Chapter 9

Bellalyse's P.O.V.

I felt oddly sedated and drugged. I couldn't remember anything besides pushing my keys into Rogue's hands. I guess I got knocked unconscious then. I tried moving my wrist. Nothing. I frantically looked over and saw that my hands, arms, legs, feet, and neck were strapped to a table. Why the hell would my neck be strapped? That thing was good for nothing except for cutting off part of my oxygen supply.

"Operation: Commence." I heard a robotic voice but besides the table and strap I saw nothing. Okay, one thing if pitch darkness counted. The table started glowing and it felt like I was being ripped apart from my body. I screamed and fell unconscious. Again.


Rogue's P.O.V.

I was sipping a glass of water to replenish my strength while Esmerella rattled on and on about her life.

"Annoying, isn't she?" I gasped as I heard a voice in my mind. I looked up and saw Ash smirking at me from his seat near the bar. "We all have to live with it. Just think and I'll be able to hear you."

"Have you ever heard of privacy," I thought back. "When could we go searching for Bella again?"

He shrugged. "We'll go for her tomorrow. She's strong; she beat me in hand to hand combat." Ash looked annoyed at that. "And she beat Esmerella at multiple battles."

Then I lifted my head. A scent flooded my nose. I smelled a lot of coppery liquid around. Blood. One glance at the other dragon slayers, and I could tell they could smell the same thing. I concentrated on the scent under it to tell who exactly was losing a lot of blood. Cherry blossoms, peaches, and meadow grass assaulted my nose. I stood up almost immediately, knocking my chair over. Ash and Esmerella were already running to the guild doors. I pushed the door open, afraid of what I might find there. A figure lay on the sidewalk, bloody and torn. I brushed the hair away. Bella. She was unconscious and dirty.

"I can't reach her through telepathy," Ash muttered. Esmerella paused.

"Yeah, her minds blocked off." Worried, she cleaned Bella's face. "This shouldn't be happening if she's unconscious."

"Oh no…" Ash said a lost look in his eyes. "Do you think that she went through the extraction?"

"Shit," Esmerella cussed. All of the other Fairy Tail members were looking around cluelessly. Ash and Esmerella weren't telling what happened yet and none of us were experts on demigods. "It failed then."

I picked up Bella and cradled her in my arms. Whatever they were talking about, we weren't going to heal her on the sidewalk with a lot of curious passersby watching. I walked into the infirmary and gently scooted her on one of the beds. A groan came out of her and she started shivering violently. Esmerella was concentrated on her, a blue glow coming out of her flat hands positioned over Bella's heart. Ash was chanting quietly, ending each time with a curious gesture. He started again and a green light was starting to form from his open palms. Wendy was also helping, her face tense as she assumed the same position as Esmerella.

She stirred and then started sweating. A lot. I poked her and yelped. Her skin was flaming hot. "Get Gray in here," Ash yelled. Gray appeared. "Use your Ice-Make to make sure Bella's cooled off for at least fifteen minutes. I'll help you. Esmerella will use the Healing Dragon Techniques on her. We can't heal her if she's an abnormal temperature."

"Ice Make: Cube." Gray muttered.

"Healing Dragon's Healer of the Stars." Esmerella said softly. "Mind Penetration."

I watched them try to heal Bella. In my opinion, she didn't look any better. Whatever ice cubes touched her melted off instantly. Esmerella sighed and sat back, defeated. "Ash, I can't scan her memories."

"That's a problem," Ash rubbed his forehead. "We don't have the Dragion Keys with us at the moment. Zeref probably has them and is gloating about it too."

Keys for Dragion? I slowly took out Bella's blue and white keys. Esmerella fixed her gaze upon me and her voice pierced the silence. "Where did you get the Dragion Gatekeeper keys?"

Before I had a chance to reply, Ash spoke up. "Bella probably gave them to him." He extended his hand. "May we have them?" I hesitated before dropping them in his open palm. They were Bella's siblings. I could probably trust them.

He picked through the ring of keys. "There are more keys on here than usual. I guess she emptied her requip." He selected one key, unhooked it and handed it over to Esmerella.

"I am the Daughter of the Dragon God and the bridge between Earth and Fearless. Forced Substitute Summon: I summon thee, Dragon of Memories, Wilona!" A dark blue dragon appeared, with the pattern of the night sky displayed on her scales. Esmerella gave the key back to Ash while he got in another stance.

"I am the Son of the Dragon God and the bridge between Jai and Myralis. Forced Substitute Summon: I summon thee, Dragon of Healing, Healia!" Healia popped up, in the middle of the room, grooming her claws.

Healia raked her eyes around the room. Wilona gave her a nod. She stepped forward. "Esmerella, Ash, why have you called us? You know full well that under these type of battle circumstances, only the Gatekeeper of Dragion may summon us."

Esmerella gestured toward Bella. "The Gatekeeper of Dragion is in an unstable state. I suspect she went through a failed extraction. We need her memories and Wilona still isn't powerful enough to do it by herself."

