3.) Battle Scars
3
This is about the DGM part but its a bit before where Natsu is betrayed by the guild.
Sorry I don't want to spoil anything!!
Also sorry for the slow updates!! Gomenesai!! Gomenesai!! Gomenesai!!
I apologize in advance for this chapters longness. I was trying to show how much Allan had changed in the duration of 3 centuries while fighting the secret war with the Earl.
Seriously: -_-' 2820 words.
A elderly man walked through the crowd of people bustling about to try and reach their destination of various places that many people would occupy in the early Saturday mornings.
He may have been old, to the point of where his skin was wrinkled and scared, but he was a pillar of strength as he weaved through the crowd with such ease as if he was gliding.
People wouldn't give a second thought to him at first glance. With his knee length black and white cloak. But on closer inspection you could see a certain pattern along the edges and on the man's left arm sleeve.
If you were a seasoned fighter you would recognize the slight bulge on his right hip and a longer one on his left.
He wore a pair of black combat boots that touched the hem of the cloak. To any passer by they would think he was a mage or a civilian with a slight knowledge of magic.
His hair hung around his face and covered his left eye, but as the wind blew towards him the white strands were moved and a flash of red could be seen going from his forehead to his chin.
The man seemed to be lost in thought and ignoring the people around him. Not out of rudeness, for he definitely was not a rude person, even if he was older than many of them there.
He had seen many horrors that most of them would never come close to seeing in their lifetime, or the next if rebirth was a possibility in human life. He believed it was, at least he prayed it was, for it was the only hope he had for, maybe seeing the ones he called his family so long ago.
His name was Allan, Allan Walker, the man that had walked through many horrors. The man who had lived through 3 centuries. He didn't show it on his physical body, but Allan had lived that long, he had lived that long fighting a war. A war that took his family, a war that seemed to never end.
He had once fought along side them, they were a group, a small one, but they were also a family. The Black Order. Lavi. Kanda. Leenalee. Cheif Komoi. Krory. Miranda. General Cross. General Tiedoll. Link. Bookman. The Finders who were so vast in number it would take days to name them all. And many others, they were all his family and he was theirs.
He missed them. Oh how much he did. He missed how Cheif Komoi would seemingly go from scarily serious to crazy scientist in seconds and then unleash a new insane robot to cause chaos. He missed bantering with Kanda and how well they knew each other, their quirks, their fighting styles, they knew each other to a point to where they could have executed a plan in the battlefield without communication with each other.
He missed Leenalee's optimistic attitude, and the way she could light up a room in seconds, he missed her determination and strength even with everything she had been through. Lavi had eventually quit being a Bookman, with much difficulty getting away from it, and was able to let down that fake mask of his. He missed Lavi, the real Lavi, how Lavi would be the one with answers to alot of questions, fact wise.
He missed how Lavi annoyed Kanda and was cheerful, he always tried to cheer them up if they were down about something.
Honestly Allan thought of all of them as his brothers and sisters. He missed them all.
The events that led to what he was today and what was made of the black order where brutal and horrid even for the things he had seen as a child and on the missions he took with one of his family members.
He had been cleared of Link's watchful eye, after he proved his worth as an Exorcist, even with a Noah inside his mind.
A month after that they had discovered he was the Heart.
It was two years later when everything went horribly wrong. It had to have been every single Akuma the Millennium Earl had made along with all of the Noah who were still alive, they had attacked the Black Order base. The northern base first, then the eastern, western, and southern. All of them were reduced to rubble.
His family died Heros. Taking down two Noah's with them as they fell.
He watched them die. He watched them fight on. He watched them get stabbed, shot, cut, slashed. He watched them bleed. He watched them win. He watched them fall.
He fought along with them. But he couldn't save them. Not without having his own head lopped off. At the end of the battle only two Noah remained along with the Earl.
They fled. They had won the battle but not the war.
They were the only Exorcist Base that did win the battle.
Allan was the only one still standing on the battlefield.
He held, watched, and wept as his family died in his arms. He couldn't do anything about it.
