How does magic even work? Chapter 12.

``C-Captain.. are you sure you are alright?´´

``I'm fine.´´

``But Captain you.. y-you're not looking very steady on your feet..´´

``I'm FINE.´´

``...´´

``...´´

``But Capta-´´ ``Just shut up! I said I'm fine so stop as-´´ Naruto's retort turned into painful coughing, and the jittery guard's doting intensified.

``Captain you aren't alright at all!´´ Naruto turned a half glare to the guard, who inched back a step as soon as he received the look. The boy considered his options, he needed to get to the king as fast as possible, because strangely enough the safest place for him to be was in the middle of the enemy's stronghold. But now that he had gotten hurt walking there was going to take a long time, he shifted into a sitting position on the floor and looked to the guard.

``Carry me.´´

``...´´

``Eh?´´

``I said carry me! I don't have time to limp all the way to the king okay! So just... carry me...´´

The guard fidgeted for a few seconds before cautiously stepping forward ``aah.. w-well then...´´ he bent down and picked up Naruto. PRINCESS STYLE. ``how's this captain? It's not too uncomfortable right?

``What are you doing?´´

``Eh what do you mean?´´

``Why are you carrying me like this?!´´

``Well... this is the best way to carry someone right?´´

``Wh- NO! Let me ride on you back or something! This is freaking embarrassing!´´

``Please don't whine about this captain. You said you were in a hurry to get to the king right?´´ The guard was now ignoring all of Naruto's complaint's and proved to have a steady grip as no matter how much Naruto struggled he was unable to get out of the man's hold.

Naruto's teeth were grinding together and his face was red from embarrassment, the only thing that lessened the humiliation was that no one saw him in this state.

``you know.. Captain. I have a daughter about your age, or maybe she is a little older, she is turning 15 this year. She's a little short for her age, but you might actually be a little shorter then her. But anyways her name is Tenten, me and my wife decided on that name when we saw-´´

Naruto decided to stop listening to the rambling man, though he did wonder where his confidence came from. At first he had only been stuttering, but now he was carrying him like a girl and loudly talking about his daughter. He had a hard time imagining how this situation could become more bizzare.

``Naruto?´´

The boy in question looked to the speaker, and there he saw Erza Knightwalker, carrying an unconscious Naruko over her shoulder. Looking behind her he saw Gray and Natsu bound up in ropes.

Naruto was absolutely speechless, not only had Natsu, Gray and Naruko been beaten, but they were freaking SEEING him being carried princess style by a guard.

``oh! Captain Knightwalker! I see you have caught some intruders, well done!´´ The guard was the first to break the stare down.

Strangely enough Erza went stiff and mechanically stuttered out something like a response. But Naruto paid it no mind, he was quite done with this embarrassing position, he turned his head and spoke commandingly to the guard.

``Let me down and get back to your post. I will be going with captain Erza to the king.´´

The guard looked down at him for a moment with a look on his face that Naruto was unfamiliar with. ``Are you sure you want me to put you down? You seemed to have a lot of trouble walking just now, and just so you know I really don't mind carrying all the way to the king.´´

``y-yes! I'm sure! Put me down already!´´

``pff-´´ Naruto's face went bright red as the guard finally complied, he looked over and saw that Natsu and Gray were doing their best not to break into laughter, and Erza was still looking stiff. Really what was up with that?

The guard finally left after fuzzing over Naruto for a few more moments, and the boy let out a sight of relief. Then he turned to the Problem at had, Edo Erza had taken Gray, Natsu and Naruko prisoners and he had no idea what to do about it.

``so uh. Captain Knightwalker, I see you've caught some intruders... n-.. nice job...´´ Naruto was nervous, he could barely keep eye contact and he was having a hard time keeping his hand away from the back of his head.

But then Gray spoke up ``Naruto this is OUR Erza, we have a plan to stop the king's plan, but we need to pretend to be caught like this first.´´ As Natsu nodded Erza started digging around in the clothes that were definitely not hers. ``Naruto I don't think you've taken one of these yet...´´ she was quiet for a moment before producing a little vial filled with black pills.

``what's that?´´

``It's a pill that will let you use your magic here in Edolas.´´ Erza said, face filled with pride, as if she was the one that had made them or something.

But that got Naruto thinking, would his magic make a difference here? In his fight against Zabuza he was completely outmatched, would his magic have let him win? Would having his magic have let him save Buster? No. there was no use thinking about it, he took one of the pills from Erza and swallowed it.

