I am extremely sorry for the extremely long wait.
Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail, its characters or its all belongs to Hiro Mashima. If I had been responsible for writing it, it would probably already been on a straight course towards hell, as I most likely couldn't have kept it as good as it is, in addition to the fact that I can NOT draw. Well anyway, here is the next chapter for you.
"It is because, Gray isn't 100% male!" Natsu proclaimed proudly, making everyone all the members of the guild facepalm cause of Natsu's stupidity. Kuro and Ichiro was still just standing there frozen while all of this unfolded in front of them, while Lucy were trying to make them understand that she and Natsu weren't dating, and that it was just a big misunderstanding. On the other hand Gray who was really pissed off at Natsu, threw a punch at Natsu, who ducked so the punch hit Gajeel, who threw Natsu into Elfman, who yelled something about being manly before punching Natsu, who got pissed of and put himself on fire, burning everybody within a ten metre distance - and so the first guild fight of the day had begun. Somehow or another Lucy had made Kuro and Ichiro understand that she and Natsu weren't dating, and that they simply were nakamas. Just as they understood this simple fact, somebody pushed Erza from behind, making her lose her strawberry cake, which she was enjoying by the bar, making her beat up all the guild members who were involved in the brawl, before Mira could calm Erza down with another slice of the legendary strawberry cake.
"Ok, now that everybody are quiet again, I want to ask you something, Lucy" Kuro said nervously.
"ask me what?" Lucy asked curiously, just as Kuro handed her a little scroll of paper. Lucy took it and rolled it out. (This roll is supposed to look something close to the scrolls they use in Naruto). It said:
"On the evening of the 24th of June, I the King of Fiore, invites you to my masquerade ball. Please take a friend with you and attend my party. I will send a cartridge to get you and your companion." (the reason to why it filled the entire roll is ,because there were a lot of decorations and such on it).
"So will you come with me to the dance, my dear Lucy?" Kuro asked sweetly.
"But the 24th of June is today, and I don't even have a costume," Lucy said.
"That is already fixed, hime" Virgo said as she popped up from nowhere / the spirit world, and handed Lucy a huge clothes bag in life size, and small box.
"What is this?"
"It is your dress and an accessory box, hime" Virgo said, as she disappeared in a cloud of smoke.
"Huh," Lucy said brilliantly, as she looked at the spot where Virgo disappeared. Just a few seconds later, another yellow/gold flash occurred and Loke walked out of the gold smoke.
"It is your dress for the masquerade ball later. It is the same dress you used on the twenty years anniversary of your uncle's new 'home'. It should fit you" Loke finished as he fixed his glasses and threw Lucy a flashing smile, making Lucy feel really embarrassed, before he disappeared to the spirit world.
"So you guys came all the way over to Magnolia to ask, if I wanted to come to the ball with Kuro?" Lucy asked, feeling lighthearted.
"Of course, why shouldn't I came all the way over here to ask you to the ball?" Kuro asked and gave her a genuine grin.
"After all there is no one in the entire world who I would rather ask to come to the ball with, than you." Kuro said truthfully.
"Does that mean that you are gonna wear the same costume as you wore, back then Kuro? I mean since I am wearing the same as back then."
"Of course, what else could match us as well as that?"
"Then I will come over to this ball of yours," Lucy answered happily, making Mira squeal with delight as she saw another opportunity to match Lucy with either Kuro, or to make Natsu jealous, so he could begin to date Lucy.
"Then we got to go, and make you presentable, Lucy! Kuro and Ichiro! You two meet us here at about five o'clock."Yuki said, as she pulled Lucy through the doors, leaving the others behind. (When Yuki pulls Lucy through the guild doors it was about two o'clock).
