Chapter IV
Far too short, I thought with a snort. The assignment had taken much less time than I had thought. The beast that had bullied this village had been just a too big boar. Of course, I had to admit that it had looked pretty frightening because of its abnormal size, but that was all. It had only taken me a few minutes to finish this cattle, and the villagers had nonetheless celebrated me as an unsurpassable hero. I snorted again at the memory of how they had stoodaround cheering and pretending that I had accomplished a wonder of the world. I was a little uncomfortable with that attention again and I was glad when I finally got my reward and then disappeared there.
Now I was on my way back to Magnolia. The city was not too far away, so I decided to walk. It also did a pretty good job of running around alone and not being surrounded by noisy people all the time. After a while I strolled through a dense forest that looked unusually calm. I heard hardly any sounds of animals or the splashing of a stream. Even the gentle wind sounds were almost completely swallowed by the mighty trees and immediately my hair on the haunches stood up. I had always been able to rely on my instinct, which was probably one of the reasons why I had been able to get along so well for so long alone. And at that moment my instinct told me something was wrong. The forest was too quiet, too inanimate, but I just could not find a reasonable explanation for it.
I carefully appraised my surroundings and slowed down a bit. Every muscle in my body was tense, ready to react at lightning speed. My footsteps became slower, until I finally stopped and looked around with a faint foreboding. I had lived on the street too long to be unaware of what was going on.
Suddenly a big man burst out of a thicket not far from me screaming and lunged at me with a heavy ax. He was a lot taller than me and had a weather-beaten face that was already covered in countless scars. His body was bursting with energy and his scuffed and ragged clothing hinted that this man was certainly not doing honorable and legal work.
Skillfully, I jumped a big step back and escaped his attack, which apparently made him a lot more angry. Now he stood in front of me snorting and held his ax again in the air. From big dark green eyes he stared at me hostile and exposed a series of slate yellow teeth.
"No movement, midget!", he growled at me and my eyes darkened immediately. Who called this bastard here a midget? Shortly we were both completely motionless, each fixed the other with his eyes, when I suddenly heard noises behind my back and quickly turned my head. Behind me appeared three similar figures, like the one in front of me, each with a different weapon in his hand. With malicious grins on their faces, they looked at me and seemed to believe that they had light prey.
"He could dodge your swinging ax? Is it as nimble as a weasel, the little one?", one of the three muttered to my counterpart and now I began to growl softly. They would pay for calling me like that.
"The main thing is that he has something valuable about him.", another squeaked, confirming my suspicion that I was dealing with bandits here.
"Certainly, but now he does not seem to know what to do.", my attacker laughed dirty and my head shot back to him and I pierced him with my cold eyes. Briefly, he looked into my gray eyes and I thought for a tiny moment to see something like confusion in his face when he saw me standing so dogged in front of him.
"Believe me, I know exactly what I have to do,", I growled, darting sideways in an elegant jump roll. Immediately the four bandits set in motion trying to guess where I would jump next, but I stopped there.
"Blade incantation!", I exclaimed loud and determined and stretched out my arms to the sides. At the same moment I already felt the cool grips of two weapons in my hands and threateningly looked at my opponents. They came shortly to a halt when they saw that there had been formed out of nothing two narrow blades in my hands. Both of these blades were almost as long as my whole arm and were extremely narrow and sharp-edged. A thin dark brown handle at the end allowed me to touch them without cutting myself. Just right, to inflict a few nice injuries on these lousy bandits, I thought grimly, still staring at them hostilely.
"Holy shit! Is that guy a magician?", one of the four exclaimed, looking desperately at his cronies .
"So what?", thundered the one who had attacked me and spat disgustingly on the floor. How disgusting, I thought and had a great desire to slit him his stomch alone because of this action. "Some razors like those do not scare us off!", he went on and a little bit of fighting spirit returned to him and his companions.
" Tch.", it just snapped me off. So these four guys did not seem to be aware of what they were dealing with here.
With another loud roar, the huge ruffian who had attacked me first lunged at me and wanted to split my skull with his ax but I dodged again in a smooth movement. With a dull clink, the ax hit the ground, right where I had just been before. Confused, he grimaced as he realized I was already behind him but it was already too late for him. In a fluid and spinning motion, I rammed my blades into his hips, causing him to scream in pain and splash his blood.
"You should never underestimate your opponent.", I muttered in his ear, as he fainted beside me, half fainting. I was sure that I had not mortally wounded him but he would not be able to get up for a while. However, I could not guarantee that I could act so humane with his cronies.
The other three were staring at me wide-eyed and even trembling almost imperceptibly. My icy cold eyes whirled around and I paused for a moment to see what they would do. You should never take the first step, that was the first thing I had been taught when I was living on the street.
A ghostly silence formed around us for a moment, just facing each other and giving us hostile glances. Only the yap of the bleeding man at my feet was occasionally heard like a shiver.
