Notes: Anyone who read the scrapped chapter three on tumblr might recognize some of the plot points here, which I've reshuffled and reused. But more importantly, I've finished writing everything up to the timeskip, which will follow chapter seven, so we'll have three weeks of timely updates!
~.~.~
V. Living and Learning
"I've decided," Hisui said, setting down her teacup and looking across the table at her father. "I want to learn magic."
Toma paused, forkful of cake halfway to his mouth. "...Yes?" he let out uncertainly.
It was a question, not an agreement, but Hisui beamed. In the end, her father could never refuse her anything anyway. She was going to learn magic.
~.~.~
"Magic?" Arcadios repeated, staring at the king in surprise.
"It's not anything terrible. Learning magic won't besmirch Her Highness's honor," Kama said dryly. "In fact, a number of her ancestors were famous wizards. The only question is who will teach her."
"Yes, and it's a bit of a complicated question," Toma said, wringing his hands. "Traditionally, giving a child to a wizard as an apprentice is equal to fostering, almost an adoption. Some went as far as to trace their lineage through teachings instead of bloodline. Even if Hisui's apprenticeship is much more limited…"
"It will still grant her teacher a great deal of political capital," Arcadios finished.
The king nodded. "I don't want to turn Hisui's wish into a political game," he said pensively. "But it's something that can't be decided casually either. At the very least, we need to lay out the possible options. Kama, among your people…"
"Not a chance," the Garou commander said immediately. "None of us have any capacity for teaching. And I doubt our magic would suit Her Highness."
Toma sighed. "It's a bit of stretch, but not even Erza?"
"That's even worse," Kama said, waving his hand. "She doesn't have any formal training of her own. She just throws her power around. If Her Highness tried it like that, she'd likely end up killing herself."
That was about what he had expected, so the king only nodded. "I would prefer to avoid using any of the wizards in the city," he said. "All of them are affiliated with some guild or family who would use their position for leverage. And there's so few left in the kingdom outside Crocus..."
"The common choice is to send magically inclined children to the Runic Order for tutoring," Arcadios said, though his tone and expression gave away how little that appealed to him.
The Order was highly respected and their neutrality was rarely questioned, true, and they certainly performed vital functions in dealing with the dangers of magic across the continent. But because their reach and influence was so great, no nation fully trusted them — or lacked resentment for their interfering, controlling presence.
True, the Runic Order was neutral in its treatment of other countries. Instead, it favored itself.
Kama snorted loudly, letting his opinion of that be known.
"There is one more option," Toma said, tapping his fingers together in a sure sign that he expected his vassals to object. "Tenrou."
The reaction was as anticipated. Kama barely swallowed a groan, covering his face for a moment with one hand, while Arcadios openly facefaulted. "Master Makarov is certainly an outstanding individual," he said delicately, "but his band were a rather… colorful group. If he or one of his… associates were to train Her Highness…"
There was no telling what kind of terrible habits she would pick up. Habits like leveling half a town to catch one small-time thief whose only magic was to turn invisible. That story was still famous, decades later.
"She'd turn out one wild tomboy," Kama concluded, smirking. "And Darton would probably have a heart attack if you even suggested it. Fairy Tail was a bit before my time, but I've heard the stories. The old commander would always start in on that when he drank… Did they really graffiti Mercurius at one point?"
Toma chuckled awkwardly. "Yes," he had to admit. "My mother was… well, she was rather forgiving toward them. They did a lot of good, but… yes, many people breathed a sigh of relief when they disbanded." Hurriedly, he added, "But that was decades ago now! Master Makarov served admirably as a Saint in the Runic Order, and now as the headmaster of his school on Tenrou. I'm sure he's… settled down…"
He wasn't sure at all, actually, and going by their expressions, neither were Kama and Arcadios. However, it was the best option they had.
They'd have to find a way to break it to Darton gently.
~.~.~
"A magic… school?" Gray repeated, staring at Hisui dubiously.
"Yes, that's right. It's located on an island called Tenrou, not too far off our coast. It's not technically part of Fiore, but Papa gets along well with their headmaster," Hisui explained. "I heard that… well, you know how it is. Most wizards have been leaving to go to Era, for many years now. So there are fewer and fewer left in Fiore, and in the other kingdoms too, to teach children who are magically inclined."
Frowning, Gray nodded slowly. "So when they use their magic for the first time by accident, they don't have anyone to go to," he guessed.
Although everyone had the potential for magic, to a greater or lesser extent, those who were naturally magically gifted tended to spontaneously manifest their powers at a young age. Without any training or intentional effort, they would cast uncontrolled spells, which could range from small, startling things to wild destruction.
Even in the current age, it was a dangerous, traumatizing thing that, in a remote village, could lead to exile, if not worse.
