Chapter 4

My Drive

"We're back!" Flrea rolled off the large bird that Seliah had taken control of and back onto the grassy ground below. His body had only partially grown back and the plant creatures primary mode of transportation was still rolling around.

"Gosh, this is the exact spot we left too...how did you get them to land here?" Hud jumped from the giant bird as Seilah followed.

"It was simple. I ordered the creature to land where we left." She forced far more complex task before, something as straightforward as that wasn't beyond her ability.

"I-it will be nice to finally be able to rest a bit after all that." Lamy sighed closing her eyes slide off of the beast. Once she did Seilah released the monster from her curse as it quickly flew away.

"Rest? As I recall you were supposed to start making a regeneration chamber for you and me..." Seilah's eyes narrowed.

"W-what you want me to start working on that no-" Lamy was cut off with a glare as she laughed nervously. "O-Of course I will just show me where the guild hall is."

"Alright, come with me garbage bag..." Flrea rolled his head as Lamy and him vanished into the brush, right before Hud could do the same Seilah stopped him.

"I suppose that battle was far more than you bargain for..." Seilah stated as Hud laughed.

"Yeah, but I'm glad I fought them. Because of that, I got a little bit stronger..."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, when my body takes damage it recovers stronger than before. It's only slight, but I get better from fighting far more than training, but training is important too." Hud laughed as Seilah smiled .

"What if I could tell you a way to get stronger quickly?"

Hud fell silent, his expression telling the demon that he was at least curious.

"Lamy is an expert on demons. If you ask her she will be able to implant demon particles into your body, even a monster like you would grow st-"

"Nah..." Hud quickly cut her off as Seilah's eyes twitched.

"Why you want to get stronger do you not? If you are worried about me betraying you..." She did have that in mind, but it wasn't the first thing that entered her head when she told Hud.

"Because I'm Monster Hud. Not Demon Hud, that sounds way lamer."

"That cannot be the only reason." A part of Seilah wouldn't put it past him.

"It's not that, even if you asked Flrea he would say the same thing," Hud replied still not giving her an answer.

"Then...why, why do you even fight? Is it to conquer something...or perhaps something as disgusting as protecting your friends?" Seilah growled at the sheer thought of the latter one.

In fact, she wouldn't be surprised if that was his answer...

"Nope, nothing as worthless as that. I have no interest in conquering anything, and my friends can take care of themselves." His response confused her for a moment, mostly because she really couldn't comprehend it.

"Then why..."

"Because I want to reach my goal. To become strong and fight a lot of strong people along the way. I want to be a better version of myself every day until I reach the invincible me at the end!"

"You just want to be strong? That doesn't make any sense! Everyone wants power for a reason!" Whether it was to show off, or because something horrible happened to them in the past. There was a reason for everything, perhaps a stronger monster beat him when he was younger, or he was too weak to save someone.

There had to be a reason...

"My reason is because...because...I REALLY LOVE FIGHTING!" Hud nearly cheered as he said that. "Every time I'm punching something or training I just feel great, even when it looks like I'm about to die for sure I can't help but still feel excited about it," Hud replied as Seilah frowned.

"Then this guild is..." Seilah started to speak as Hud finished her statement.

"To meet really strong people. I wanted you to join because I had a lot of fun fighting you, and once you get your strength back we can have a rematch."

She knew that was at least part of the reason, but oddly enough, to have it spelled out for her so bluntly made the whole thing seem...silly. Like she had joined a playground game, not only that.

"Isn't that selfish?" Even a demon like her could see that much.

"Yep~" Hud grinned as Seilah nearly tripped over herself.

"D-don't say that so casually! Who would join a guild just to satisfy your battle lust?"

"Well, Frlea already told me that when I came up with the idea, and I mean...you, and Lamy joined." Hud laughed, Seilah just growled. He had a point no matter how basic it was.

"Perhaps it was foolish of me even to ask." Seilah sighed as Hud shrugged.

"I mean, we can still do plenty of other stuff besides fighting. Like, we can take those task things I read in a magazine." Hud crossed his arms as Seilah felt a sudden urge to correct him.

"You mean jobs..."

"Yeah those, once we get enough members we can start doing those...I mean, I'll let you and Lamy handle that kind of thing since you guys are more experienced in pointless stuff like that."

