"Shadow's coming with us on the job, if that's okay?"
Natsu and Lucy looked down at them, and Lucy nodded. "Sure!"
"Great!" Wendy agreed, and looked at Shadow. "You can just follow us, and we'll show you how it's done!"
In lack of a better answer, he simply nodded. Natsu and Lucy then went to the doors, and Wendy quickly followed, the ca – exceeds – trailing after in the air. Shadow followed Wendy, but he had to walk pretty fast to keep up with her. Humans are so much taller than mobians, and take so much bigger steps…
And, mind you, that was not a metaphor for anything.
The doors opened. Magnolia greeted them with sunlight and birds, pastel-coloured houses, flowers, magic and stands and salesmen. Natsu and Lucy argued about something – sounded like how big a responsibility a spare-key was – and Happy had taken up the task of leading the way, flying along one of the bigger streets.
Their group was given some odd looks from the crowd, but this time it was mostly at Natsu and Lucy. After a few seconds of confusion, Shadow realised that Natsu and Lucy seemed to be some kind of celebrities here.
He was not sure how to feel about that. He almost caught himself wishing Mavis was here, but then he realised what he was doing and immediately shook off that feeling.
Wendy and the others could tell him more about this world anyway. Speaking of that… "What kind of 'job' is it anyway?"
Wendy looked both surprised and happy that he had asked, and she said, "Oh, it's just a basic search-and-find. The one who put up the job wanted some rare herbs, and we're going to go and find some."
Shadow nodded. Herbs, huh…?
Happy led the way, and soon they were back in the forest. Vines and roots were climbing over each other there, and everything was either bright green or flowers. Natsu and Lucy had come to an agreement, and they were joking together now. Carla just sulked quietly, and Wendy looked at the surroundings happily.
"…What kind of 'magic', did you use now again?"
"I'm the Sky dragon slayer." She paused. "…What did you use now again?" She said sheepishly.
After contemplating over saying 'chaos magic', Shadow then said, "Chaos energy. It' like… lighting magic?"
"Oh! Like Laxus' magic?"
Who the hell is Laxus? "…Yeah."
They walked and walked – or flew in two cases – and the landscape changed. Shadow wondered how long they were really going to have to walk, but he didn't ask. Natsu spared him the effort in any case, as the Fire dragon slayer suddenly exclaimed,
"Luce! Are we ever going to get there, or what?"
Lucy sighed and said, "We should be there soon… I hope."
…It was at this point that they got attacked by a pack of monkeys the size of large boulders…
Suddenly they had just jumped in front of the road, menacing with their – for some strange reason – green fur, and Happy yelped as he was almost crushed. And then – before most of them could even think of acting – Natsu charged.
And… Chaos energy was never going to seem quite as powerful to Shadow, after he had seen Natsu's magic at work.
He shouted something, and then he slammed his fist into the first one.
-only thing was just, that his fist was on fire, and that flames was just whirling around, melting the grass even. The heat could be felt even from where Shadow and Wendy stood, and needless to say, he and the girl didn't have to lift a finger in this fight.
…And Shadow suspected that Natsu could easily have eliminated the monkeys with a single strike, but didn't because a) he didn't want to do needless killing, or b) he wanted to fight together with Lucy for whatever reason.
Lucy, whose magic was just as brilliant and impossible as Natsu's, summoning forth a warrior with the help of a golden key…
And it was in this moment that Shadow thought that maybe you really shouldn't judge books by their covers. That maybe all of those seemingly harmless people back at the guild, in reality had magic just as strong and vivid and impossible as Natsu and Lucy.
Yeah, he was going to call it magic from now on. When it looked like magic, and worked like magic, then it really had to be magic, right?
…Besides, Fairy Tail? That, at least, should give you a clue…
"Wow Natsu!" Happy exclaimed. "Those monkeys didn't stand a chance!"
"Of course!" Natsu exclaimed, and then he grinned in such a way that Shadow almost hissed, because it looked so Sonic. Ughhh…
"Tsk, was that really necessary…" Carla grumbled, and Wendy told her to cheer up with a smile. Lucy just chuckled, and Shadow… felt almost out of place. Almost like he should just go back or something, but then Wendy had leant down and taken his hand, dragging him with her as the team continued their journey.
"C'mon Shadow! Don't fall behind now, okay?"
"Yeah, yeah…" Shadow said. But then Natsu joked around with Lucy again, and Happy led the way, occasionally stealing glances at Carla, who just scoffed and looked away, and Wendy would chuckle at that and tag Shadow along…
Team, huh?
And the landscape shifted slowly as they travelled, skies going from light forget-me-not to deeper indigo shades…
-And even though she couldn't possibly be here, Shadow could almost hear Mavis talking in his head, saying that he should just enjoy the moment for what it was.