Normally, the closest wizard would step in, to calm everyone and take the new magic user under their wing, but if all the trained wizards had left…
"It was becoming an issue, for a while," Hisui admitted unhappily. "Sometimes, families don't… react well. Magic just suddenly happening, it's frightening for everyone involved. And when there's no one to explain and to help them get it under control… That was why Master Makarov, who had been serving as a Saint in Era, decided to retire and create a school — to take in as many young wizards as he could and give them a place to learn and grow in peace."
Gray nodded along. "Then... you're going to go to this school?" he asked.
"Hm?" Hisui let out a sound of surprised. "No, no, I can't do that. The academy is on Tenrou, and I can't abandon my duties here. I'm a princess of Fiore first and foremost."
"That's good," Gray said without thinking. "Uh, I mean, not that I…" Seeing Hisui's knowing smile, he gave up. "Anyway, what kind of magic do you want to learn?"
"Well…" Hisui fidgeted, clutching to her chest the well-worn copy of Heavenly Records that Gray had come to return to her. "Something practical would be best, of course. Something versatile, like water magic maybe, or telekinesis, or even telepathy…"
"But you really want to learn something flashy, don't you?" Gray guessed with a grin. "Rain beams of light down on your enemies like the white maiden?" Judging by Hisui's blush, he was spot on. Taking pity on her, he added, "Everyone likes flashy magic, there's nothing weird about that."
Compared to what people imagined when they thought of magic — fire and lightning, beams of light, being able to move the earth to your will — something like crafting wasn't particularly impressive. Ur had bemoaned it sometimes, how the more unassuming works of a crafter and the amount of memorization and base knowledge necessary for even just basic proficiency meant there were always relatively few interested in learning her trade.
And every time, that teacher's pet would pipe up about how no combat magic could hope to match the versatility and elegance of crafting... Gray frowned a little, remembering that.
"Did you want to learn something flashy too, Master Kreuz?" Hisui tried to strike back sulkily, going so far as to include the hated title.
Gray still twitched at that, a little. "I guess…" he said, shrugging. He would have certainly liked to learn something powerful and destructive, but not for the usual reasons. "My magic isn't that strong, so it wouldn't have been powerful enough. And there aren't any really strong combat wizards in Isvan anyway. The most famous magic user was Master Ur, so..."
"I think it worked out for the best," Hisui said, smiling. "I'm glad this is the magic you learned. Without it, we might have never met!"
Tentatively, Gray smiled back. "Yeah," he said. "I'm glad too. I guess something good did come of it."
~.~.~
The king waited patiently in an empty, circular room in near the edge of Mercurius. Ceiling high windows lined the walls, letting in the morning sun and showing a beautiful view of the castle gardens. The spired skylight in the ceilig above was topped with a strange crystal that cast a shimmering rainbow of spots across the mosaic floor.
Gray, if he had been present, would have noted how the room was designed to let in as much magic as freely as possible. It was open to every direction and even drew the flow of energy into itself like a well.
Toma, being less versed in magic, only knew that this room had been created for the purpose of serving as the arrival point of incoming Thought Projections — wizard visitors arriving in spirit only, leaving their bodies elsewhere. It had once been common practice, when magic skill was often a requirement for a successful — and surviving — leader, but in recent times it had fallen out of favor.
The headmaster of the magic academy at Tenrou, however, could not very well drop everything to come to Crocus in person. Thus, when the date set in the the letter from Toma to Makarov arrived, a figure materialized in the center of the mosaic circle, ghostly and transparent at first, but slowly growing more opaque and finally taking on a completely lifelike appearance, as if the man was truly present in the flesh.
"Yo, long time no see!" Master Makarov greeted the king casually, raising one hand in a loose salute.
Toma beamed happily, regardless of the impropriety. "Long time indeed! It's good to have you here again, Master Makarov," he said. "And thank you for coming on such short notice!"
"No, no, it's always a pleasure to visit Crocus," Makarov insisted. "Good to get away for a bit too... I love those brats, but they're becoming quite a rabble. I don't know if these old bones can keep up."
"It sounds like they've inherited the Fairy Tail spirit," Toma said. "Do you think they might take on the old name again?" —Elsewhere in the castle, Darton choked on his spit, as if sensing a disturbance.— "Hearing it disbanded when I was a child... it was like the end of a legend. I think I wouldn't mind seeing a new generation of adventurers."
Makarov laughed. "Who can say? I wouldn't stop them," he said. "I always did regret that we didn't have anyone to pass the name on to, back then. All of us were getting too old to be running around the countryside on adventures, but there was no one to carry on Fairy Tail in our place, and we just went our separate ways instead."
"Then how about your grandson? He should be getting to that age," Toma suggested.