Three hours later the guild doors opened to reveal two stunning beauties, one was blonde while the other one was a brunette. The blonde girl was clothed in a yellow/orange/goldish long dress with straps. The dress was stuck to her curves from her waist and up, while the lower part was really wide like an old time ball dress. The blonde's hair was curled into beautifully curled golden locks that framed her face, and emphasized her deep brown eyes, so that you could easily drown into them. In addition she wore a golden necklace and bracelet with the Fairy Tail mark, marked in the gold. The brunette wore a crimson dress with short arms, while the rest of the dress was really similar to a traditional ball dress. The brunette had had naturally curly and silky hair, so she had not bothered to do anything with it.
Ichiro wore a simple blue suit which stood in contrast to Yuki's dress, yet emphasizing her eyes. Kuro's suit on the other hand looked a bit more flashy, as it was black with small golden stars sewn into the texture, which matched Lucy's hair. In addition his tie was a midnight blue/black color, with the little pin that hold the tie together with the suit showed a full moon. Both of the men's pants were respectively regular dark blue / black pants.
"Damn, Lucy, my nickname for you doesn't suit you anymore, as you just surpassed the definition of being gorgeous with your new dress." a shocked Ichiro said as he eyed Lucy and Yuki.
"You look beautiful, too, Yuki " Ichiro said quickly.
"Don't sweat it, nii-san, and don't bother telling me any compliments today Kuro, as for the next twenty four hours, all of your compliments should solely be focused on Lucy" Yuki said, as she threw Lucy a smile, before Ichiro guided Yuki out the door and into one of the waiting cartridges.
"For once I have to agree with Ichiro, there are no words in the entire dictionary that can describe your beauty, my dear Lucy." a dazzled Kuro told Lucy, who blushed due to all of the compliments she received.
"Yeah, Lucy you look stunning today, almost as if you were a sun, or a huge fireball" Natsu told her, as he licked his lips, suddenly hungry as the word - fireball- reminded him that he hadn't eaten since Lucy and her friend left the guild in order to fix themselves up.
"...Thanks I suppose" Lucy said.
"Well, shall we go my lady?"Kuro asked sweetly as he offered his arm.
"Don't forget your masks, and enjoy your night", Capricorn said as he offered one black mask to Kuro and one golden mask to Lucy, before he kissed Lucy's hand and disappeared in a yellow cloud.
"Have a sweet night together!" Cana slurred to Lucy, while the other remaining guild member made agreeing sounds, making Lucy blush even more, as she took Kuro's arm, and he guided them out of the door and into their waiting cartridge.
"Damn that dress looked so beautiful!" Levy told the others at the table she was sitting at. The others were basically Cana, Lisanna, Natsu, Erza, Grey and Mira, who had unusually enough taken a break from her waitress job in order to try to match up Lucy and Natsu. However if somebody wanted a drink, she would leave the table to fetch it, but unusually enough nobody asked for a drink. Who would be crazy enough to tell Mira to get them a drink, when she obviously was busy plotting Lucy and Natsu's future wedding.
"We know Levy, all of us were drooling over it, too!" Lisanna told Levy.
"Sure it was nice, but it was still just a dress. What's the big deal?"Grey asked the others.
"Just a dress! Didn't you look at it?! It is a dress that could easily take a girl to a royal throne, or even to the throne of Kami-sama (Kami-sama = God) himself." Levy told shocked to a bored Grey.
"Yeah, Grey that was obvious! The real question is why she used such a dress?" Natsu lectured Grey.
"Why she used SUCH a dress?!" Mira asked, shocked that Natsu had actually looked closely at that beautiful dress. Then perhaps he had understood that Lucy had looked stunningly in it.
"Yeah, sure it was nice and all that, but why did her dress look like a sun, while his dress looked like the night sky?"
"Oh" Mira said disappointed that that was what Natsu had been talking about.
"It is probably because it was a masquerade ball, and they decided to do a word play/pun on their names." Lisanna explained.
"Their names?"Natsu asked curiously.
"Yeah, their names. Lucy means light, that is probably why her dress is donned to look like a blazing sun. Kuro on the other hand means black, so he has donned his suit like a midnight sky. That way their names will show off their clothes in a way more interesting way, and make them clear winners, in addition to the fact that it looks sooo good on them!" Levy said, as she began squealing at the end.
