The Kingdom of Fiore... A neutral country of seventeen million people. It is a world of magic.
Magic is bought and sold there every day. It is an integral part of people's lives. And there are those who use magic as their occupation. These people are referred to as mages.
The mages belong to various guilds and perform jobs on commission. There are a large number of guilds within the country. And in a certain city, there lies a certain guild. A guild from which various legends were once born... Or rather, will continue to be born long into the future... And its name is Fairy Tail!
He was at the request board when the guild hall's doors are kicked open with a loud bang, and Natsu comes stomping in, yelling about something or other. In the blink of an eye, one of their famous Fairy Tail brawls was underway.
After having to duck the second chair thrown in his direction in less than a minute, Masa decides that choosing a job in this chaos was a lost cause and starts making his way to the bar for a preferably alcoholic drink instead. At the rate the fight was progressing people will start going airborne soon too, and he'd prefer not to be accidentally crushed underneath one of his guildmates as it so often happened to visitors.
His decision was proven correct when Elfman goes flying into the board almost the instant he steps away, barely missing him by a few inches. Masa glances back to make sure the man was relatively unhurt, and when the larger man rushes right back into the thick of the fight despite the blood dripping down his face, he continues on his way unconcerned. It wasn't his problem if anyone winds up in the infirmary. He'd stopped trying to prevent those morons from going overboard years ago.
"Hey, watch it!" He scowls at the two men who rolled under his feet while trying to strangle each other, and steps over them ignoring the resulting shrieks of pain when he unintentionally tramples on some of their fingers.
Generally, walking from the request board to the bar barely took a minute, but during their fights, it could take up to fifteen. Being forced to avoid grappling heaps of people and various flying objects, both inanimate and breathing, could slow anyone down considerably. Even for Jet, it was impossible to get across the hall rapidly. So when yet another pile of broken furniture impedes his path, his eyebrow twitches in irritation, and his hands start crackling with electricity menacingly.
"This is getting very annoying." He growls aggravated, dodging a half-full mug of beer.
Only, before he could relieve his rising anger by joining the fight and teaching his fellow guild members a lesson, the hall suddenly darkens.
"Stop this, you fools!" Their giant Master demands, his voice thundering throughout the building.
The silence is immediate and total. Nobody dared move from their frozen position, no matter how uncomfortable or unstable, for fear of attracting the old man's attention.
Except for Mirajane, as always. She had balls of steel, really, and sometimes, Masa thought she was manlier than even her brother. Especially in instants like those when she fearlessly approached their enraged Master with that big smile of hers on her innocent-looking face while everyone else was petrified in terror.
"Oh, you were here, Master?" She asks.
"Master?!" An unfamiliar blond girl exclaims, and he blinks, startled. Did they get a new member and nobody told him? Or did he forget again? His hand drifts towards his pocket, brushing against the book hidden within.
While he's busy raking his memory trying to recall if he's ever seen the girl, Natsu ends up crushed under the Master's foot by stupidly trying to proclaim his victory thanks to everyone having been scared stiff by their leader's arrival.
The girl's terrified squeak brings the Master's attention to her. "A new recruit, are we?"
She whimpered out an agreement, and Masa sight in relief, glad he hadn't forgotten anything important again. Not that it had happened recently, but he preferred not to be blindsided by one of his episodes again. It's been a while, and he was due for one soon.
The Master shrinks down to his usual tiny size and raises a hand in greeting, suddenly smiling like a fool. "Glad to have you on-board!"
"Now, he's tiny!" The girl exclaims in response. "And wait, if you're the Master..."
"That's right," Mirajane interjects when she trails off uncertain. "this is Fairy Tail's guild Master, Makarov-sama."
The man turns to jump up on the second floor's balcony railing, and they all obediently gather underneath, ready for the upcoming lecture. Masa gets comfortable by leaning against one of the nearby and only surviving tables and looks up, crossing his arms over his chest. Depending on how pissed their Master was, this could take a while. For example, the previous week he'd yelled only a for a few minutes, but for the one before that, it had taken almost three hours before they were free to go.
Makarov coughs into his fist once and begins. "You've gone and done it again, rascals! Look at all the paperwork the council sent me! They're all complaints!" Truly, the pile he waves around was very large, and Masa once again, as he did every time, praised all the gods he knew he was not the one in charge of doing it. He'd never get it done. "All you fools do is make the council angry at me! However," Here, the paper burst into flames. "screw the council!"