I was confused. Why didn't Esmerella summon a more powerful memory dragon instead? I knew there were other shadow dragons so there had to be more than one dragon per element.

"Wilona is the only Memory Dragon currently alive." I jumped at the voice in my head and glared at Ash who smirked at me again. "The keys Bella always kept on her ring were the most powerful ones. Each dragon has a summoning key but she just kept the ones that would be able to endure mental and physical challenges with her. For Memory Dragons, there could only be one dragon alive. They would transfer their memories to their child and the child would later on mate with a Star and Constellation Dragon. When they transfer their memories, it's like giving their life force to them. They no longer have an element to use so they die. Wilona's a very young dragon. Maybe a teenager at best. She still needs time to train."

"Ah." I nodded. "Now get the hell out of my head!"

Ash grumbled and drew back. We both turned and saw Wilona and Healia bent over Bella, concentrated. Esmerella also was connecting hands with Bella. She gasped suddenly and drew back. "Thanks, Healia, Wilona." Esmerella turned toward us. "Ash, her contact is in Nightwalker."

He went pale. "So we have to capture Nightwalker?"

"Can you guys please explain this," Mira butted in, impatient.

"Ah." Ash cleared his throat. "For all of the demigods, we each have a dark persona. It's another personality that will fight and do whatever it takes to take control of the physical body. They also go against out magic element. Like, we're in the Creation element. So our personas would be in Destruction. Sometimes, our persona gets messed up and whenever they fight, we feel physical pain. To avoid that, Mom created lacrimas that when consumed, could seal in the dark personas for one month. When she died, the demigods were left with two options. The first was to just bear it and ignore the persona. The second would be the extraction. It's an operation performed on your mind. It would extract your dark persona out of you and let you live a normal life. But, it might fail. It has many times and when it does, the original demigod goes in a comatose-like state. They may either die or just stay unconscious until the cure if found. Bella's just unconscious for now. To cure a failed extraction, we need to bring the dark persona here. The part that failed during the extraction was when the persona was being extracted out. The operation might have extracted too much and brought the dark persona and the actual demigod soul into one body. Afterwards, we could usually kill the dark persona and get on with our lives but if the original soul is one with the persona, both will die if we get rid of her. It's a lengthy surgery and exhausts the mental mind and physical body."

Esmerella bowed her head slightly. "And the antidote would be in Nightwalker. To cure Bella, we would have to retrieve her soul inside of Nightwalker, but of course, capturing Nightwalker would be a chore as well." She twiddled her thumbs. "There's also something you should know about Zeref."

Ash shot her a look. "Esmerella, I'll tell them about it. Go take a walk or something. Clear your head. It won't do us any good to have you breaking down while explaining some godly business."

She nodded and moved toward the door, her actions almost robotic.

Ash faced the group and took a deep breath. "The person you know as Zeref is Luke. Son of the Destruction God and enemy of our mom. In an attempt to make peace with the demigods on Destruction's side, Mom made a contract. Bella and Luke would marry and hopefully tie the knot completing the peace. They're opposites; Mom and Destruction would constantly fight, ending each time with a violent blow." He faced the window sadly. "Esmerella fell in love with Luke at that time. Bella was kind about this; she managed to keep herself away from her betrothed to give her sister more time to confess to Luke. It made Luke upset and Zeref managed to turn all of Luke's negative emotions into evil. Kind of like Nirvana. Eventually Zeref built up all of the emotions he collected and freed himself, residing in Luke. However evil our personas may be, they still carry the thoughts and emotions of the original demigod. Zeref, as Luke, loves Bella. He managed to turn that into a negative expression by rampaging the world, non-stop until she agrees to be his bride."

I was shocked. Bella hadn't mentioned any of this to us. "Then should we go find Nightwalker?" I was curious; the sooner we found her, the sooner Bella will be conscious right? So why are they all still fussing over her condition?

Ash stood up. "We'll go right now. Requip: Ancient Bow of the Forest." A bow with some type of vine growing around it appeared and a bark quiver was positioned on his waist.

Esmerella also had twin swords sheathed at her belt. She pulled on a pair of pure white leather gloves and grasped the red handle of one of the swords. The other black handle remained untouched. Ash glanced at her position.

"Is it really necessary to use the Style of the Undrawn Twin Swords?" Ash backed away.

"That's the same as Kagura's magic of Mermaid Heel right?" Sting had entered the room, followed by Team Natsu.

"No," Esmerella replied, a slow smile spreading across her face. "Hers is the Long Sword Style. I admire her effort to keep her magic original but that kind of magic was created to mimic this style. The Style of the Undrawn Twin Swords. As you can see, I have a pair of red and black twin swords. It's kind of like the recreated Long Sword version but more powerful. The Long Sword is more on swordsmanship ability and speed. The Twin Swords are more of balance, agility, flexibility, strength and control. The Black Sword is Confidence. The Red Sword is Victory. When fought with them together, they emit a strange magic energy. It's the swords resonating with one another. I guess I could draw the swords but to do so, I would need to have enormous control over them. Once drawn, they attempt to defeat the enemy, no matter what which often results in one's death. I wear white holy gloves when I draw them; it subdues their energy, allowing me to use them as regular magical swords." She briskly rubbed her gloved hands together. "Let's go find Nightwalker."