Lucy and Kuro on the other hand had already reached their destination, a beautiful palace in Crocus. However they weren't the only ones, there were at least a hundred other cartridges there, but then again this was an invitation to a royal masquerade ball, so of course there would be a lot of guests. (The palace looks exactly like it does in the anime/manga from the outside. I will just redesign the interior and inside to work with my plot)
Kuro helped Lucy out of the cartridge, before he gave her her yellow mask, and he put on his own black mask. These masks were not regular masks, but magical masks from the spirit world. So when they put up these masks it was completely impossible to distinguish who they were. Then he guided her to the front doors of the palace, which were stocked with guards and guests. Those doors were huge, it was at least a metre across one of the doors, and this was one of those double doors made of beautifully carved timber. It reminded Lucy of the Fairy Tail guild doors, just in a bigger size. Kuro guided her through the doors and into an elegant hallway, after showing the guards their invitation. The hallway led into a beautiful and gorgeous ballroom, with huge chandeliers hanging from the roof. The room was very light and warm, and decorated with red and purple roses, in addition to small white and blue lilies. On the foremost part of the room there was a huge stage like setting where an orchestra were playing a very soft and beautiful song, that the other guests were dancing to.
"Well since we are at a ball, would you like to dance with me?" Kuro asked sweetly, yet kinda unsure of himself.
"Sure, Kuro" Lucy said, as she hold up her hand for him to take, so they could began the slow dance to mesmerizing and slow music. They slowly danced for about a quarter or so, while Kuro guided their dance towards the corner by the left side of the stage.
"Hey, Kuro I know you didn't come all the way over to Magnolia simply to bring me to this ball."
"What makes you say that, my honey?" Kuro asked sweetly.
"Because now that you are Senshi Hakushaku (Hakushaku=Earl in Japanese), you won't have as much spare time as you had before. That means that you certainly won't have enough time to run around searching for, and then playing around with a girl" Lucy grinned as she ended her explanation.
"I should have known that you are way too clever to be fooled by my little excuse." Kuro said with a small smile playing with his lips.
"You should have. So can you please explain it to me?"
"Ok, I will. The truth is that his majesty asked to meet with you and gave me the mission of getting you here." Kuro said as he pushed the door in the corner up with his left foot, before dancing her into the room. Where he let go of her in order to bow deeply to the person standing behind her. Lucy slowly turned around to look onto a man in his early fifties wearing the blue uniform of the royal family, with a little white beard, and with the sigil of the ruling king.
"You look gorgeous, Lucy, just like Lalyla - nee - san, me dear niece", the King told Lucy lovingly.
What's up with the flowers today?! I was just writing down some completely random flower and color combinations to the decorations in addition to the regular ones, right? Then i thought, hmm, it would be kinda bad if those flowers didn't actually exist, cause then I would have to explain it and so I well decided to search for purple roses and blue lilies on google images. And to my great astonishment there is actually such flowers. Can you believe it? Naturally blue and purple flowers? Well I can't and still think it is kinda surprising to know that my complete random combinations actually existed. Who would have known.
I am really grateful to the fact that you guys are reading my story and adding it to your favorite/alert lists, but i would have been even more grateful if you could review my story too. Those few reviews that I got are so motivating. They are the things that keeps me motivated enough to write the next chapter. So please, write something in the review area, it will definitely make my days a lot brighter. It doesn't matter if it just is a word or a page, everything motivates. even a little smiley. So please review, cause it means a lot to me ^_^
Thanks to Celestial-Mage231, CelestialTitania, JustGoCrazy, SakuraIchigoDark, SecretOtaku27, Yashieforever, animebunny23, chimmy66, final-zangetsu, phoenixflamemarauder, year-of-the-panda and zeck232 for following this fanfic.
Thanks to CelestialTitania, EllieBloodStain, GoldenRoseTanya, animebunny23, chrissyroo1, final-zangetsu, sticy17 and year-of-the-panda for adding this fanfic to your favorite-list.
