A/N: Well... I guess I should explain myself... Okay, first, real life happened last week (and that will happen again most likely since I do have one of those real life things)... so I wasn't able to update or work on the chapter when I planned to. Then, when all that was over I came down with a stomach flu (and as I said, I will never write when sick since it would come out horrible since I can't even think straight when I'm sick), which was awful, I even spent the night in the bathroom one night since I couldn't stray too far from it without being miserable or needing to rush back to it. And then, even more real life stuff happened and even more is going to happen. So I haven't just been slacking off or playing hooky, I've actually been rather miserable the past few days if you couldn't tell from my bathroom story. So there's my reason, but I will try to make up for missing the last few weeks eventually.
Now onto business. A word about the frequency and length about Historical Omakes first. Historical Omakes will be happening at my discretion without much of a warning, but they'll often happen after a chapter has a scene that heavily focuses on a single character (such as Camille reading her letter from Zander in chapter 10), so keep an eye out for scenes like those and you might be able to guess when a Historical Omake is coming. Also, Historical Omakes are exempt from the schedule, so they'll happen even if I already have posted a chapter that week. Now on to their length, the length of a Historical Omake is completely determined by the length of the history section of your character's profile. So if you only sent in one small paragraph about their history, you should only expect to see one part to their Historical Omake. But if your character had a rather long history section, expect to see multiple parts to their Historical Omake like Camille's. Also, some character's Historical Omakes will combine at certain points, such as Camille and Rayner's will combine after a certain point, and then that will run into Salina's before running into another character or two's history before finishing up. So, if you want to refine your character's history (or if you come up with new magic spells, cause having more makes it easier for me), feel free to do that and send it back into me, but if you do plan on extending their history, try very hard to avoid involving members of Fairy Tail otherwise I can't be sure of how many conflicting pasts I'll have and then I'll have to ask a bunch of you to redo the history and that's just inconvenient for everybody, make sense?
Onto review responses! I'd like to thank lexlovesya, SaiyaStyles, MyDearWatson, potentialauthor18, WaterDragonMaverick, FrozenBlast13, Joshua1277, Hikari, Guest (I think I'll call you Stan, or Stanette if your a girl), LightandDarkHeart, and Falling Lanterns for their reviews for the Historical Omake.
lexlovesya- Yeah, Camille's early childhood was pretty rough, but the strange thing is, Camille doesn't hate her father, otherwise she wouldn't be worrying about making him proud or disappointing him. But anyways, I hope you enjoy the chapter!
SaiyaStyles- *Nods in agreement* Very tough love.
MyDearWatson- Well Hello Once Again MyDearWatson! Yeah, I never expected anyone to feel sad for Philemon when he died and Morgana was more or less a doormat character whose only real importance in the grand scheme of things was that she gave birth to Camille and then died about 10 years later. I'm glad that liked my introduction of Zander and you'll notice that only one other character voiced themselves thinking that Camille was a boy, which was intentional given the similarities between the two. That was my biggest worry actually, getting all the different members of the Ealdwine family's personalities down, but it's good to hear that they all came out just right. Yeah, such huge displays of affection were a completely foreign idea to Camille, so she didn't really know what was happening at the time and she still isn't really sure what to think about things like that since Christopher was the only one to do stuff like that to her. Well some good news is that I have the next point where we continue Camille's Historical Omake all figured out, the bad news is that it won't be until after the next arc, but oh well.
potentialauthor18- It's all right if that thing called real life keeps you busy, happens to all of us really at some point or another (...don't I know that now). But yeah, I was hoping to surprise people with that omake since I said absolutely nothing about it after chapter 10. But anyways, Zander can be a pretty nice guy now that he's matured compared to his Thunder Stone counterpart (who is 19-20, in that omake he was 29-30, which makes him about 36-37 now in the story). And I'm glad that I could tug on some heartstrings.
WaterDragonMaverick- Bittersweet is a good word for Camille's early history, but I'm happy to hear that you think that I did so well with that omake and we'll just have to see how I do with everyone else.
FrozenBlast13- Oh hey! A new reviewer with a name! I'd do a little dance for you but I'm not sure how... ('.') ('.'^) ^('.'^) (^'.'^) (^'.')^ (^'.') ('.') How's that? Your own little Kirby dance! Anyways, since we only have Camille's point of view when it comes to what Philemon said, I'm leaving that all up to good ol' reader interpretation!