Seilah couldn't help but groan at how casually he was talking about this. Even a dark guild needed some organization. They needed ways to find clients and contact them, speak with them and make sure the job was good. Not only that, while dark guilds usually didn't use the normal ranking system they needed to know if a job was too dangerous to be worth the pay.

All of this didn't seem to even pass through Hud's mind. Though perhaps it was for the best at the moment, like Hud said they really didn't have enough members to actually start doing anything. It seemed that they didn't even have a guild mark yet.

"We...shouldn't keep the others waiting." Seilah decided to end the conversation there as the two of them made it back to the broken old building that the three of them had been staying in.

Inside it seemed that Lamy was already starting perpetration on building the container. Instead of the usual glass, it seemed that it was made from thin leaves, most likely Flrea's doing. A large tentacle was attached to the top of it connecting it to the roof of the building.

"You already got this far?" Seilah crossed her arms as Lamy shook her head.

"Nope, not even someone as amazing as me can work that fast. This is more of a prototype me and Flrea created together to see if ti would be possible in this environment. Right now it would only be able to reconstruct very small limbs like fingers for us, and it goes without saying that it wouldn't work on monsters." Lamy gave a uselessly detailed explanation.

"I did not need to hear all of that. I just need to know when the complete version will be finished..." Seilah snapped as Lamy held back some choice words.

"If we can get all the material I need, about maybe a week...at best." Lamy's words caused Seilah to bite her lips. Not only did they need to find material's but it seemed that it would take longer than expected.

"That's not a big deal. We can try to find more pieces of that cube thing while we wait." Hud pointed out as Seilah glared back towards Lamy, the small bunny eared demon quickly pulling out her map.

"U-um, the closest piece is somewhere in Minstrel...that's strange." Lamy tilted her had as she examined the map further.

"What is?" Seilah asked as the bunny-eared demon quickly shook her head.

"Nothing just noticed something strange...anyway where are the beds~" Lamy yawned.

"We don't have any..." Hud replied bluntly as Lamy's eyes widened.

"What? That means I'm going to have to sleep on the floor?"

"Well, we still have some money left over from when we removed Seilah from the town. We could always use that to buy some more furniture." Hud pointed out. They were going to be stuck there for a few days until Flrea had recovered.

"Please, a beautiful lady like me can't be expected to sleep on the cold hard ground..." Lamy let out a small sob as Hud picked up Flrea and placed him on his head.

"Hey, do you want to come with us?" Strangely Hud was asking Seilah such a foolish question as the woman scoffed.

"It'd be a waste..."

Hud just shrugged. "Alright, we'll be back with stuff to lay on!" The way he worded it seemed like a cause for concern as he and the plant monster left Lamy and Seilah alone once again.

Lamy held her breath trying her best not to gain the attention of Seilah as she worked on the grassy tube. Lamy had already reached the limit of what could be done that day, and she was just pretending to work.

"Lamy, would it be possible to increase my power even with a half-functioning hell's core?" Seilah asked as Lamy's ears dropped slightly.

"Ah, maybe, but it would be simpler just to get your other half back right?"

The moment Lamy said that Seilah's eyes widened, the air in the room grew dangerous.

"How...odd, I don't recall ever telling you about my current situation."

"Oh..." Perhaps it was the realization that she let something slip out she wasn't supposed to, but Lamy froze stammer over her words. "Y-you told me back at the inn remember?"

Seilah knew that was a lie, but..."It's not like you knowing changes anything, but I do wonder what your little map has listed on it."

"I-I swear that's all, just your location and the cubes!" Lamy insisted as Seilah chuckled.

"Don't be so tense. I won't kill you. You and I are still guildmates after all, even if it is in a different guild. Plus unlike Tartaros, it seems this guildmaster actually cares about your worthless life."

Lamy relaxed finally stopping what she was doing as she leaned against a nearby wall.

"This place is no Cube, but it is comfy enough, and it beats sleeping outside. So what's our plan anyway? I mean after we get your power back and defeat Fairy Tail."

Seilah tapped her bottom lip before sighing. "Perhaps it is against my style, but we shall think of that once we get to it."

After all, such a thing was quite a ways away. And she wanted to see how the Demon Fang guild panned out. Speaking of such things...they would need a guild mark.

Author note

This was more of a cool down chapter. Next chapter it really will head straight into the next arc.