"You ... you bastard!", one shouted at me and looked down briefly at his injured companion, before he growled at me angrily, "I'll finish you!". Come on then, I thought bored. Surely their combat skills were less pronounced than those of the man who was now lying in front of me, so they were not really a challenge for me.
This man attacked me now with two pointed short daggers, which he quickly swung back and forth. But I skillfully avoided any of his attacks and it almost looked like we were performing a kind of abstruse dance. He tried to give me a blow, I dodged, he started another attack, I jumped in the opposite direction. However, he came dangerously close to me, so that I could hardly do anything with the long blades.
"Blade incantation!", I therefore cried out again and immediately changed the long blades in my hands into the form of two peaks and dainty daggers that flashed silver and menacing in the sunlight. Distracted by this performance, my opponent dropped his cover for a brief moment and stopped in his movement, which of course I exploited. With great and expansive movements, I first added some deep cuts to his hands and arms until he was able to save himself at a distance from me. At that moment, his two other comrades also threw themselves into the fray, probably because they had finally awakened from their shock rigidity.
Three against one, what heroes, I thought cynically and snorted annoyed. The man, who now stood to my left, also swung a massive ax. The other had an elongated and delicate sword, which he had certainly taken on one of his raids. Almost at the same time they let their weapons fall down on me and at the last moment I ducked under them, but felt the sharp breeze just above my head, which was caused by the vibrations. In kneeling position I rammed my two daggers into the knee of the left man so that he jumped loud back.
I just wanted to turn to the man to my right when he was suddenly wrapped in a huge fireball. Fire? How was that possible? The man shrieked and staggered back a few steps before the fire vanished again, but still had some bad burns done to him. As fast as lightning, I straightened up and looked around as I could already see the source of this attack.
A few paces away from me stood none other than Natsu and now, grinning happily, put his hands on his hips and nodded to me. I raised an eyebrow in question. What the hell was he doing here?
"Damn Natsu! You should not grill them!", suddenly the voice of Erza came up to me and she appeared shortly afterwards behind him, with a rather grim facial expression. Immediately Natsu became noticeably smaller and looked like a beaten dog to her.
"I've made an extra effort to hold myself back.", he murmured meekly.
"Damned moron! Do you think we'll get the reward if we run them in pieces?", Gray now spoke as well, approaching Natsu's other side. At once, Natsu's eyes darkened and he glared at him belligerently.
"As if you would do better!", he grumbled annoyed, before Erza stepped between the two and they were immediately quiet.
"Shit! Do they also belong to this freak?", I now heard the voice of one of the bandits behind me and I turned my head. The one to whom I had made many deep cuts on the arms now stood bleeding and completely disintegrated in front of me, taking turns looking at his coarse comrades and the magicians who had just appeared.
"Let's get away from here!", shouted the one I had injured on his leg and with moaning and groaning sounds they tried to escape but did not get very far. After only a few steps, they were completely wrapped in huge blocks of ice and were unable to move. I glanced at Gray for a moment who was grinning contentedly. I was only surprised that he still wore his shirt.
"Friends! Why can not you wait for me?", I heard a fourth voice and sighed inwardly. Actually, I could have imagined that Lucy was involved, too, when these three chaotic guys showed up somewhere. Slightly out of breath, the blonde came to a standstill next to Erza and then looked in amazement at the sight of four ice statues and me in their midst in front of them.
"What are you doing here?", I grumbled, taking a few steps toward them to reduce the distance to the fours.
"We could ask you the same, buddy.", Natsu laughed.
"And what did you have to do with these bandits, above all?", Erza asked and for a moment her eyes fell on the two pointed daggers in my hands. I snorted briefly and then let my weapons disappear before I pulled a clean, white cloth from my pocket and began to wipe away the blood spatters on my hands and arms.
"I was on an assignment. And on the way back, I was attacked by these rascals.", I answered and discovered to my displeasure more bloodstains on my shirt.
"Looks more like you attacked them.", said Gray casually, as his eyes fell on the gaping wounds of the bandits and for a brief moment he looked as if he was actually afraid of me. He probably did not expect me to do that, I guessed.
"As long as they are still alive ...", Erza said, "Our mission is to capture this gang here.". Her gaze was still curious on me. I probably had drawn her interest in me because of the blades in my hands.
"You saved us some work with that, Levi.", Lucy flirted friendly and gave me a big smile, "Thank you.". I just looked at her coldly and said nothing. After all, it had not been my intention to help them, so no thanks to me.
"Then we can already return now.", the voice of the blue cat happy was to hear, which now emerged behind Natsus back. He probably had been in the background so far, so I had not noticed him yet.
"But we still have to look for Wendy. She wanted to locate the campsite of the bandits.", Gray said and was now upper body free in front of us. I rolled my eyes a little and wondered again how it was possible to undress in such a short time.
