A/N: A new chapter!
I don't own Fairy Tail!
Please enjoy!
Chapter 37: Angra Mainyu
April 16, X792 – Mid-Morning
The small, old woman in the clothing shop stared over her handy work that still currently hung on Gordon. The metal mage still held an unamused face as he tried his best to ignore the laughing that was still coming from the group of men beside him.
"No."
Gordon looked down at the woman when he heard her speak, "No? What do you mean no?"
"No, no, no, no, no," she repeated quickly, "It's all wrong. I must fix it at once! Maybe in purple this time."
"Excuse me?!" Gordon snapped, "I just stood here letting you prick me with damn needles and put this stupid dress together! There's no way I'm doing it a second damn time!"
"Mmm, I suppose I should have used a real woman," she said, earning an eye twitch from Gordon, "Yes, a real woman will do much better."
Isaak stepped in before Gordon could blow up on the woman, "Well, since he did go through the trouble of being your practice frame, could we still have the puzzle piece we came for?"
The woman eyed Isaak for a moment before she sighed, "I suppose so. You were all good sports about this," she said as she moved towards a large closet stored with fabrics. They could hear her moving a few things around before she came back out while pushing an overly large, red puzzle piece that stood as tall as her, "Here you are."
"I suppose it was a good thing you guys came to meet up with us after all," Rin said, looking at Seth, Kasra and Gordon, "These things will be easier to carry with your help."
Isaak walked up to the piece, taking it from the woman and leaning it so the flat surface of it faced him that held black lettering on it. He quickly read over it once before reading it out loud for the rest of the room to hear, "Way down deep where it's dark and wet is where you'll find the next piece."
"I hope we don't have to go down into a cave," Rin mentioned as the rest of them thought over where the next piece could be located.
"Hmm, it isn't quite a cave," Jean said, turning to the old woman, "Does there happen to be a well here in town?"
"Yes. Take a right when you leave here and go all the way down the street and then take a left. You should see it at the end of that street right before you hit the forest."
"Thank you," Jean said, "We should be going then. You will need to take the dress off, Gordon," he added with a smirk.
Gordon could only glare at the smiling group before ripping the dress off and throwing it over at the woman and stomping out of the store. The group said their goodbyes to the woman before following him, Kasra carrying the first puzzle piece. They followed her directions, seeing she had been correct when they all walked up to a well on the outskirts of town.
"So I am going to assume it is at the bottom of the well," Jean said as the six men stared down the manmade hole, "But who gets to be the one to get it out?"
"Well, it seems only right that the one to figure out the clue is the one to go in and get it," Rin stated with a smile.
"Yes, I suppose you do have a point," Jean said before he suddenly realized what Rin had meant, "Wait a minute."
"Too late! You already agreed!" Rin said, smacking a hand to his back to send him over the edge, "Just land in the bucket!"
Jean shouted the entire way down the well before landing with a heavy grunt in what sounded like the bucket at the end of the rope to the rest of the group standing around the well, "How dare you! Do you know how much these clothes cost me?! Now they are soaked in dirty well water!"
"Oh, stop being a cry baby and look around for that puzzle piece!" Rin shouted down at him.
"I cannot believe this!" Jean grumbled, "Just wait until I get back up there!" he continued, but started looking around for the puzzle piece nonetheless. He eventually spotted it within the wall of the well, having to use one of his rapiers to pry it out. It eventually popped out and he caught it before it fell into the water, "All right, pull me up!"
"Do you have the puzzle piece?" Rin asked.
"Yes, yes! Now pull me up!"
"Are you sure?"
"Dammit Rin! Pull me up this instant!"
Isaak rolled his eyes at the two men yet again as he pushed Rin out of the way and began pulling on the rope to the bucket, having Gordon help him out with the process. Soon enough, Jean appeared, looking like a wet dog sitting in the bucket with a glare on his face.
"I suppose it wasn't so bad wearing a dress, now was it?" Seth asked, looking over at Gordon with a smile.
Gordon twitched in anger as he let go of the rope to start arguing with Seth. This caused the bucket to fall back into the well since Isaak hadn't been prepared for Gordon to release the rope. Jean once again shouted as he was sent flying back into the well, the bucket barely being stopped in time from crashing into the bottom of it by Isaak pulling on it as hard as he could. Once he let out a sigh of relief, Isaak turned back to the metal mage to send him a glare while Jean could be heard shouting from the well again.