The Master throws the flaming ball, and Natsu gleefully catches it midair with his mouth for a snack. Everyone straightens in pride, knowing what came next. After all, this was a regular occurrence.
"Listen up!" Makarov unnecessarily calls. They were all paying attention already. "Magic is an unreasonable power, but it is born from reason! It is not some miraculous ability. It is the combination of the spirit that flows within us with the spirit that flows within nature itself, incarnated into physical form! It takes a strong mind and focus! In fact, magic is the pouring out of one's entire soul! One cannot progress in the way of magic by being mindful of the watchful eye from above! Be not afraid of those fools on the council! And follow the path you believe in! That's what it means to be a Fairy Tail mage!"
The cheer that rises after that speech was deafening as everyone lifts their fingers in their Guild sign high into the air following their Master's example.
Masa eyes the new blond and smiles amused. Her astounded, but glowing from excitement face was quite the sight, indeed. Though to be fair, everyone reacted like that the first time. He did it, Natsu did it… Hell, Erza did it.
He doesn't think of the girl again until the next time Masa spots her, several days later in the company of Erza, Gray, Natsu, and Happy. He fleetingly wonders what they were doing all together since the boys were famous for not getting along, but quickly concentrates back on other things.
The train station he was going to use seemed to have been shut because of a train derailment. It was rather unfortunate as he had been hoping to get home earlier than expected from his job, and now it seemed he would not be getting the nice and hot bath he'd been yearning for anytime soon. Didn't he deserve one after spending so much time trying not to drown in a swamp? It felt as if every single mosquito for miles around had attempted to eat him alive.
After loitering in the crowd for a short while, he was just about to approach a guard hoping to offer his help when he notices Erza doing nearing one too, and veers in her direction. The headbutt she gives the poor man after exchanging a few words makes him wince in sympathy, and reconsider his route. Only after she starts repeating the process with the remaining guards did he starts realizing there might be something more happening than a simple train derailment. Even Erza would not be that angry at simply being delayed.
Hands stuffed in the pockets of his cargo pants, he nonchalantly wanders over towards her meekly waiting companions at the side of the station's main building, instead.
"Masa! What are you doing here?" Gray exclaims when he notices him.
He shrugs in response. "Just returning from a job. Is something wrong?"
"There's this dark guild, Eisenwald, led by the God of Death, Erigor, who found a dangerous ancient magic flute called Lullaby and are going to use it for something." The girl explains in one breath, strange gold and silver keys clinking on her belt.
"The Lullaby?" He repeats in disbelief.
"You know what it is?"
"I helped Levy research about death magic once or twice. Lullaby is the flute whose sound kills anyone who hears it, right? One of Zeref's earlier creations? It was said to have been sealed behind powerful wards to prevent it from being used."
"That is correct," Erza confirms, having returned. "I'm afraid a man called Kage broke through them." She pauses to peer at him in relief. "I'm glad you're here, Masa, you will be much help. Let's go, Eisenwald is inside."
Not one to argue with Titania, the Queen of Fairies, he willingly follows after the others into the station, leaving a group of guards lying unconscious behind them.
As they run through the large corridor, Erza explains that an army platoon had stormed in earlier, but hasn't returned yet and that they have likely engaged the dark guild in battle. Unfortunately, with the quiet in the station, Masa doubted they succeeded in their endeavor.
Sure enough, soon after she finished talking, they come across the brave men.
They were scattered around on some stairs and further into the next passageway, having been obviously trying to put up a fight before being completely wiped out.
He wished he could feel surprised. While no doubt well-trained for non-magic users, they had been up against an entire dark guild full of mages known for taking assassination jobs. They probably knew from the beginning they had no chance but did their duty anyways, though it had predictably ended in a massacre. Now, they were undoubtedly dead and not merely unconscious as his companions appeared to believe.
He pauses next to a soldier sitting slumped against a column, and kneels next to him, shifting his neck for easier access. As he had thought, there was no pulse, and judging by the markings, the poor boy had been viciously strangled to death. Like most of the others, he had been killed in a surprisingly bloodless manner, judging by the lack of blood decorating the halls.