Joshua1277- Yeah Camille had it pretty tough there at the start (I actually teared up just a tiny bit while writing), but she was in good hands once Zander found her. Callin' the ZanQuinn? Good Call.
Hikari- It is as WaterDragonMaverick said, I believe the most famous use of the name Jareth was David Bowie's character in Labyrinth. Although I'm not sure if that's where MyDearWatson got the name, I never asked. Did you try to see if resetting your password fixed the problem? Or maybe just getting a new account straight-out fixes the problem? Just some ideas is all. Well, we won't get to see more of Camille's past until the end of the next arc (I don't even know if we'll see another historical omake between then and now though, but details, shmeetails).
Stan/Stanette (or Guest if you prefer)- Well Stan/Stanette, you see Stan/Stanette, I'm really glad that you liked Zander so much and if you want to see a younger Zander and Quinn, then check out MyDearWatson's Thunder Stone if you haven't already, Stan/Stanette.
LightandDarkHeart- Well at least Philemon got what was coming to him for how he treated Camille. And both Camille and Zander are very sentimental characters when it comes to mementos like Camille's necklace or Zander's beanie, those being the most important ones that they have.
Falling Lanterns- It's alright if you can't think of what to say in a review, I'm pretty horrible at deciding what I want to leave in a review as so I often just sit and stare at the screen for like an hour before figuring out what I want to say, so I don't review for many stories. Anyways, yeah little Camille acted like a boy and kinda looked like a boy too, so she was often mistaken for one when she was a kid. It even happens to her sometimes now even since her build looks like a lean male build.
Credits:
Aurora- dreadburner94
Proclus (Horsey-kun)- dreadburner94
I don't own Fairy Tail! Or Lamia Scale...
I hope you enjoy the chapter!
Chapter 11
Euclid looked out of his office window, the sun was setting, turning the sky a vibrant crimson with a hint of orange and violet in it. He watched a bandaged man walk away from the building before disappearing entirely.
"Heh... Hahahahaha!" Euclid laughed as he spun around to look at his payment for the task that the man had given him, a large silver-plated 7-shot revolver pistol. At a glance, it looked like an ordinary gun, but it was a powerful magic weapon with none like it in the rest of the world.
"Was the deal really that good?" an emotionless voice asked from the far corner of the office.
Euclid looked over to the young girl standing in the corner, she had been in his employ for a few years now and she was one of the few that he trusted. The girl stood at 5'4" with a pale complexion and a thin build. She had emotionless green eyes and black hair that was tied into a high, wavy ponytail while her bangs framed her face and slightly covered her eyes. She was wearing a knee-length, black dress that flared out around her knees with black frills on the bottom of the dress. Over that she wore a dark purple, hooded cloak that had gold trim and she also had on black stockings with tall, brown boots and a bronze, runic pendant on a rope necklace.
"Yes, I think it was Aurora," Euclid answered as he looked at an ancient pendant that had the image of a dragon head on it that was sitting on his desk next to the weapon, "That man is almost as good as me when it comes to collecting information," he admitted as he picked up the pendant and examined it, "So it isn't really surprising that he knew what happen outside of Acalypha Town, or that he knows about that girl," he continued in a quiet tone before he started laughing again, "Oh this is perfect!" he exclaimed as he dropped the pendant on his desk before hopping around it and over to Aurora, "Finally! Everything we've worked so hard to start is finally beginning!" he laughed as he grabbed Aurora's hands and began jumping up and down while the girl just stared at him.
"May I deliver my report now?" she asked as Euclid suddenly stopped jumping and smirked in affirmation, "I've narrowed down one of the locations the artifact may be held, it's near Oshibana Town," Aurora explained in her emotionless tone as Euclid's smirk broke out into a large smile.
"This is perfect!" he exclaimed, "There are mages from Undine's Cove headed on a mission to Oshibana Town right now! This'll be fun, this'll be fun, this'll be fun, this'll be FUN!" he shouted like an excited child, "We should go right now!"
"What about Proclus?" the girl asked as Euclid began pulling her out of his office.