"We split up,", Erza said in command, "Gray and I are delivering these bandits and getting our reward. Hou guys, Natsu, Happy, Lucy and Levi go looking for Wendy. We meet again on the outskirts of Magnolia.". I shook my head in confusion for a moment. When did I join their strange club?
"Since when do you have the right to give me orders?", I growled a little gruffly. I instantly felt patronized for some unknown reason and could not stand it if she just dictated about me. Her menacing brown eyes shot at me and beside her I could see Gray and Natsu starting to shiver, though that cold look did not suit them. She stepped right in front of me and since she was a lot taller than me, she could easily look down on me.
"So you do not want to help us find our comrade, Levi?", she asked now, her tone slightly reminding me of my own. Without even showing any emotion, I looked up at her directly in her eyes. Probably she had not really noticed what a commanding tone she had just struck and seemed to take it for granted that the people around her simply did what she said. And, of course, I would not deny them my help, after all they were my comrades but I did not like how she took it for granted that I would immediately do what she ordered.
"I did not say that. Listen to me, Erza.", I muttered and could see out of the corner of my eye, as Gray and Natsu threw me glances that only wanted to express: Are you crazy? "I just do not like the way you talk to me,", I added, realizing some astonishment in her eyes. Maybe she could handle the others like that, but not with me.
To my surprise, she gave a slight sigh and grinned weakly with a raised eyebrow. "You're right. Sorry.", she said, then turned around to face the ice blocks with the bandits. That was it? The people of Fairy Tail were all really moody. But I was not completely satisfied with the outcome of this conversation but somehow I did not feel like talking to her again about it and maybe even breaking a fight. I just wanted to go back to the Guild and the quickest way to get there was to help others search for Wendy.
Without a word, I joined Natsu, Happy, and Lucy while Gray walked past me with wide eyes to Erza. The other three looked at me a bit dumbfounded. Apparently they could not quite handle that I was just telling Erza my opinion and got away unscathed.
"Come on, brats. Or do you want to stand around here all day?", I grumbled to them as I stood next to them and then they broke free of their shock.
"Um, no,", Lucy answered and the three of them turned around so we could start walking side by side. Behind us, I heard Erza and Gray deal with the blocks of ice but after a short while those noises were barely audible.
Next to Lucy, Natsu sniffed in the air, leading our little squad in a way. By now, I had heard that Dragon Slayers, like Natsu, had an extremely good sense of smell and he was able to lead us to Wendy. Strangely enough, this name seemed completely unknown to me, but by far I had not noticed all the members of the guild, I had not much to do with most of them.
"Who is this Wendy?", I asked untypical for me, because although I did not want to admit it myself, I was curious to whom I would like to meet.
"Oh, right, you do not even know her because she was visiting Lamia Scale for a long time. She has a fried there, you know.", Lucy chattered happily and I had to pull myself together, not to snort annoyed. That did not answer my question in any way, I thought grudgingly, but forced myself to remain silent.
"She's also a Dragon Slayer.", Natsu explained more helpful as he continued to sniff in the air, "A Sky Dragon Slayer.". Astonished, I raised an eyebrow. So besides Natsu and Gajeel there was a third Dragon Slayer at Fairy Tail. But I did not ask for more, because i was not more interested in anything and so we walked silently for a while, until we finally came across a wide clearing. There were a few tents set up around an extinguished campfire and there were numerous barrels and boxes around which food had probably been stored. A petite person knelt in front of one of the boxes and examined her and beside her a small-fashioned cat was sitting in a red dress.
Another cat like Happy, I asked myself, as the person and the cat turned to us and jumped up joyfully.
"Oh, you're already here!", she called and only then I recognized that the person was a little girl. As she clambered awkwardly toward us, her long blue hair was blowing in the wind, which she tied to two side braids. Her childlike body was tucked in a green dress with yellow stripes on it and by age she was maybe 13 or 14 years old.
"Hi Wendy. It went faster than expected!", Natsu called to her grinning, while we also approached her.
But only a few steps away from each other, my breath suddenly stopped and I stopped dead in my tracks. When I looked into her face, the blood froze in my veins and I could not believe my eyes. At that moment, I did not know what to think or feel, because everything boiled up inside me. I saw pictures in my mind's eye, felt that anger again, the sadness, the helplessness. But there was also a hidden feeling of joy in me, which I could not fully classify. I could not think rationally and for the second time in my life, I simply did not know what to do and felt helplessly exposed to my stormy feelings.
From wide open eyes I stared at this girl in front of me stunned, because her face looked horrifyingly similar to a person only too familiar to me, not to say, it was identical with her. Suddenly seeing this well-known face in front of me made me completely disconcerted, and the thoughts and feelings that I had associated with this person all suddenly came up again and almost drove tears into my cold, gray eyes.
Because this person was dead for many years.