The effect was almost instantaneous, he could already feel his magic starting to flow though his body again. ``so... what happened to the other me?´´

Erza looked confused for a second before glancing at the unconscious woman on her shoulder. ``oh uh...´´ Erza turned to Natsu ``what happened to her?´´

``Dunno she was like that when I found Lucy.´´

``Guys I don't think we have time to stand around talking right now.´´ Gray said with a tired look on his face.

Erza was quick to take command of the situation ``Yes! There is no time to loose, lets get going.´´ however as they all began walking again she was the first to notice that Naruto was limping. ``Naruto.. are you hurt?´´

Naruto glanced at her and smirked slightly ``yeah... I was attacked by a guy with a bigger sword than any I've ever seen you use. I managed to loose him when we crashed into the castle a while ago, that's when I got hurt by the way.´´

For a moment they were all silent, before Erza, almost hesitantly asked ``crashed into the castle?´´

``ah... yeah. I tried to get away from him by flying with a Legion, but he managed to tag along, and he... killed it while we were flying.´´ Naruto stared at the ground as he limped along, with his head was suddenly grabbed and mashed against Erza's chest.

He blushed bright red when his face met soft skin instead of the usual breastplate. Meanwhile Erza was loudly proclaiming that he had 'learned well' and how he had 'gotten strong'. Behind them Natsu and Gray were once again trying to keep their laughter in check.

Naruto managed to wrestle his way out of Erza's somewhat enjoyable hold and yelped as he hit the ground. He grunted as he stood up and then said ``we don't really have time to waste here right? We should get going.´´

``pfff huhuhu, trying to mask your embarrassment huh?´´ Natsu said with his bound hands covering his mouth slightly.

Naruto didn't respond but it was obvious that his face was red again, as he began walking again, but then he suddenly stopped and turned back.

``Do you guys remember where the kings room is?´´

XOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Zabuza sighed as he slowly walked through one of the many corridors in the castle. He held his sword in front of him, or rather, half of his sword, the other half had broken of when he was forced to use it to break his fall. This was not really a problem, but it annoyed him nonetheless that he would have to fix it.

He began hearing footsteps further along in the corridor, and a smile came to his face. How nice that all the tools he needed to repair his sword were all over the castle.

Soon enough he was met by a patrol of six guards, all armed with magic lances and shields. They had already noticed him and were shouting for him to lay his weapon down and submit or they would force him to do so. What the hell were these ants doing ordering an assassin around?

``I really like this sword... I have killed a lot of people with this, it's a shame to see it in this state... but you guys can help me with this.´´ Zabuza was speaking, but it was almost like he was talking to himself rather than the guards who were now preparing for a fight.

The apparent leader of the patrol had enough he loudly stated ``Surrender NOW or we will use... force?´´ the guards loud proclamation turned into a question, because before he was done speaking his head was no longer a part of his body.

The other guards had no time to scream or even raise their shields to defend, they were all dead before the first guards head hit the ground.

Zabuza bent down and put his sword down in the growing pool of blood and spoke again, this time it really was to himself. ``i really like this sword, since it is a magic tool that will drink blood to keep itself sharp.´´ as he spoke the sword was quickly growing back into the massive cleaver it had been just a few minutes ago. ``now I just need to go and find that brat and chop him up too... maybe I should have tried to remember his name, he's the first to make me this mad in the last few years.´´

He hefted his now fully repaired sword up over his shoulder and began walking again. ``Or maybe not, I already know enough names as it is. Hehehe.´´

XOXOXOXOXO

Naruto stood next to Erza and looked up at the floating island in the sky while the now unbound Gray formed a key out of ice and used it to activate the dragon cannon. As the thing started powering up Naruto went over what Erza had told him once again in his head. Activate the cannon, change it's launch trajectory and keep anyone from stopping them once the enemy realized they were not on the same side.

He glanced at Gray, who was desperately looking for a control panel or anything to change the launch direction. Something was not right, he looked over to Erza who was tightly gripping Natsus bindings.

The king was shouting out orders and then came the words they were not ready to hear ``Fire the cannon at my word!´´

Erza whispered something to herself, and faster than Naruto could see Natsu was suddenly free and had already let loose a large amount of fire on the soldiers around them.