For a short moment, he debates telling the rest. Then, Erza calls for him to hurry up, and he abruptly realizes what a bad idea that would be. If they were lucky, the only city to be obliterated in their anger would be this one. And if luck wasn't with them?
He throws the dead men a pitying glance before hurrying forwards. It simply wasn't worth it. There was no need to cause their Master a heart attack when he saw the inevitable damage bill.
Soon, they leave the corridors and enter a spacious room filled to the brim with sniggering Eisenwald mages, causing him to discreetly search around for escape routes. Despite his absolute confidence in the skills of Gray, Natsu, and Erza, there were still a lot more adversaries that he had been expecting. If Eisenwald had several more mages even half as powerful as their ace was rumored to be, then they were in trouble.
"I knew you'd come. You Fairy Tail flies!" Laughs the man Masa assumes to be the famed God of Death. Honestly, he was not impressed. Not only he was half-naked, but that giant scythe of his looked like he was compensating for something.
The blond girl - he really should learn her name sometimes soon - drops Natsu and desperately attempts to wake him up by shaking him.
"Not a chance." Happy tells her. "Trains, four-wheelers, Lucys... It's motion sickness times three!"
What's a Lucys? Masa furrows his eyebrows in confusion. He's never heard of such a type of transportation, but it would explain why the girl had carried the unfortunate boy the entire way on her back. He had assumed Erza had knocked him out again because he's annoyed her too much begging for a fight or had argued with Gray a little too often for her tastes, but motion sickness could knock him out just as easily.
"So, I'm transportation now?!"
Ah, she's a Lucys. That made a little more sense. He glances towards where Erza was intimidating the dark guild into telling her plans and figures the situation to be quickly heading towards a fight.
"Here, let me help." He says, dropping down with a sight. His hands glow light green, and he gently pressed them to Natsu's stomach.
"Masa's magic is one of the best, Lucy!" Happy exclaims.
The girl stares at the blue cat suspiciously. "Like Erza's magic is pretty?!"
"No, silly, he can heal!"
"Isn't that Lost Magic?!" She exclaims, and whirls towards Masa. "And why haven't you helped earlier?"
"I usually don't get involved unless someone is dying or maimed. Too much work otherwise with all the fights Fairy Tail likes to get into. But as we are going to need bigger guns to deal with this, I'm making an exception. It's just this once, though." He warns. "Besides, if I had done this earlier, he'd had run ahead of us and tried fighting the entire guild alone."
Meanwhile, Erza succeeds in making Eisenwald into boasting about their end goals. It was the problem with most villains. For some reason, they all loved to monologue.
There is gust of wind, and Erigor flew up using his famed Wind Magic to crouch on top of a nearby pole with multiple loudspeakers, grinning gleefully. "What's here at the station?"
"You plan on broadcasting the Lullaby?" Masa demands incredulously having guessed the plan first.
The man laughs in response. "I wonder how many thousands of onlookers are gathered around here? And if you increase the volume, it'll reverberate throughout the city. The melody of death, that is!"
"You plan on making innocent people listen to the flute's lullaby?" Erza glares up at him, stepping closer.
"It's a purge," Erigor explains condescendingly. "I'm purging the fools who guard their own rights and safety without knowing there are those whose rights have been stolen away. Their sin is living without knowing that this world isn't just. And so… The Shinigami has come to punish them!"
"Yeah. This guy's gone 'round the bend pretty hard. Pretty sure this is called indiscriminate mass murder." Masa mutters, and Gray makes a sound of agreement from where he was quietly standing, watching the proceedings.
Lucy plants her hands on her hips disapprovingly. "You're not going to get your rights back by doing something like this. And weren't you thrown out of the league because you did a ton of bad stuff?"
"Now that we've come this far, we don't want rights anymore. It's power! Those with power can wipe the past clean, and rule the future." Erigor clenches a hand in front of his face, and the blond gives him a disgusted glance.
"You're a complete idiot, aren't you?" She observes.
"Too bad for you, flies. You won't get to see the new dark age because you're heading to the afterlife!" One of the Eisenwald mage interrupt and strands of shadows stretch out on the floor to race towards the girl, and under Masa's hands, Natsu twitches.
