Juvia POV
After a while of walking, we had come across a particularly large hill with an opening in it. The grass seemed to sag into itself, creating a mass of darkness.
"Is this the cave that Erza was told about?" I said, unsure.
"Unless there's some kinda invisible cave around here, there's no way that it ain't," Gajeel responded sarcastically.
Natsu began to look around for another cave, only for Gajeel to smack him in the back of the head.
"Ack! What was that for, you jerk?!" Natsu shouted angrily.
"To get you to stop looking around for something that ain't there," Gajeel frowned at him.
"That didn't mean you had to hit me."
"Yes it does."
While they were talking, Lisanna walked into the cave and looked around.
"What's in there, Lisanna?" Levy asked her as she walked over to the entrance.
"There's a stone staircase leading underground, but I can't see much after that," the takeover mage answered. "It's too dark."
"I see..." Levy then turned her attention to Natsu. "Excuse me, Natsu."
"Hm?"
"It's too dark in there to see anything, so you'll have to light things up with your fire," she told him. "Do you think you can do that?"
"Of course I can!" he responded confidently, before heading into the cave. "Come on."
Without waiting for a response, Natsu rose up his hand and ignited it, lighting up the area around him. He then proceeded to walk down the stone steps into the darkness below.
We quickly followed after him, reaching an underground path. I looked at the walls as we walked, my mind drifting.
"Wait," I stopped the others upon spotting something.
"What is it?"
"There is something written on the wall," I told them, pointing to some red scribbles on the cave's wall.
"I'm bright but I'm not clever," Gray read it.
"What is?" Gajeel asked.
"Nothing...it ends there," he answered.
"If it ends there, then there's probably more," Levy pointed out. "We should keep an eye out for more writing."
"Yes, it could be useful," I agreed.
"How could scribbles on the wall be useful?" Natsu, as usual, didn't understand.
"Juvia doesn't isn't sure, but it could," I responded. "You never know, after all."
After that, we continued walking, keeping an eye out for anymore writing on the walls of the cave. It was a surprisingly dry cave, and a long one, as our steps echoed through the barren tunnel.
"I burn but I'm not a bonfire," I read writing that we passed by.
"I sound like I'm a celebrity but I'm not famous."
"I twinkle but I'm not an eye."
"I can be seen at night but I'm not the moon."
Each of the messages that we passed by were all written in red, and at least thirty seconds of walking apart from each other.
After passing by all of the messages, we came across a large stone door that had a bucket of red paint with a single paint brush next to it.
Huh? Who would leave this sitting here? I wondered.
Gajeel went over and tried to open the door, but it wouldn't budge. It was almost like it was nothing more than a drawing on the wall instead of an actual door.
"It won't open," Gajeel said, sounding irritated.
"Maybe the paint has something to do with opening it?" Natsu guessed.
"How is paint going to help us open a door?" Gray asked skeptically.
"I don't know," he huffed. "Maybe there's some kind of spell on the door or something?"
"Then why would the paint bucket still be here if it was the key to opening the door?" Gray asked. "Wouldn't that thing have moved it?"
"Maybe someone else left it for us?" Gajeel suggested, before turning his attention to Levy. "What do you think?"
"I wouldn't say that someone else leaving it for us is impossible," Levy responded. "But if the way to open the door is by using the red paint, then we'll have to either draw or write something on the door."
"What are we supposed to draw, then?" Lisanna asked.
"I'm not sure," Levy answered.
Everyone began to talk about what they thought the answer could be, but I stayed out of the conversation because I was trying to figure it out on my own.
Hmmm...the messages from earlier may have something to do with this. I thought as I stared at the paint bucket.
I began to repeat the messages in my head over and over again.
I twinkle but I'm not an eye...I can be seen at night but I'm not the moon... I thought. Is the answer star?
I decided to see if the answer was right, so while everyone was talking, I went over to the door, picked up the paint brush, dipped it into the paint, and drew a star on the door.
Star... I thought to myself as I wrote the word underneath it, before stepping back. Was that it?
After a few seconds, the door began to open on its own, only stopping when it was completely open.
"Juvia opened the door," I turned my attention to the rest of the group, who were still talking.
They stopped and looked at me, quickly becoming surprised by the fact that I had managed to open the door.
"How'd you do that?"
"Juvia drew a star on the door and wrote 'star' underneath it, then the door opened up," I answered.
"Why was that the solution?" Lisanna frowned.
"I'm bright but I'm not clever," I recited the messages. "I burn but I'm not a bonfire..."
"Oh I get it!" Levy was the first to figure it out. "The answer was to figure out what the text was referring to."
"Right."
"I wonder who left those hints for us," Lisanna wondered. "It couldn't have been that thing, could it?"
"No way," Gray said doubtfully. "Why would that monster help us?"
"Well whoever it was, I hope that they know that we're grateful for their help," Lisanna said optimistically.
"I have a strange feeling that they know," Erza spoke up after being silent for so long. "Anyways, let's go."
Natsu walked in front, illuminating up the cave with his fire. We followed after him, immediately stopping in the middle of the room.
"Is this bunny girl's area or whatever it's called?" Gajeel asked as he looked around.