Naruto took a deep sigh, and felt the magic flowing inside him again, with another deep breath he took control of it and by extension took control of all the shadows that spread across the dimly lit terrace. ``Oblivion!´´ there was no need to say it, but it felt good nonetheless.

Streams of darkness shot out of the dark corners of the room and from under the feet of the many soldiers. All of it gathered around Naruto, some of it flowed around his body and stayed ready to harden into armor at a moment's notice. While the rest formed into a two handed longsword in his hands, he couldn't help but smile at the more familiar weapon.

He leaned into a relaxed stance as Erza took the king as a hostage and began demanding that they re-aim the cannon. But the king was having none of it, he hollered ``FIRE!´´ over and over. Moment's later the cannon fired.

Naruto stood stunned as the cannon fired a massive chain tipped with the head of a dragon into the sky. Or more exactly at the floating island with the massive lacryma on it.

While he was distracted something made a loud noise near him, he looked over and saw that there were now two Erza, one half naked, locked in combat. He considered going to help... one of them, but decided against it, Erza and Erza were strong enough to hold their own.

``Guys!´´

Naruto looked up and in the sky saw a legion was flying towards them, on top of it sat Lucy. However Naruto had no time to stare at the beast flying in, as the guards around him were closing in quickly. But it turned out that he had nothing to worry about, because when the legion landed behind him the soldiers backed off a bit in fear of the massive beast.

``Get on!´´ Naruto didn't know who had shouted that but he complied as quickly as he could. Getting up on the legion with the others was easy, but take off was just as hard as it had been on Buster. For a second all of them were laid flat on top of buster before the legion began beating it's wings.

When he could sit up Naruto quickly took a look around, Lucy and Erza were there, so was Natsu, and gray. And for some reason there was a girl with a somewhat dog-like appearance. When she noticed Naruto was looking at her she gave him a salute, strange.

Naruto glanced at the chain now connected to the floating island, they were flying quite close to it. As he stared at it a question came to his mind, 'how does that work?', it was made out of magic but why would it mold into a dragon head-tipped chain?

Then he glanced back towards the castle, and on the chain he saw a figure making it's way up on it. He swore his heart stopped for a few seconds when he saw who it was. Zabuza.

Did he really decide to RUN up a chain into the freaking SKY just to follow them? Even though he felt afraid of the man he admired that dedication, but then again that was dedication to kill him so it was pretty bad actually. But if he followed them all the way up it would make problems for the others. With a sigh he made up his mind.

``oh! Someone is running up the chain!´´ Lucy shouted as she noticed the man in his was towards them. As the others turned to look Naruto used the darkness surrounding him and formed a large pair of oblivion claws around his hands.

``Naruto!´´ he looked to Erza who had a serious expression on her face ``what are you doing?´´

``...I'm going to fight him.´´ Naruto answered slowly. ``i don't want him to remember me as just some kid that ran away! I want him to remember Naruto Uzumaki! The guy that kicked his ass!´´

Erza looked at him and then smiled with pride ``you're starting to sound like a real mage of Fairy tail!´´

Naruto smiled at her and the others before talking a step back, then bursting forward into the air. His smile disappeared when he was in the air though, the chain was moving away from him. In sudden desperation he turned his left claw into something like a rope that he grabbed onto the chain with.

He pulled himself up as fast as he could, Zabuza was getting closer by the second, with a grunt he stood on the chain and faced the man. As Zabuza came close enough he slowed down and stopped just a few meters in front of Naruto.

``you're a lot of trouble Haru! I was hired to kill you and wont stop until that is done. Now are you going to keep fighting or be a good brat and let me behead you quietly!?´´

``WHO IS- whatever! My name is Naruto and you better remember it because I'm going to kick your ass until you piss your pants every time you even think about it!´´

``...´´

``ha... hahaaa HAAAHAHAHAAAHAAHAHAH! THOSE ARE SOME BIG WORDS FROM A PIECE OF SHIT LIKE YOU!´´ Zabuza stilled for a moment to calm down a little, when he began talking again his horrifying smile was still on his face. ``fine... lets see you try to beat me.´´

With those words Zabuza lifted his sword of his back and held it with ease in front of him. ``lets see how long it takes to kill you.´´

AN

So how do you like your Zabuza, cold with a heart of gold, or just straight up insane?

But anyways, lately I've been thinking about where I'm going with this story and I've got freaking loads of ideas that I want to write down. So next chapter will probably be the end of the edolas arc.