"You should pay more attention to what you're doing," Seth said.
"And you shouldn't say stupid things!" Gordon snapped before taking his place behind Isaak again, the two men once again pulling Jean back up.
"You all are the worst teammates ever," Jean said once he was up above the well again, "And someone better take this puzzle piece and get me out of this bucket before you idiots drop me back down there!"
Seth stepped up to take the puzzle piece from him first, setting it down against the well before turning back and pulling Jean out of the bucket and onto solid ground. Seth then moved back towards the piece and picked it up to read over the black lettering on it.
"My girl's name is Senora. I tell you friends, I adore her. And when she dances, oh brother. She's a hurricane in all kinds of weather."
The men stood looking at each other, trying to figure out what the clue meant and hoping no one would say what came to mind first. Though, Rin seemed to shatter that hope instantly.
"Does this mean we get to go to a strip club?"
"You moron!" Jean shouted, smacking the younger man upside the head.
"What? It was talking about a woman dancing!"
"Just because a woman is dancing does not mean that she is automatically a stripper! Honestly!"
"Jean has a point," Isaak interrupted before the two men could continue, "Plus, I remember seeing a dance studio earlier in town, so we should probably head there."
The team nodded in agreement before moving back into town, Seth carrying the second puzzle piece.
. : + : .
The team was currently making their way out of a bar where they had found the sixth puzzle piece, having found the others before it at various locations throughout the town.
"That was smart thinking using Kasra as our player in the arm wrestling match in there, Isaak," Rin said.
"Of course," Isaak smirked, "It made it hard for the other men to pay attention with Kasra admiring them."
"Really, they should have put up a better fight," Kasra said, "Calling themselves men and then freezing up like that. It makes it hard to admire their muscles when they are not using them."
Half the group laughed in response while the other half rolled their eyes. Though, before anyone could say anything further, the light in the area began dimming as lights began to flash around. Loud and heavy music began playing as the ring that belonged to Atlas appeared at the end of the street.
"Seriously?! Again?! Does this guy not know how to fucking lose?!" Gordon shouted.
"I thought I knocked him out," Seth said, scratching the back of his head, "He must have a lot of energy to burn through."
"Well, who's going to take him this time?" Isaak asked, the entire group ignoring Atlas's introduction into the ring.
"I do believe it is my turn to fight him," Kasra said, a devious smile spreading across his face.
"Have at it," Isaak said, "Meet us back where Bahir is waiting for us since we only have a few pieces of the puzzle left to find."
Kasra nodded in agreement, watching the group run off towards their next destination for the seventh puzzle piece. He then turned back towards the wrestler at the end of the street, seeing his men cheering loudly for him while he continued to pose in the ring. Kasra's smile only grew as he began making his way towards the ring.
"Ah, have you come to fight the champion?!"
"I suppose that is one thing I will be doing here today," Kasra answered, looking out across the recently fixed ring before turning his attention back on Atlas, "Are you sure this ring will hold us?"
"Of course! I would never come unprepared to a fight! It has enough strength to hold up a hundred men!"
"Is that so? We will have to see if that is true," he said before pulling himself up into the ring. He walked straight up to Atlas and began circling him while inspecting him, "It is finally nice to examine you close up. You are quite the specimen."
"Oh? You admire the champion then?!" Atlas asked, striking a few poses for Kasra.
The take over mage smirked in response as his eyes lit up with appreciation for the man before him. Unlike most of the men on the guild, Atlas didn't flinch away from his staring or words of admiration. It made him that much more likable in Kasra's book since he took his compliments in stride, almost seeming to find pride in them.
"Honestly, I am," Kasra finally said as he came back around to stand in front of him, "Though, it does seem Seth did quite the number on you. You would certainly look better without all the damage taken along with that chipped tooth, but still a fine specimen nonetheless."
"So you are already awestricken?! I knew it would only be a matter of time before I had you all marveling at my mere presence! Though, I am a bit disappointed that you have been stricken by my glory so early on! How will I fight you now?!"
"Oh, do not get me wrong," Kasra said, his smile still intact, "You may be a piece of lovely work to admire, but I still do have a job to do given to me by Miss Murdock. I will fight you and you will lose. You may even wish that you would have stayed down after your fight with Seth as I do not plan to go easy on you even if you have already fought twice while I am currently unscathed and have my full magic supply at the ready."
"The champion would have it no other way! There is no honor in winning a lukewarm fight!"