And when the shadows lift into the air, swaying like snakes, the dragon slayer flings himself up to deflect the attack. "So that voice was you."
Masa stands from his crouching position and crosses his hands behind his head, discreetly pooling his magic there. "You two know each other?" He inquires.
"He beat me up on the train." The pinkette replies nonchalantly, and slams a fist into his palm, grinning wildly. "And there's a whole bunch more of them! This is gonna be fun!"
"We're just wasting time talking to those idiots. They're not going to change their minds, so we better make the first move." Masa sights, and flings out several long needles at the dark guild members. "Shock senbon."
As the men he'd hit crumple to the floor, electrocuted, Erigor crashes through a window, escaping outside, and the rest of his goons' spring forwards with battle cries.
"Natsu, Gray, you two head after him." Erza orders, reequipping a sword. "As long as you two work together, there's no way you'd lose, even to the 'Death God' Erigor."
"Aye, sir!" They squeak and run out of the room so fast, they kicked up a cloud of dust behind them.
Erza turns towards them next, as he throws more needles at the quickly approaching horde. "After we clean up these guys, we're heading after them too."
"Just the three of us against this many?" Lucy exclaims.
"Relax." He tells her. "We're Fairy Tail mages. This will be a piece of cake."
As if to prove his word right, with a swing of her sword Erza dispatches the closest group of enemies and advances unto the next. Somewhere behind them, he could hear Happy explain to a clueless Lucy how Reequip magic worked, just when the scarlet-haired woman's sword turned into a spear, then into another pair of twin swords.
Masa also switches tactics, the dark mages now to close for him to use his needles effectively. "Scalpel." He announces, his magic coating his hands in green, slightly glowing, transparent short blades, and throws himself back into the fray.
"Hah!" One of the men yells triumphantly. "You missed!"
"Did I?" He calls back over his shoulder and listens to the sound of sudden screams of pain in satisfaction. His blades weren't made for cutting skin, though they could do that too, but for highly accurate incisions necessary for surgeries and anatomical dissections. They could reach inside the body without creating open wounds, thus preventing the risk of infection and to his delight, the creation of large messes. He hated washing blood out of clothes.
And while they could be used offensively, the blades required concentration and medical knowledge to use them effectively, because of the precision needed to make fatal wounds. His personal favorite method was to cut muscle tissues and tendons, which rendered his opponents immobile without great difficulty from his part. Their relative low power cost was also a big advantage.
A loud ding momentarily distracts him, and he squints in confusion at the crab-like person that appears in a burst of light. Watching the man rush at the enemy, and cutting not only their hair but their weapons as he passed by with a pair of scissors in each hand, he abruptly recalls the rings hanging on Lucy's belt. "A celestial mage? And with a golden key too? Now those are rare." He whistles impressed.
"Hey! Pay attention to us, fly!"
"Are you certain you want that?" He shoots back at the man who had just tried to take off his head with an ax, and ducking cuts his hamstring tendons. "This is getting irritating. How many more of you are there?"
But before anyone could answer him, a call echoes in the room. "Circle sword!"
Masa yelps, and jumps back to avoid the many flying swords that wipe out all the remaining Eisenwald mages in a single blow. "Maybe a little warning next time, Erza?!"
The last man standing takes in the carnage, and hurries out of the room, terrified. "I'm not going up against that!"
Erza turns towards a star-struck Lucy. "He might be heading towards Erigor." She tells her. "Go after him. I'm counting on you!"
"Right!" Lucy snaps to attention. "Off I go!"
He's about to follow after the blond, but Erza's wavering form sidetracks him. "Are you alright?" He asks, hands already glowing from a diagnosing spell.
"Yes. I'm sorry, I must've driven that magic four-wheeler too fast…"
"Magical exhaustion." Masa cancels his magic regretfully. "Nothing I can do about that, unfortunately."
"Right." She staggers to a stand. "I'll go warn the people outside. Meanwhile, can you tie up the Eisenwald mages?"
"Don't push yourself." He cautions but still walks away to search for some rope.
When Erza finally returns, just as he finally finishes restraining the last of their defeated opponents, she's clutching a wounded arm.
"What did I tell you?" He scolds. "You're lucky this is an emergency, or I would have let you suffer. Heal."