The room that we had walked into was circular. The walls were painted to look like outer space with the stars glowing, providing a bit of light but not much. Star charts littered the floor in such quantity that they acted like a big carpet. Different stuffed plushes of celestial spirits(No, not the Knight kind.) were scattered around the room. There were all kinds of celestial gate keys hanging from the ceiling on thin golden chains, and a spiral staircase that had the steps shaped like stars led to a second floor.
"I doubt it," Natsu stated, his voice skeptical.
"Why's that?" Levy asked, turning to face him. "This place seems like the sort of thing Lu-chan would love."
"You're right, it does. But this place doesn't smell like her," the fire dragon slayer answered, his nose twitching. "It smells like someone else."
"Do you think that it could have taken another person?" Gray looked at Levy, his blue eyes questioning.
"It's not impossible..." Levy responded. "But I wonder who it is, if someone else is here."
"There's only one way to find out," I gestured to the stairs, assuming the person was up there. We were about to head for them when we were stopped by a voice.
"I'll be right back, I think I heard something downstairs. Don't go anywhere, alright?"
"Okay! Hurry back!"
Soon, a familiar face descended down the spiral staircase, looking down at the steps as they walked down and stopped at the base. Afterwards, the familiar face, AKA Dragon, looked up at us.
"So, you finally got here," his olive eyes glared at us. "I was wondering when you'd show up."
"Oh great...not you again," Natsu groaned, clearly not happy to encounter his doppelgänger again.
"How'd you even get here before us?" Lisanna asked, voicing what the rest of us were thinking. "We were ahead of you."
"People like me have our ways," he answered smugly. "Anyways...you may have gotten away from me last time, but Master says that I really, really can't let you stay here any longer."
He turned around suddenly right after saying that.
"This is my last chance too...Master may have forgiven me last time, but even Master's forgiveness has its-" he muttered to himself.
"Do you always do this when you're talking to people?" Gray asked.
"Great...you're wearing girly clothes and you talk to yourself while talking to other people," Natsu frowned. "All while looking like me."
Dragon quickly spun back around to face us.
"Dammit! Stop saying that my pajamas are girly! They aren't girly, they're cool!" that comment seemed to upset him.
"They are sort of girly," Lisanna agreed with Natsu.
"Shut up and go home already!" he ordered.
"We already told you," I spoke to him. "We aren't waking up unless our friends wake up with us."
"If you won't leave, then I'll...I'll..." he seemed like he was thinking. "I'll beat you up! Yeah! I'll beat you so bad that you'll wish that you'd never have come here!"
"You'll beat us up?" Gajeel clearly had doubts. "With what?"
"With this!" he held up his stuffed dragon. "Now you better start running, because here I come!"
Dragon ran at us with his stuffed dragon, but Natsu punched him in the face with his free hand causing him to be knocked back a bit.
"Ack!" he exclaimed as he held his most likely bruised face with his free hand.
"Come on...you know that you can't beat us," Natsu told him. "So why are you even trying?"
"Because Master told me to!" he moved his hand away and tried to attack again, only for the same result to happen. "Ack!"
"You aren't going to win," Lisanna tried to sway him. "Just move aside and no one will get hurt."
"No!"
"Don't you have anything better to do?" Gray asked him. "Get outta the way already. This is a waste of time."
"No! Fuck you!"
"You sure are a stubborn one, aren't you?" Levy frowned at him.
"Listen, if you don't get out of the way right now then we're gonna either beat you up or tie you up," Gajeel told him, cracking his knuckles.. "It'll be easy, too."
"No it won't!"
"Yes it will, especially with a lackey like you," Gajeel responded confidently.
"A...what?" that seemed to get to him as he lowered his plush dragon.
"A lackey...you're a lackey to that thing, and you do whatever it tells you to do with no questions asked by the looks of it," Gajeel explained. "In other words, you're a servant...nothing more, nothing less..."
"I-I'm not that! I'm more than that!" he exclaimed. "I'm important!"
"You're Dragon, right?" Erza spoke up.
"Yeah, but I-"
"For someone with such a powerful name, you're really just a weak, stubborn lackey that can't even complete the orders given to you by your master," Erza insulted him, which caused us all to become both surprised and shocked. Harsh, Erza. Harsh.
"I-I'm...I'm..." he stuttered, looking to be on the verge of tears.
"Geez, Erza...did you really-?"
"I AM NOT A LACKEY!" he screamed in anger as his eyes changed color.
After that, he immediately turned and ran back upstairs, but we didn't follow him as we all looked at Erza.
"...What?" she asked when she noticed that we were staring at her.
"Did you really have to say that to him?" Lisanna asked. "He looked like he was gonna cry."
"It was the only way to get him to move without hurting him," Erza answered. "Would you rather him get hurt?"
"No, but you didn't have to go that far," Lisanna frowned.
"Yes, you could have just stopped when you called him a weak, stubborn lackey," I agreed. "It would of gotten the same result."
"I guess that you're right, but what's done is done," Erza told us. "There's no fixing it now, so let's go."
We turned our attention away from Erza as we began to head up the spiral staircase to the second floor one by one.
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