Before they died, a small group of the Exorcists talked to their innocence and told them to protect their youngest member. To protect the heart and become his own weapons when they died. They gave their weapons to Allan and as they died they watched what they thought was one of the most amazing sights in their life.
Allan's arm activated itself and changed itself into its sword form.
The innocence from Kanda's sword shot foward, still in its sword form, before glowing so bright you couldn't see its color or shape, it collided with Allan's sword and merged together with it.
Allan's sword became a little bit smaller and a etching of a Lotus was carved into the base of the blade near the hilt over top the white upside down cross.
Lavi's hammer shot foward and glowed the same way before slamming into the sword merging itself as well.
Allan's sword again changed in a small way. The handle and hilt changed its color to a fiery red that matched his hair. Above the Lotus a dragon was carved around the dragon was a storm with fire dancing in the clouds. Lenalee's Dark boots repeated the process and changed his sword as well.
Thick black leather straps wrapped in a spiral around the handle, making a beautiful design and pattern of red and black. Black strips ran down the blade alongside the Lotus and Dragon.
They had all smiled to him as they watched his arm, the one that had caused him so much pain, regenerated into a totally normal looking arm, while the sword layed in front of him.
They died smiling at him.
He had screamed to the heavens for them.
He was the last Exorcist alive, with the last innocence, that they knew of, that wasn't destroyed by the Earl.
Over the years he learned that with his friends innocence merging with his own gave him new abilities.
He was able to summon the Dark Boots on his feet and use them the same way Leenalee had. He was able to summon Hammer and use its abilities the same way Lavi had. And he was able to summon the hell beasts that came from Kanda's Katana.
His sword could disappear if he wanted it to but it would sink into his new human arm and disfigure it till it looked as it did since he was born. He didn't mind though.
He had wandered for a while. Slaying Akuma as he came across them, and collecting innocence. That was another weird thing.
Since he discovered he was the Heart he could feel other innocence all over the world. Not feel them as if touching them but feeling them like a pull.
He collected them and hid them in a bag at his waist.
Over the years he encountered more Noah, who he soon discovered where remaking their Noah clan, and fought them. But the war was never won.
One battle was over a unique piece of innocence, the Earl hadn't known of Allan's status as the Heart, but neither side won.
The innocence exploded on its own, without tampering from either side. It spread over the whole earth like a mist.
The humans that breathed it in soon had abilities they named magic.
He watched them grow and prosper with magic and he often thought that maybe it was a good thing it had exploded and given humans the ability of magic.
Of course the civilians never knew of the Black Order and with no one to record it anymore, except Allan who kept a book of history he was writing in about the war, its history of ever being built was soon wiped away from knowledge of anyone and anything.
That didn't mean that Allan didn't wear the Exorcist's uniform and Star proudly on his chest.
Allan had aged to an old man, he was still a strong fighter and wasn't weighed down by ailments to his own body, but he knew he wasn't Immortal.
He may have lived this long, but only because of the Noah inside of his mind, who had calmed into a docile creature who hated the Noah and wanted peace.
He had felt the pain his nephew had felt as the white haired boy watched and held his family as they were dieing. And it humbled and changed him, for the better.
The past 14 years he had felt a pull to something, it felt different than the feel of an innocence. It felt as if it was a...a...he didn't know what.
That was until he had arrived at a magic guild.
It led him to a pink haired teen, who had a fire in his gut and personality, who wasn't afraid to fight for what was right or speak his mind.
And that was determined. Determined in protecting and determined in the strength of his magic guild. His family.
He had watched the teen for a year, studying him, learning about him, and sometimes even laughing at what the teen would do.
His name was Natsu Dragneel. A Dragon Slayer. A strong one at that.
He had learned of the strength of the guild that it had in each other. In their bond as a family. He admired it.
That was something you should treasure.
He watched but he never approached. He felt it wasn't time.
Let his be free. Free of the bonds of this dreadful war. He would think that on a regular basis.
But then he had seen the ultimate betrayal.