"Oh, he's preoccupied at one of our safehouses," he explained with a small chuckle.
. : + : .
"Kitty-kun!" Vladimir exclaimed while he gave the black and white tabby cat a tight hug.
"DAMN YOU EUCLID!" Proclus screamed while being squeezed by the injured Schrodinger.
. : + : .
"I wonder what the Lamia Scale mages will be like?" Yune wondered while the three of them sat in the cabin on the train, Ladon taking up one side by himself so that he could get some more sleep before the mission.
"They're probably going to be full of themselves since they're the 'second strongest guild'," Wilhelm scoffed while he tapped his foot nervously.
"You might have a point," Yune mumbled, she didn't like thinking poorly of things or people, but often times it was just easier to since there would be less disappointment that way. Yune continued to think while Wilhelm kept tapping his foot, seemingly in rythm with Ladon's light snores, until a familiar figure walked past, "Oh! Aspen!" Yune exclaimed when she saw the young woman walk past their cabin, "I didn't know you were on this train," she admitted while Wilhelm's tapping picked up speed, "Are you going to Shirotsume Town too?" she asked.
"Yeah," Aspen answered with a nod, "There's a case of kidnappings going on there," she explained.
"Maybe our missions are connected?" Yune pondered while Ladon woke up with a yawn.
"I doubt it," he muttered, "We'll be leaving not long after we get there," Ladon explained while he unzipped his sleeping bag enough to where he could sit up, "We're just meeting the Lamia Scale mages there, then we're leaving again by carriage."
"All passengers please return to your seats, we will be arrived in Shirotsume Town shortly," a voice announced over the trains intercom.
"Best of luck on your mission," Aspen said as she began walking back to her seat.
"Good luck to you too!" Yune called out after her as the train began to slow down, eventually coming to a stop in the new train station.
"The Lamia Scale mages should already be here, right?" Wilhelm asked as he stood up and grabbed his scimitar from the storage area above his seat.
"That's what Salina said," Ladon sighed as he stood up and walked out of the cabin and off of the train, his teammates following him.
"Is that a dog-man?" Yune asked in bewilderment as she saw a man with dog-like features yelling at another man with incredibly large eyebrows who appeared to be trying to calm down the dog-man. Nearby the two of them were two more people, a young man with hardly any clothes on and spiky silver hair, and a woman with long and wavy pink hair who was saying something about love.
"What's up with them?" Wilhelm wondered as the three of them just stood there and watched the strange scene.
"I think those are our Lamia Scale mages," Ladon sighed as he saw the guild mark on the silver-haired man's chest, "Come on," he said as he began walking towards the four strange people.
"Um... Excuse me," Yune called out to the four mages, getting their attention "Would you four happen to be the mages from Lamia Scale that we were sent to meet up with? We're from Undine's Cove."
"Hm?" the silver-haired man hummed as he looked at the three mages, looking at each of them for, presumably, a guild mark and stopping his search when Ladon held up his hand to show his guild mark, "You're the mages from Salina's guild then?" he asked coolly with an air of confidence about him.
Ladon nodded in response to the older man, "And you're the mages from Lamia Scale then?" he asked in response, receiving an affirmative nod in return as well, "Well then we should probably get go-," he started to say as he opened his mouth wide and let out a long yawn, with little tears forming in his eyes as Yune began to yawn as well.
"WAKE UP DAMMIT!" the dog-man yelled, agitated by the yawning.
"Calm down Toby!" the man with large eyebrows shouted, "Should we wait until tomorrow to leave?"
"No, they work better at night actually," Wilhelm stated while tapping his foot in a seemingly nervous manner.
"I'm Lyon Vastia by the way," the silver-haired man said as he held out his hand towards his teammates, "These are my teammates, Toby, Yuka, and Sherry," Lyon stated as he pointed at each of them in turn.
"Right," Wilhelm sighed as he looked at his two yawning teammates, "I'm Wilhelm, that's Ladon and Yune," he said briefly as Yune stopped yawning.
"Where's your shirt?" she asked suddenly, causing Lyon to look down and notice that he had taken off his, blue, tunic-like shirt, sending him into a small panic until he had found it and put it back on.
"Do you think you need a few more hours of sleep?" Wilhelm asked Ladon while he ignoring Lyon's struggle.
