Disclaimer: I am not the owner of Fairy Tail
Researching from Lulu's books was an interesting experience to say the least. When she brought them to the library of the house, Gray had been expecting a small collection of books, not an entire study that even Levy would be impressed with. Lulu still seemed to be struggling a bit with the discovery of her missing memories, but she managed to force a smile as she showed them around.
"Most of this belonged to my parents," she said. "When I told them I was going to move out, they decided they wanted to do things backwards and give me the house we lived in." She gave a small chuckle. "They insisted that it was their goal to build their own house from scratch and that me wanting to live independently gave them the perfect excuse to do just that. Apparently, they'd designed some magical trinket that was supposed to enhance the user's strength - they'd secretly sent the details to some wizard shop on the mainland to have it made and sent to them here."
"Wait, they actually designed a spell?" Lucy's eyes were wide. "Just how detailed are these magic books anyway? That's not exactly an easy thing to pull off, you know."
"Well, considering my parents successfully built their house in about a month, I'd say it worked very well." Lulu smiled, walking towards a shelf and pulling down one of the books. "Some of these get more detailed than I ever bothered to understand - Mom and Dad lived and breathed this stuff though. They'd get invested in debates over calculations they were running, models they had built, the structure they designed…most of it went over my head, really."
"Wait, what the hell is this stuff?" Natsu was looking at a book, rushing over to them and showing the page to Gray and Lucy. "It's got weird descriptions of magic, talking about maintaining the—" Natsu broke off, turning the book back towards himself to read "…concentration of ethernano through appropriate juxtaposition of runic characters—" Letting the book fall to his side, Natsu seemed to give up on continuing. "Lucy, I can't read any of this!"
"Wait, are you saying it is actually talking about the reasons behind the design of magic circles?" Lucy reached for the book, grabbing it away from Natsu. As she started skimming through the page, her eyes were wide. "No way! This book has got to be ancient. Magic text books today, if you can manage to find one, only talk about existing structures and guide wizards through the process of accessing their own energy to use them."
"You would be correct." Lulu smiled. "My parents told me it was written about 450 years ago. The principles are still sound though - there are a few others that go into different aspects of the same subject if you're interested." She smiled, looking over at Natsu. "Though, admittedly, I think I have to agree with Natsu on its understandability. I usually avoid that section there as a result." She pointed towards the shelf Natsu had selected a book from. "Those are the books like that one that dive into magical theory and construction. If you're interested in specific spells, you're probably better off sticking to the books over here instead."
Lulu guided them towards a different shelf. Lucy still kept her hands on the other book that Gray had yet to even try and look at. Just based on those descriptions, it wasn't exactly going to be an easy thing to just skim through for an answer though. "Do you have a specific area to research this ritual magic you mentioned? Given our theories, that's probably what we want to focus on while we're here," Gray said.
"Give me one second." Lulu began skimming through the books on the shelf of spell books, before pulling out a few that caught her eye. "These should be a good starting point for now. And if you need to come back, you're always welcome." She shot them a smile, more genuine this time after her breakdown. With that expression, Gray had an odd sensation of familiarity to that look; that smile combined with Lulu's features and hairstyle reminded him so much of Ur for just a moment.
Ignoring the pang he felt in his chest at the reminder of his master, Gray took a book without meeting her eyes. "Thanks." There were some chairs set up in the room, along with a small coffee table to rest at. Gray made his way over to the area, sitting down and opening the book to begin reading.
The more Gray read through his ritual magic book, the more he realized it probably wasn't quite the thing they were looking for. It did include detailed descriptions of many rituals, including the foreign phrases to chant to activate the spell, calculations to determine the number of people required after factoring in the time of day, land elevation, the desired power of the spell, and apparently even the moon cycle. It described potential outcomes well and after reading it, Gray imagined he could probably participate in using one of the rituals if he was assuming the correct pronunciation of the weird language the spells required.
The issue with it all was the fact that every spell was some variation on displacement or teleportation. Some were more recommended than others and the book spent a good portion of time comparing them with each other to display the strengths and weaknesses of each option. One was ideal for larger objects to move, while another worked better if you were looking to move multiple at once. Distance to travel played a role in every one of them, often resulting in different recommendations once more if the goal was long-distance travel, short-distance travel, or even a specific option when the exact destination was unknown (Gray couldn't imagine a situation in which anyone would want to be teleported to a random, unknown location, but maybe there was some benefit to it that he just couldn't understand.).
"Huh, I guess the moon isn't evil." Natsu looked over towards Happy. "Take a look at this, Happy! It says that ritual magic that draws on the moon's power does weird things with the atmosphere - the moon isn't actually purple, it's just a ritual spell that causes it!"