"Then shall we begin? I am quite ready whenever you are."
"Let's go!" Atlas shouted, causing one of his men to ring the bell.
The wrestler charged Kasra, not wanting to waste any time with the fight. He began with an onslaught of punches, but soon became frustrated as Kasra dodged each one of them with a smile. Atlas shouted as he attempted to use his Lariat move on him, his forearm moving towards his neck. Though, Kasra easily moved to the side and caught his arm by the wrist.
"Brute force may be helpful with the offensive fighting you use, but it is meaningless if you cannot even hit your target."
Atlas had been surprised by the man catching his arm when the same move had worked so well on Gordon previously. He then realized that he was going to have to be much more careful around this man as his levels of intelligence and observation were much higher than his last two opponents. He attempted to swing a leg towards Kasra, but the mage caught onto what he was doing instantly. He caught his leg in mid-air with his free hand, now being able to flip the man up and over him, slamming him down onto the ring with his backside facing upwards. Atlas let out a whoosh of air from the slam and he didn't have enough time to notice Kasra's next attack. The take over mage wasted no time in dropping down onto Atlas and delivering a heavy blow with his elbow. Atlas let out a groan of pain as the elbow drove right into his spine, causing him to stay down a moment longer than usual to let the pain fade.
"I hope that is not all you have. Otherwise, this will be a rather boring fight for me."
Atlas used Kasra's words to fuel himself back into a standing position. Once back on his feet, he turned to face the still smiling man, "Not at all! I am the champion for a reason!" he announced before he forced his magic to flow through his body, strengthening and enlarging his muscles in the process, but it was easy to tell how tired the man had become from overusing his abilities and the damage he had taken from both Gordon and Seth.
"Well, that is quite the manly ability," Kasra said, immensely enjoying the sight before him now.
"You should be more worried now, no matter how much the champion enjoys your admiration!"
"If you do not mind, I would like to show you my own abilities since you seem to have boosted your level of strength. It is only fair and you seem to be a fan of level playing fields."
"I encourage you to boost your own strength! I only want a fair and honorable fight, so please do so! That way my title of champion can truly stay in place!"
"Even if this guarantees you to lose?"
"I will not lose! No matter what you may be able to do, you shall be the one facing failure today!"
"We will see," Kasra said as he readied himself for his spell, "Avatar Soul: Angra Mainyu."
As the spell took over his body, he gained a black, carapace-like skin that was similar to a skin tight armor that covered him from head to toe. In this new form, he was much taller and more muscular along with broader shoulders that had curved spikes coming out on each side. His feet had also transformed so that he walked on his tiptoes instead of flat on his feet, his heels now having black spikes on them as well. On the top layer of his forearms were scimitar appendages made out of a hard, gray material that could retract back into place. His torso was covered in a silver, sleeveless chest-plate made out of the same material as the scimitars. On his head he wore a silver, dragon horned shaped helmet and his pupils were now in a triangle shaped formation while his teeth had become sharp and jagged.
The men around the ring went silent upon seeing the new formation of the man, and even Atlas himself was having a hard time taking it in.
"Well…this is new for the champion," Atlas mumbled before he returned to his previous confidence, "But no matter! I will still prevail!"
This time when Atlas moved to charge in on Kasra, the take over mage followed suit, the ring creaking under his new form as he moved. And while he may not have been as fast as he was in his Amesha Spenta form, Angra Mainyu more than made up for that in the strength and durability departments. The two men met fist to fist, seeming to cancel each other out. Though, they both did feel a ripple of the other's power run up their arms. Once the feel of the first hit faded, the two moved in to start a heavy hand to hand combat battle. Punches flew back and forth, moving quick enough to make it hard for the men around the ring watching to see them. Though, unlike Seth's fight, Kasra had chosen not to use the bands around the ring since he could feel the ring groaning from the weight and pressure that was already on it. He was fairly certain that if he tried to bounce off the bands, it would only cause the destruction of the ring to happen earlier than it was supposed to, so he made sure to keep himself as well as Atlas in the middle of it. And so while he was concentrated on keeping them both in the middle of the ring while holding off his punches, he wasn't watching Atlas's feet as the wrestler suddenly twisted in his fighting.
"Super Kick!" Atlas shouted, spinning and landing a roundhouse kick on Kasra's side.