A Few Hours Later… (Rogue's P.O.V.)

"Hidden Sword Style: World's Oblivion!" Esmerella finished off the group of bandits. Ash was watching her, an amused expression on his face at the shocked looks of Team Natsu and the Twin Dragon Slayers. It had barely been five seconds and a group of fifty bandits were already defeated by only one person. "So, Ash, I sense Nightwalker nearby."

Ash lifted his head, sniffing. "And I could smell her too."

A girl silently walked through the forest. She had long black hair that reached her waist and red eyes that looked almost black. She had a robe and in her hands was a simple little wooden ball.

Ash and Esmerella glanced at each other. "Nightwalker." They started advancing on her and stopped when she smirked at them. "Just give us Bellalyse's soul."

Nightwalker shook her head and grabbed a pouch hanging on her red robe. She looked at the pouch's contents and selected one and held it out for the group to see. A single white teardrop hanging on a silver chain dangled from her fingertips. "You want the soul?" Her voice was emptied of emotion.

Esmerella leapt forward and made a movement to grasp the teardrop but Ash flung himself at her and knocked her down. Everyone was tense and watching Nightwalker.

"Let's see…" she muttered and closed her eyes. "Original Death Demigod Magic: I call upon thee, the Soul of Mother Nature." A woman with a flowing white gown and long light brown hair appeared.

"Mom," Esmerella said, "What?!"

"Mom…" Ash said, his composure breaking.

The woman turned toward them. "Ash, Esmerella…? What happened?"

The Creation and Dragon Demigod siblings broke down, sobbing. Nightwalker smiled, enjoying their mental struggle. "Two down." She murmured, still swinging the necklace. "Three strikes and you're out!"

Team Natsu attacked. Natsu used his newly learned Secret Dragon Slayer Techniques along with Wendy and Gajeel supporting him with theirs. Erza requipped into her Purgatory Armor and Lucy summoned Leo and Capricorn. Gray used his strongest Ice Magic with Nightwalker distracted. She didn't fight back. She merely dodged the attacks on her. They retreated back next to the Twin Dragon Slayers.

"That's one strike." Nightwalker whispered, her voice low in the rising wind.

Sting and I attacked next with Amy supporting us. We used Dragon Force but yet again, Nightwalker dodged them.

"Twice." She murmured, caressing the teardrop.

"You bitch," Ash snarled and launched himself at her. Esmerella started to get a deadly aura around her and Amy used Erza's Requip Magic.

"Three times!" Nightwalker cackled. "I gave you a warning, didn't I? Humans are as foolish as demigods! That is the third chance, missy!"

"She's gone mad," Natsu said, still not understanding why Nightwalker still had the teardrop necklace out. I kind of agreed with Natsu. She was acting crazy.

She glanced at him and dropped the teardrop in her pouch. "ROGUE!" I heard some soft sobbing in my head once my name echoed around in my head. "Please…don't…" The voice was low but I could still hear it. I could tell I was the only one hearing this; the battle continued without any interruptions. "Run away! Now!" By that time, I could recognize the voice. Bella. My mate. "I'm in the teardrop… but go. Now. Before everything is lost!"


Bellalyse's P.O.V.

I cried softly inside my soul barrier. I could see my fellow friends fighting Nightwalker. I knew what she was planning; she was wasting their magic. "ROGUE!" I screamed in my barriers. It wasn't helping; the battle continued. "Please…don't….Run away! Now! I'm in the teardrop…but go. Now. Before everything is lost," I yelled. It's not like it was affecting them. My efforts were useless. Then I realized I was using Dreamer's Teleportation. And I was in Rogue's mind. I quickly sent him images of my memories and so on. Hopefully they can defeat Zeref. But as for Esmerella…I wasn't too sure that it was okay for her to witness the final battle.

I wandered aimlessly in time and space, bored. If I were to watch the battle, I would end up broken. If I ignored it, it would be heartless. So I stayed in my Teleportation state.


Rogue's P.O.V.

When I heard Bella was in the teardrop, I went crazy. Almost. I leapt forward and snatched the pouch. Black ghosts started twisting around my arms so I tossed it to Sting who reached in and grabbed the necklace. I could faintly hear Esmerella and Ash yelling.

"Retreat! We have what we came here for!" Esmerella ordered for everyone to go back. I blindly stumbled around, only to be lifted by Fro.

"Thanks Fro," I mumbled, tired.

"Fro thinks Rogue should have a naptime!" He chirped up. Sting tossed me something. Once my vision cleared I could see the white teardrop stone. I almost saw Bella in the reflection but once I looked again, she was gone. I clutched the necklace. Bella would be okay. Then it would be time to fight.


Author's Note: Please review! I'm kind of having a writer's block at the moment so sorry if the next few chapters are a bit short. If you have any questions, please message me! :D Thanks for reading!