In his travels he did not completely avoid confrontation with others. He had taken hits from magic attacks. He had deflected them. Avoided them. Even had some take his energy. He knew how much they hurt.
He had also read up on magic and its power. He knew of guild marks. He knew of magic cores. He knew of anything that he thought was relevant according to magic.
So when he had walked onto the scene of the guild beating Natsu to a pulp as he took it. Surprised. Horrified. That would be an understatement of what he felt.
He wanted to stop them but somehow he felt he shouldn't.
When he had heard Natsu's broken whisper of 'Why?' It had broke his heart.
And angered him by what the Master of the guild the one that he thought was a 'father ' to the guild members replied to Natsu's broken form as he ripped the guild mark from the boy's shoulder.
Natsu's scream had ripped though the air and he desperately wanted to stop the man from harming the teen who was clearly already in enough pain, but something told him not to. A nagging feeling, thought, instinct, just told him not to intervene no matter how much he desperately wanted to.
Neah had screamed in his mind with anger, rage, and sorrow. Both of them felt a deep connection to the pink haired boy and they wanted to stop his pain.
But that feeling Allan had in the back of his mind rooted him to the forest ground.
He didn't know why the guild was doing this to the teen, who he thought had done nothing wrong. But he started to hate them for it at that moment.
When they had retreated into the guild and the teen had forced himself up to wander towards the wooded area, seemingly in a daze he had shot foward to catch the boy who was barely keeping conscious.
As soon as he touched the boy a flash covered his sight and he saw a vision. A vision of a man.
The man was strong. With a dark hood covering his face. Pink strands of hair peeked out of the hood. On his face or at least the bottom half, he could see a crimson scar, much like his own, running towards the cheek of the man.
Another flash and he felt the emotions the boy had felt as he fought for his family that had just betrayed him. The pure raw emotion that the teen had felt when he had wept, cheered, fought, suffered, sacrificed, loved, lost, and screamed all for his nakama.
And with it came images, flashes, scenes moving too fast for comprehension, along the inside of his eyelids. He had seen the boys life, before his own eyes, and felt the teens pain. And in that instant he knew why the boy was so special.
He had come back to reality and pulled the teen close to him. He had silent tears running down his cheeks, not for himself but for what the one he was holding. The boy had been through so much and was only 14.
It reminded him of himself in many ways.
He had realized that the teen had cryed as well before he had collapsed unconscious in his arms.
He had bandaged the boy up and gave him special pills that he discovered Chief Komoi had been working on before he died. He had found them and finished creating them once he had read up on medical, medicine, and science books.
Once done, he knew he couldn't stay there. Natsu would have a lot of thinking to do and probably several people he wanted to talk to, so he wrote a note to the boy in a blank notebook he had bought a week ago to continue on writing the history of the war, and set it, along with several more of the pain medication beside the teen before standing up and gazing at the boy.
He had already felt a fatherly love towards the teen as soon as he felt the tug towards the lad.
He smiled a little bit, it was soft and foreign on his face, as he hadn't smiled a true smile since his family had perished, and crouched down beside the boy. He ran his fingers though the pink stands before leaning down and whispering in the boys ear.
"You will find me one day and I can not wait for the day. I will always be there for you even before you find me." And with that he leaned his forehead against the teen's and closed his eyes.
He couldn't understand it. He felt such a strong connection and bond with the boy even though Natsu didn't even know Allan's name. It puzzled him. He knew that Natsu was going to be the one to change everything and that this was just the beginning.
He could feel it. He could feel it in the old bones he had that he knew wouldn't hold out for him much longer and he could feel it deep within his soul.
This boy will be the one to change everything.
He whispered again. "Natsu do not let this darkness of betrayal cloud your soul. If so I fear for many people's future. I will see you soon."
As he finished those words he rose as quick as a lion attacking its prey and walked away from the teen.
He knew the teen would be fine from there. And he wouldn't be that far away if the pink haired lad needed him.
Besides he needed to prepare.
The climax in this war was coming. And it was going to be anything but pretty.