"A few more hours of good sleep couldn't hurt," he admitted with another yawn, "It's still fairly early," he stated as he looked up at the clock that read seven o'clock pm.
"Mind if we wait a few hours before going?" Wilhelm asked Lyon as the man finished putting on his shirt, "Ladon could use some more sleep before going,"
"I don't mind," Lyon answered, "We can talk in the meantime."
Wilhelm's eye twitched for a slight second before he turned around, "I'm going for a walk," he said coldly as he walked off, leaving Yune with the Lamia Scale mages and Ladon who was getting comfortable on a bench.
"Sorry," Yune apologized with a bow, "Wilhelm doesn't take very well to new people or groups," she explained, still bowing.
"I see," Sherry responded, "He must be troubled... by love," she said dramatically, causing Yune to stare at the older woman with a blank and confused look.
"Eh? I'm not sure that I understand."
"Just forget about it," Lyon interrupted before Yune wound up even more confused, "How's Salina been?"
"Master Salina has been very well!" Yune answered cheerfully, "I feel like there was something that she wanted me to tell you... Oh yeah! Hi!" she said as she cheerfully waved like Salina would, causing the four Lamia Scale mages to chuckle a little bit.
"Sounds like she's doing well, despite the bad terms she left on," the Ice-Make mage said with a small smile, confusing Yune.
"What happened?"
"It's a sorrowful tale of love..." Sherry sighed with a distant look in her eyes.
"More like Archer being an ass and Salina and Ooba Babasaama not getting along like always," Lyon clarified as Yune began to blush at the thoughts entering her head.
"Did she leave Lamia Scale because of a lover's quarrel?" she thought as her entire head turned beat red, "H-hey," Yune called out while she nervously poked her index fingers together, "Wh-what was Archer to Salina?"
"They hated each other. Oooon," Toby answered.
"But I heard from Jura that they used to get along," Yuka finished.
"L-lover's quarrel!" Yune thought as she turned even more red, "Was our guild really made by a lover's quarrel!?"
"Is she alright? Oooon," Toby asked as they watched Yune flail about in a flustered manner.
"I'm not sure," Lyon said with a slight sweat drop.
. : + : .
Aspen walked through the streets of Shirotsume Town after departing from the train station. Ever since Duke Everlue was imprisoned 6 years ago, Shirotsume Town had abandoned it's feudalism system and was instead ran by an elected mayor, who happened to be the man that had hired her and who she was going to go see.
Aspen looked around through the shops, most of them were closed though, due to the time of day.
"Looks like the kidnappings have everyone spooked," she muttered as she observed the empty streets. Normally, people would still be out and about at this hour, headed to pubs and taverns to go drink, but it seemed that most of the people of Shirotsume thought that it was too dangerous to walk around this late, "Well this must must be the place," Aspen sighed as she came across a small, red brick building with a sign that read 'Mayor's Office' out in front of it and the lights in the windows were on, so she assumed that someone was present inside the building as she walked up to it and knocked on the door, entering when she heard a muffled 'come in'.
"How may I help you this evening?" A cheerful woman asked from behind a wood desk.
"I'm here from Undine's Cove to resolve the kidnappings," Aspen stated as she held out the request form, "May I speak to the mayor?"
The secretary looked at the request form before smiling and nodding, "Yes, please go right ahead. The mayor is currently in his office there," she said as she pointed to a door that had a small plaque that read 'Mayor' on it, "Please help the town," the woman requested with a small bow.
"Of course," Aspen responded as she knocked on the mayor's door and entered.
"Hm? Oh hello there!" a short and stout man with brown, combed-over hair and mustache greeted, "I take it from the conversation you had with my secretary that you're hear to resolve our problem.
Aspen looked down at the older man, she guessed that he only stood at about 5'1", but he was very broad and he wore a blue suit with white pinstripes on it with a red tie, white dress shirt, and brown dress shoes.
"My name is Karl Wordsmith and I'm the mayor of Shirotsume Town as you've no doubt gathered."
"Aspen Weathercroft. What can you tell me about what's been going on in town?" she asked.
The mayor's expression turned grim before he started, "Straight to business then. Well as you know, we've had a recent stream of kidnappings here in Shirotsume Town. It's mostly been children and adolescents so far, but here and there a grown person disappears, although there have only been two cases of that so far and they disappeared at the same time."