"Wait, let me see!" Lucy reached over, grabbing the book away from them. "No way. This almost confirms it then - whoever is cursing you is using ritual magic to do it."
Lulu gave them a small smile, nodding. "Well, that's a start then." She bit her lip, staring at her feet. "I'm sorry this is turning into such a complex mess to solve. I can't imagine guild wizards study this sort of thing anymore so finding an answer is probably just as difficult."
"Don't worry about it." Gray set his book aside with a sigh. "It's not like you caused this to happen." He still didn't quite know if he was even helping with the curse or not. His goals were messed up and it was starting to get to him. Grimacing, he closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair.
"What if we're wrong about that?" Lulu was quiet. "We've already seen that this curse has affected my memory. What if we cursed ourselves and just can't remember why?"
"But Gray's already seen a suspicious person." Happy frowned. "I don't get why someone would curse themselves even if he hadn't seen that guy."
"It takes more than one person for ritual magic." Gray was quiet as he responded. "I'll admit, it does sound unlikely for your village to curse themselves, but when you have books like this and a decent population of people to back it up…"
Lucy smacked his arm with a glare. "You're not helping," she hissed at him under her breath. Then, she turned towards Lulu. "None of you ever go near that temple, remember? I don't know what it's like myself as I haven't been there, but I can't imagine it's a small place. There's probably a large group of people there involved in this mess and you're just overthinking it, okay?"
"I just…feel like something bad happened." Lulu shook her head, sighing. "But, I suppose that's something that I just need to move on from. Whether I remember it or not, it is in the past. Really, it shouldn't be bothering me when I can't even remember what it was."
"We'll get to the bottom of this, Lulu." Natsu grinned at her. "I promise, as Fairy Tail wizards, we will free your village."
Of course he had to go and promise that. "Don't forget about Erza, idiot." Gray shook his head. "She's going to murder all of us when she gets here." He'd promised he wouldn't get too close to the job. Yet, Deliora was here and somehow involved.
"But…she won't get mad if we've already finished before she arrives, right?" Lucy laughed nervously. "That'll, uh, show her we were ready, of course." She quickly looked back down towards her book as if her life depended on reading it. "Wait, I think I might have something! This ritual is supposed to be able to undo the affects of any spell and unravel the energy holding it together. Essentially, it'll render any spell useless if performed properly."
"Wait, seriously?" Gray leaned over with a frown. That sounded way too powerful to be true. No one spell could just undo every curse in existence, even if it was some ancient ritual. Skimming the page Lucy was reading, he caught the name of the spell - Moon Drip. Casting the ritual required a full moon, numerous people…seemed pretty standard as far as he'd seen for rituals. Though, it did add a very specific requirement that was not in any of the other ritual books.
This ritual relies heavily on amplifying the moon's energy. As such, the area in which it is cast must contain an appropriate structure to act as an amplifier and storage unit for this energy to strengthen the spell as it travels. Otherwise, the required number of chanters to cast this spell increases to over 100,000, a level at which this spell would be labeled as theoretical rather than available for practical use. With an amplifier built from the below listed ideal materials, this ritual could theoretically be utilized with just a single caster provided the amplifier also acts as a conductor to channel the energy to the desired location for the spell.
The book proceeded to list materials that were capable of amplifying the moon's energy due to their natural properties. It did state that they could be mixed with anything from a second list of conductive materials to save on costs and allow for the materials to actually form a structure of any kind (when the most recommended material was silver, Gray wondered how anyone would build some massive building out of it at first).
"Seems like there's some difficult requirements to meet to actually cast this thing." Gray frowned as he saw it go on to highly recommend casting the spell from the geographic location with the highest land elevation. Lulu's comment about it assisting in rituals was proving to actually have a foundation in some of these books after all. Either way, building something just to get rid of a specific curse seemed excessive.
Gray did see it start to describe how the spell worked, getting a bit more complex as it described the results.
This spell is intended to reverse any spell already in effect, but it should be noted that there are limitations. Moon Drip accomplishes its goal through energy overload - it will push an enormous amount of lunar energy into an existing spell. Through repeated use, this overloads the molecular bonds of the ethernano still tethering the spell to reality. With shattered molecular bonds, most spells revert back into nothing but pure energy that dissipate naturally into the atmosphere as excess ethernano.
