be gone for a few days.

Though considering the circumstances, I wanted to head home and check on her.

It didn't take us long to get on the road, causing me to let out a sigh. "I feel kind of bad that I didn't properly say goodbye to Juvia."

"No! Don't tell me you fell under that siren's spell!" Lamy whined, causing me to roll my eyes.

"She did help us out a bit, but she wasn't at her place for some reason." At least that is what Gajeel told me.

No matter what I thought, it was far too late for me to say anything to her now. We were two hours away from Magnolia town, and turning back wasn't an option.

Everything was going smoothly until a strange sound came from the trunk.

"Eh?" I slowed down as the noise grew louder and louder. Lamy and I looked at one another wondering what exactly was happening.

"Did an animal sneak into our trunk in the middle of the night?" I pulled off to the side of the road as the two of us stepped out.

Our gaze fell to the closed trunk. Something had to be in it, but I had no idea what it could have been. That was until Lamy spoke.

"This smell, it's the smell of a desperate woman!" Lamy frowned.

"W-wait, you can smell that sort of thing? Can all demons do that?" I asked.

Lamy just shook her head. "It's not about me being a demon. It's about me being a woman! Us girls are pretty much sharks!"

I had a feeling that Lamy was making it up. Still, we needed to open the trunk to check what was inside. I swallowed harshly inching my way closer to the chest. With a single press of the button, the lid popped open.

Inside was a familiar blue-haired woman gasping for air.

"That was close. Juvia thought she would have to tear open the back of the trunk to breath..."

"Oh, it's just Juvia..." My lips curled as my brain took a few seconds to catch up to what I was seeing. "Wait, why are you in my trunk?!"

"That..." Juvia held her cheeks, blushing. "I heard you were going after Gray so..."

"Isn't this a bit much?" I asked as Juvia stepped out of the trunk.

"Well, I don't know where Gray is, and you said that your mother might know. So it's only natural that I come along!"

"That's not natural at all!" I snapped.

Lamy crossed her arms, mumbling something under her breath. I noticed the bunny-eared demon's shifting across Juvia's outfit. "Be careful; she might be the crazy stalker type, the one that stares at people while they are asleep and write down their daily schedule."

"Juvia has only ever done that twice!" Juvia pouted, for some reason, I instantly knew that she was lying.

"It's not something you should do at all!" I replied.

"What are we going to do with her?" Lamy asked. "I think we should ditch her on the side of the road and let her walk back." I could hear a hint of sadistic glee in Lamy's tone.

"We can't do that, but we also can't head back to Magnolia town either..." I couldn't come up with a good excuse as to why we couldn't head back beside the fact that I didn't feel like it. "We'll take her back to our place, from there, we can contact one of her friends, and they can pick her up."

"I-I get to see where Gray's cousin lives?" Juvia covered held her breath for a moment. "That alone makes me sneaking into your trunk worth it!"

"Don't say things like that!" I cried out. "Just...make yourself comfortable in the back-seat."

Juvia smiled, getting in the back seat on the driver's side. Lamy, on the other hand, glared at me, her cheeks puffing out like she had been stung by a bee.

"This was supposed to be a honeymoon, but you ended up bringing home another girl...this is the worst possible outcome!" Lamy cried, completely missing the context of what was happening.

"She won't be with us for long, besides I can find out a bit more about my cousin while she's there." Due to the frantic nature of what happened, I didn't find out too many details about Gray's life.

"Fine, but you have to make it up to me!" Lamy rubbed her shoulders against mine before quickly, making her way to the passenger side.

I could only imagine what Lamy wanted me to do, but I decided to put it in the back of my head for the time being.

Author note.

I decided that longer chapters with more going on would be better than shorter chapters released faster.

I designed the demon that Lation around an old boss character from Megaman Zero 4 as well as Gamera. There will be more human-based demons, but it felt silly not to have some fun with the designs.

The cafe that Lamy and Lation visited belong to Chico's father.

I wanted to give Lation a hobby, so clothing design seemed to make the most sense to me.

I try to do some humor even in the fight scenes. It just makes sense, and I feel fits into the mood more when it comes to Fairy Tail.