Aspen raised her hand to her chin in thought, there must be some reason for only two adults to have been kidnapped, "Do you have any ideas of who's behind it?"
"Not really... the only man who would have a reason to do something like this to Shirotsume Town is still locked behind bars last I heard," Mayor Karl explained.
"Are there any suspicious spots in town?"
"Well... there's the old Everlue Manor, part of it's been rebuilt ever since it was blown up, but everyone decided that it wasn't worth rebuilding it all the way since the money and materials could be used for something else."
"That's sounds as good of a place to start as any then," Aspen stated as she turned and headed for the door.
"Good luck!" the mayor called out after her.
. : + : .
Hughes stepped out of the carriage, Ziv and Zain following him out as they reached their destination.
"This is as far as I can take ya," the carriage driver said, "The terrain from here on out is too rough for the carriage."
"That's alright," Hughes responded with a smile, "You wouldn't be able to be a carriage driver if one of your wheels broke, so we understand."
"Do you know where we're going sis?" Zain asked as he looked at the map Ziv was holding.
"We should keep going southeast," Ziv explained as she pointed in the general direction, "The client said that he found the ruins not too far in, but they were filled with too many monsters and traps for him to go in and expect to survive."
"So he hired us to go in and get the treasure for him?" Zain asked.
"Basically."
"Don't worry Zain, we'll get a cut," Hughes reassured, "Otherwise it wouldn't be a fair trade."
"We better," Zain huffed as the trio began walking through the thick foliage.
"It's getting pretty dark out... don't you think?" Ziv muttered with a hint of nervousness in her voice after about twenty-five minutes of walking.
"Yeah, but I think we're almost there," Hughes responded, "The client said that there was a clearing in front of the ruins that we can use for a campsite," he explained.
"Anyone else smell wood burning?" Zain asked suddenly.
Hughes sniffed the air for little bit, checking to see if he could smell it, "Yeah that's the smell of wood burning alright. A campfire maybe?"
"You mean there are other people in these woods?" Ziv asked, "What if they're here for the treasure?"
"Then we're just going to have to blow them away," Zain announced confidently.
"Yo!" they heard a cheery voice say from behind them, causing the three of them to jump, "Hahahaha! That was great!" the man laughed after watching their reaction.
"Who are you!?" Ziv hissed.
"Normally it's a courtesy to introduce yourself before asking for someone's name," the man explained, "But! I already know your names, Ziv, Zain, and Hughes! Correct?" the man asked rhetorically, leaving the trio shocked.
"How did you?" Hughes mumbled.
"How did I know?" the man asked, "I knew because I know almost everything worth knowing," the man explained in a sinister tone.
"Euclid," they heard an emotionless voice call out as a young girl no older than Zain walked towards them from the direction of the ruins, "Are you finished?"
"I suppose," he sighed as he placed his hands in his jacket pockets, "You three are here for the same thing we are right? So how about a little competition?"
"A competition?" Ziv mumbled.
"That's right. The rules will be simple! Whoever finds the treasure first wins! The winners get to keep the treasure for themselves and do whatever they please with it while the losers walk away with nothing!" Euclid explained with a large smirk on his face, "Does that sound acceptable?"
Zain looked over at Hughes with a large smile as Hughes wore his own smile and nodded back at Zain, "You bet it does! You're going down!" Zain announced as he pointed straight at Euclid, who continued looking at the trio with a smirk on his face.
"I wouldn't have it any other way," he said as he picked up a stone a threw it in the air, "We start we that stone hits the ground!" he announced as the stone flew up into the air and back down to the ground, "GO!" he shouted as both teams took off towards the ruins.
A/N: And there we have it! It's a bit shorter, but I didn't want to keep you all waiting any longer. So once again, sorry that this one took so long, but illness and real life called and I had no choice but to respond. Anyways, I'm going to be kinda busy this week too, but I should have enough time to get another chapter out, hopefully.
Well, anyways, as I said I'll try to make up for the missed weeks eventually, but I don't know when.
I'm still accepting villains! See Chapter 10 for details.
I hope you enjoyed the chapter! Please remember to review!
Your sleepy host,
dreadburner94.