On rare occasions, this overload of energy will not be able to overcome the molecular bonds keeping the original spell intact. In these situations, the Moon Drip ritual will become unpredictable and depend on the exact target of the spell. As the magic it is targeting cannot be broken, the excess energy will eventually become absorbed into whatever the ritual is cast upon. Increased molecular energy can often result in the death of the target by forcing the target into a liquid or gaseous state, if such a target is a living being. Use this spell at your own risk and please note that prior studies have shown this is often the result of using Moon Drip on any variation of transformation spell.
"Does everything have to take a scientific approach to explaining things?" Natsu frowned. "Can't it just be simple and say it breaks the spell?"
"Natsu, think about what this implies." Gray looked over at the dragon slayer. "Don't you think there's at least some form of transformation magic involved in their curse? If anything, I'd say it's a good thing the book warns about it."
The dragon slayer frowned, but didn't say much else as they kept reading. It continued to describe how to use the spell, both the variation with and without a conductor to direct it to a specified location. It ended with a brief description of what the ritual looked like upon a successful casting along with a carefully drawn sketch of the ritual being cast. Yet, the description caught Gray's eye. It described it as looking like a harmless, purple glowing light in the shape of a conical cylinder. That description…he'd seen purple light shining down on Deliora.
He inhaled sharply, leaning back from the book at the realization. The question he wanted an answer to was here, but he just hadn't been able to imagine someone wanting this. Whoever was here was trying to free Deliora.
"Gray, is something wrong? I mean, I get that there would be risks to try using this to help the village, but…" Lucy trailed off, watching him with a frown.
Even Lulu noticed, walking over towards them. "I didn't think there were any graphic depictions in these books. You seemed rather startled."
Avoiding their looks, Gray shook his head. "It's nothing. Don't worry about it." Still, it wasn't like he could take his own advice. Iced Shell…he hadn't thought about the spell itself in a long time. He avoided it really, well aware of the cost of that spell and knowing it was something to only use as a last resort. That didn't mean he lacked an understanding on how it was used though. He'd intentionally found the book on it in Ur's house after she'd sacrificed herself. That spell was her legacy, along with the rest of the magic she'd taught him.
It wasn't like he could test if he'd mastered it, but he was confident he understood it well. The user would trap a target in an unmeetable and unbreakable block of ice, transforming themselves into that form. It was unique, a distinct spell that he had just continued to assume would never be reversed. Even Master Makarov had said it was impossible without killing her. For all he knew, maybe the old man had thought of this ritual when he said that. After all, this ritual straight up said it would kill the target if it was used on a spell with any variation of transformation magic involved.
"Are you sure? You really don't look alright, Gray." Happy frowned.
"Yeah. We're part of your guild so if something's bugging you about the ritual, you can tell us, alright?" Natsu was even serious for once, not trying to pick a fight. "That's what we're here for. All of us at Fairy Tail are like a big family, okay? And family helps each other."
They couldn't help, not with this. This was an upcoming disaster for this entire island. If Deliora were freed…Gray swallowed, closing his eyes. He didn't want to even imagine what that fight would look like. They'd be lucky if they could run fast enough to get away with their lives. This time, there'd be no Ur to defend them either. Ur would be…dead for good, rather than trapped in a mysterious spell. At least with iced shell still active, Gray could pretend there was a chance to find a counter spell. He could ignore it because people might just advance ice magic enough to free her. Now? Now, he felt numb, realizing that she was about to be gone for good and that the rest of this island was about to follow her.
"I—I need to take a walk." Gray stood up, abruptly walking away from the table as he shook his head. If it came to it, he'd follow in his master's footsteps and trap Deliora himself. At the very least, it would buy people some time to stop the group using Moon Drip. Yet, what if there was another solution? Bobo was the only demon he knew that might be willing to talk to him. Well, the only one that actually knew what he was.
A hand grabbed his wrist, stopping him. He turned to see Lulu watching him with pleading eyes. "Please. I understand you don't know me…but you don't look well." She swallowed, staring down at her hand on his wrist. Gray debated pulling free, but was still long enough for her to continue. "You don't have to tell us what's wrong. I just…can you at least promise me that you're going to stay safe and come back? You're a good person and I don't know what I'd do if I knew that somehow, sharing this library with you led to…" her voice trailed off.
Taking a deep breath, Gray nodded towards her. "Don't worry, I'll be back." He wasn't trapping anyone yet, at least. "Take care, Lulu." He hesitated as she released him, pausing to turn back to study her face one more time. "You remind me a lot of someone I cared about a lot when I was young. I lost her a long time ago." Ur's face was still so easy to picture in his mind. Even as she teased him and was strict with him, Gray remembered her smile the best. It was that smile that Lulu somehow managed to mirror so well that kept Ur on his mind and probably would have done so even if she wasn't on the island herself. "You'll be strong enough to handle this curse and whatever else life throws at you, I know it."