"Thank you, Masa." She sits in silence for a moment and then heaves a big sigh. "It looks like we're in big trouble."
"Yeah?" He glances up from his work. "What went wrong now?"
Erza grits her teeth in anger. "Erigor is no longer in the station, and he has us surrounded in a magic Wind Wall. We have no way out."
"That…" He trails off thoughtfully. "Is indeed a problem. Maybe one of the Eisenwald members here know how to dispel it?"
"Excellent idea." Her eyes glint in a worrisome manner, and he hastily backs away when she grabs the nearest man. "Let's start with you."
The next several minutes explains why absolutely everyone in Fairy Tail, including their Master but not Mirajane, is terrified of their Queen of Fairies. By the time Gray comes skidding back into the room, she's frightening her sixth man into talking, even if they all tell her the same thing; that is was impossible.
"Erza, Masa!" The ice mage calls from the second-floor balcony.
"Gray?" Erza asks, still holding her prisoner by his collar. "You're not with Natsu?"
"We split up. And never mind that now! Eisenwald's real objective is the town down the line from here."
"Isn't that Clover?" Masa exclaims in shock. "The Guild Masters are having their regular meeting there right now!"
"So that's what you're planning?" Erza yells at the man in her clutches, incensed, and emitting a horrifying aura like a demon.
"And with the Wind Wall we can't get out to warn them." Masa muses, twisting the leather cuff bracelet on his arm.
"There should be someone called Kage in Eisenwald." Suddenly recalls the woman. "He's the only one who was able to dispel Lullaby's seal."
"A Dispeller? If he's the one with the Shadow Magic, he must have gone after Gray and Natsu, because I haven't seen him here since they left." He tells her.
"Then he must still be in the station. We need to find him and capture him." Erza dropping the man she was interrogating, and starts making her way out of the room again.
Masa takes one last look around to make sure everyone was incapacitated and unable to move, before following. Once they took down Erigor, the army would be able to collect the rest of the Eisenwald members with little fuss now that they were incapable of resisting the arrest.
As they move through the halls, the building shakes around them, small pieces of the ceiling raining down on them.
"Must be Natsu." Gray pants.
"That idiot," Erza growls. "if he brings the building down on us…"
Masa interrupts her, pointing. "There's a room there."
They kick open the door, and when a quick glance proves it empty, they proceed unto the next, continuing in this manner until they come across Natsu about to beat up the man they were searching for.
Erza speeds up, and Masa forces himself to follow her example. He wasn't as physically inclined as her, and he's already been exhausted before he was recruited into this mission from his previous job, having not slept well because of reoccurring nightmares. Besides, the fight before really hasn't helped.
"That's enough! We need him!" Erza yells, and the pinkette turns in their direction, confused, only to yell in terror when the woman jumps into the air with a sword raised high.
"I didn't do nothin' but I'm sorry!" He babbles, arms raised to protect himself, but she blows past, focused on the man slumped on the wall behind him.
"Dispel the magic wind wall, and don't give us any trouble!"
Natsu whimpers. "She ain't kidding', man! Erza's a beast!"
But just as Kage reluctantly agrees, an arm emerges from the wall and passes through his chest. "W-why?" He whispers, betrayed, and collapses, revealing the trembling Eisenwald mage that had run away and Lucy had been tasked to find.
Stunned by the brutality, Masa stands still for a moment, before lurching into action when Kage chokes on blood. "Heal!" He snarls, dropping to his knees and pressing his hands over the wound, frantically trying to contain the bleeding and close the hole by pouring out all of the little magic power he had left into the man's body. There was none of the finesse he usually exhibited in his healing, as he resorted to brute-forcing it instead of meticulously mending the ruined flesh back together. "Dammit! Broken ribs, torn lungs… He can't breathe! I need too…"
"Wasn't he one of your allies? Wasn't he an ally in the same guild as you?! You bastard! So that's what your guild is like?" He vaguely registers Natsu punching the coward as he tries to make his escape by sinking back into the wall he came from, but his fatigue at long last catches up to him, and he collapses, slowly fading into unconsciousness.
He's done everything he could. The man, Kage, will not only live but be able to dispel the Wind Wall, and the others could go save their Master.
I don't own Fairy Tail.
Anything you recognize is from the manga or anime.