This sent the take over mage sliding across the ring, causing him to flick out the scimitars and slam them into the ring to stop himself from falling out of it. This left behind two thin, torn up lines in the ring, which only had the ring groaning in protest even more. Kasra knew he had to make the next few attacks count before the ring fell apart. He was certain that if the ring was destroyed that Atlas would make them stop and wait for it to be rebuilt, and while he did enjoy admiring the man in front of him, he also needed to meet up with the group to complete their mission.
Kasra stood up straight and retracted the blades back into his forearms before pushing off from the ring straight towards Atlas. He began his own onslaught of kicks, using the spikes on his heels to his advantage as they managed to slice across the man's skin a few times. Kasra could tell that even though he had revived from his fight with Seth that Atlas was definitely more sluggish than he had been when he had watched him fight Gordon. It was quite easy to see that he would be the winner of this fight and that thought was almost disappointing since he had hoped for a harder fight from the man in front of him. He could only hope that at some point in the future that he would get to fight Atlas again at his full strength.
"While I must say that you have put up great effort through fighting three opponents today," Kasra began, easily dodging punches being sent his way while slamming his own punches all over Atlas's body, "You are also fighting an opponent now that is at their full power while you are having to force magic through your body," he continued, slamming more and more punches into the wrestler, "As I said before, this was only going to cause you to lose today. As a champion, you should know when to stand down instead of straining your body so much. I do hope you learn something from this," he said, as he jumped back for a moment.
He watched Atlas's body sway from the chain of attacks he had been receiving without being able to fight back and having used up his supply of magic. Knowing that it was time to make the finishing move, Kasra ran and jumped high into the air. He came back down on Atlas, spinning once as he stretched a leg out. Using the momentum of the fall and spin as well as the power his current form held, he landed the kick right in the back of Atlas's head, sending him straight down into the ring. As soon as his body slammed into it, the ring completely broke apart, the entirety of it falling to the ground in a crumbled mess. Atlas laid in the middle of it, unmoving and knocked out like he had been when Seth had made his final blow on him. Though, this time he had no magic reserves left to ignite him back to life.
"It does pain me to beat down such a handsome man," Kasra said as he landed on the outskirts of the mess of the ring. He dropped his magic, fading back into his normal figure, "But as I said, I have a job to complete. And I hope there are no hard feelings in this when you wake up as it does appear you are no longer the champion. If you wish to set up a rematch, then please do come by our guild and you may fight for the title again."
With that, Kasra left the area to head to where they had left Bahir, a smile to still on his lips as he knew that this wouldn't be the last time he saw the handsome wrestler.
A/N: There we are! I hope you all enjoyed it!
This was definitely supposed to be updated last night, as I had it completed and everything, but I was staying out at my parents place for the weekend to help watch the dog while they were away and my computer just would not connect to their wifi! I tried and tried to get it to work but to no avail! So sorry for making you all wait for the chapter!
And I know, short chapter is short, but I was having some trouble getting this completed. I'm not sure why this one was a bit harder to finish, but it was. So I wanted to save what happens next for the next chapter when it flows a little more easily. Still, I hope you enjoyed it.
And kudos to those of you that know what I used for that dancing clue that came out of the well, haha!
Also, if you all read Thunder Stone, then you'll already know about the challenge that was given to me. Originally, the challenge was supposed to be for last week, but as I stated above, I was having a really hard time writing this week and I ended up not being able to write much at all, so thankfully the person that issued me the challenge was nice enough to let me move it to this week. So I'm starting fresh with this chapter as the start for it.
Now then, for the actual challenge itself, it was given to me by XLil MEkoX, so you have them to thank for the chapters that should be coming out quickly (they better be this time around!). But I have a week to get out as many chapters as I can. And this isn't just a random challenge either as I get something in return for the chapters I post. So with every Storm's Helm chapter I post, I get two characters drawn. And with every Thunder Stone chapter posted, I get a team drawn. So it's my hope that I'll be able to get out a good number of chapters since it seems like I broke out of whatever writer's block I was in. So hopefully this week will be a much smoother week for the challenge. And with this chapter, I'm starting out with getting two Storm's Helm's characters drawn up. So that's already a start!
So yeah, that's the challenge this week.
Anyways, short author's note will also be short today. But as always, I do appreciate all your reviews and love for this story! Every review always makes me smile and I can only hope that you all continue to enjoy the story!
That should be it for this time.
The next chapter should be up soon!
Yours Truly,
MyDearWatson