With that, Gray turned and left the house. He made his way through the village, seeking out the beach in the hopes of finding Bobo there. That's where he'd been before and Gray didn't exactly have any other leads on where to find the demon. Yet, it appeared as if his guess was wrong. So, he started exploring the island. He followed the beach at first, believing that maybe Bobo just wandered elsewhere. When that seemed to be incorrect, he turned towards the forest instead.
After about an hour of wandering, Bobo seemed to find him. "Ah, finally. I was hoping I'd catch you away from the village again soon." Gray blinked, looking up to see that Bobo actually had wings. He tried not to flinch when the demon landed. It was getting a little bit easier, but those reactions were still ingrained from his experience with Deliora in the past. "I wasn't finished talking, you know. The wizard cursing the village isn't going to just walk away and you didn't come up with a proper solution to deal with him."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll talk about that later." Gray ran a hand through his hair. "Look, I'm not backing out of helping them, alright? But something big just came up and I need some advice on if there's even a decent solution to handle it."
"Around here?" Bobo frowned. "I mean, I've seen a few weird folks wandering near the temple but that place gives me the creeps, so I didn't really get that close."
Gray nodded slowly. "The temple is where the issue is." He met Bobo's eyes. "Based on what I've seen, I think they're trying to free a demon by the name of Deliora. I know you said demons can be peaceful, but my experience with Deliora in the past has been…disastrous."
"Deliora?" Bobo paused, frowning with his brow furrowed for a moment. "You're saying the Demon of Destruction is on Galuna Island?"
"Currently, stuck in a block of ice, but yes." Gray stood tensely, crossing his arms over his chest. "They're using a spell known as Moon Drip to melt that ice and free him to unleash his destruction on this entire island. I have no idea why they'd want to accomplish such a thing, but I know what I saw."
"They can't do that." Bobo's expression was dark. "Especially not now. No one in the village…" He trailed off, turning towards Gray. "Look, Deliora isn't like us. Sure, he can talk, but he…was designed for a different purpose, you could say."
"Different purpose?" Gray frowned. True, he knew Zeref was involved in the creation of demons somehow. The black wizard was known for that in all of the legends he'd read. Yet, all demons he also found information on were destructive. He had never really considered that they could be given some sort of different function than that.
Bobo nodded. "I shouldn't say much more about that. It isn't my place." The demon rubbed the back of his head. "But what you should know is that the demons that live on this island weren't given the same destructive powers as the others. Sure, we've got some minor talents - my claws can be pretty sharp if I need them to be and most of us can fly in our demon forms. Compared to Deliora? That's nothing. At best, if we get the village to remember in time, they could possibly come up with a diversion to get us all away, but Deliora's rampage wouldn't be stopped."
"So, you're saying that if we don't stop them from freeing this demon, we're not gonna be able to reason with Deliora." Gray inhaled slowly. "I was really hoping for a different answer, you know. I kinda hoped I was wrong about all demons, not just the small few here."
"Hate to break it to you, but there are still those made to destroy." Bobo sighed. "Glad to hear you're starting to warm up to us, though. It's never fun dealing with the biases against us, you know? Sometimes, I just want to be able to wave and say hi to a person without them running away in terror."
"Well, for what it's worth, I'm sorry for how I acted yesterday." Gray shoved his hands into his pockets. "I can't guarantee I won't still be uncomfortable around you, but I am starting to see that maybe I had made some assumptions based on what I'd seen from one demon."
"I appreciate it." Bobo glanced over between the trees, shaking his head. "I'd say we should discuss the curse now, but I imagine that's become lower priority at the moment. Come back out when you've got time to plan a bit more on it, alright?"
Maybe he should. Dealing with the curse had never been his priority, but the more Gray spoke with these demons, the more he realized they were suffering in their own unique way. Lulu had broken down before over her memories, the Chief thought his own son was dead, and Bobo was alone and isolated as the only one that managed to escape the curse. Maybe helping them out would be worth facing Erza's wrath. The thought alone was enough to make him shudder, before his mind returned to what should have been his primary focus. He needed to get back to the temple, specifically the cave underneath it. For now, he'd return and confirm his theory about the spell being used on Deliora. Then, he'd find the people using the ritual and make sure they regretted ever setting foot on this island.
There may be a few scattered moments like this where I make up some random pseudo-science about magic in this story. I just tend to have fun trying to justify random things sometimes and this is the result of that in my writing. Feel free to review and tell me what you think!