"Laxus?" Makarov sighed, drawing a sympathetic look from Toma. "I think he'd prefer to make a name for himself, on his own terms. It might be better for that boy. He graduated recently, you know? Along with the rest of our first class, I suppose you could call them. But then he just ran off! I have no idea where he is." He sighed again. "As far as magic goes, he can more than take care of himself, and he's got a pretty good head on his shoulder, so I suppose he should be alright, but…"
"But you can't help worrying," Toma nodded along, understanding perfectly. Hisui was only twelve, but it was time for her to begin taking on smaller responsibilities as the princess. It was surprising, how reluctant he was to let her take that step, even though Hisui herself was determined.
Laxus, now sixteen, was old enough that Makarov had no argument to stop him from setting out if he so wished. And forcing him to stay when he wanted to leave was bound to end in disaster.
Sighing again, Makarov shook his head. "But enough about my family! So little Hisui wants to learn magic?"
Toma chuckled. "Yes, it was quite a surprise. But she's quite taken with the idea," he said. "I don't see the harm in it. Of course, she can't leave Crocus for it… Do you have anyone who might be able to do it, or anyone you can recommend?"
Humming thoughtfully, Makarov stroked his mustache. "Well, the basics I could teach her myself, with just Thought Projection like this," he said. "Gathering magic from nature, shaping it, the foundations of every magic type are the same. But for the specific kind of magic she learns… I don't know if I can help you there. My brats are almost all magically inclined to begin with, and their magic naturally takes some shape already. I just give them the basics and let them experiment on their own, for the most part."
The first time that the magic of a particularly powerful child-wizard manifested, it was usually in some way — whether water, darkness, changing everything to flowers, or making cakes appear out of thin air — that suited them best. It was possible to turn their inherent magic in a different direction and learn another style, but few felt the need. Using the magic you were most suited for felt natural and would yield the best results. By the same token, that magic didn't require specific training, and they could easily create their own spells.
"Hisui most likely doesn't have a strong inclination like that," Makarov went on. "She'll need to learn a specific style from a practitioner or a tome."
"Just a book would be enough?" Toma asked in surprise.
"If it's a real magic tome," Makarov said. "There's… hm, well, it's hard to explain, but a real magic tome is more than just a book with written instructions. It's not something you can put in words, but the magic of the author clearly appears in your mind when you read it."
"Another kind of magic tool, then," Toma chuckled. Thinking for a long moment, he finally nodded. "I don't think Hisui has decided on a specific magic, and it should be her choice. We'll look for a teacher, or perhaps purchase a tome from Era. That would be a workable compromise. And for now, I would like to take you up on that offer of teaching her the basics. If it's you, Master Makarov, I can feel at ease."
Makarov smiled back warmly. "No, no, it's a pleasure. Working with a sweet girl like your Hisui will be a nice break from those hellions…" The last part was added at a disgruntled mutter. "So! Let's set up a schedule. I'm sure Hisui is very busy, so I doubt dropping by just whenever would work."
"Let's ask her," Toma suggested brightly. "Hisui should be in the library with her friend..."
~.~.~
If the king or Makarov heard the brief scuffle that took place just before they opened the door to the library, neither gave any indication. Makarov's eyes might have lingered on one of the side tables a bit longer than normal, but he turned to beam at Hisui too quickly to be sure. By that point, Hisui had managed to school her perplexed expression into a very convincing smile of her own.
"Sweetheart, this is Master Makarov," Toma declared. "He'll be teaching you magic!"
Offering her own greetings, Hisui curtsied, while Makarov waved away the formalities. None of them spared glance to the small sheet of plain paper that surreptitiously slipped off the side table, along the floor, and under the door, into the empty hallway.
It floated a little further down the corridor before suddenly twisting in on itself and expanding to a side closer to a bedsheet. Two figures stumbled out, one cursing and keeping the other in a tight grip. "Would you stop?" Kamika hissed, giving Gray a firm shake.
He glared up at her rebelliously and mumbled something unintelligible through the hand she'd clapped over his mouth.
"You better not be thinking of biting me or something," she said, narrowing her eyes.
"Mrgh," Gray grumbled.
"Are you going to keep quiet?" Kamika asked. Receiving a reluctant nod, she slowly lowered Gray to his feet and let him angrily pull away. But true to her request, he only glared silently. Kamika sighed. "Don't look at me like that. The boss said to make sure no one from the Order caught sight of you by chance. That old guy might be retired now, but better safe than sorry."
That make him pause. 'That old man was with the Runic Order?' he thought. In that case, it was a good thing they hadn't run into each other, or there was a chance of awkward questions.
But still. Pointedly straightening his shirt, Gray maintained his glare. "Fine, but did you have to drag me out like that?" he complained.
Kamika shrugged, unrepentant. "It was simplest. You're easy to carry," she said, a smirk tugging at her lips as she made a gesture of measuring his still rather lacking height, "very compact."
"I'm still growing!" Gray hissed. "I'll get taller than you soon!"
This was probably true, since Kamika was not a particularly tall woman. But it did nothing to stop the laughter she was only barely smothering. Crossing his arms, Gray pointedly turned away.
"Sure thing, kiddo. You'll be a really lady killer one day," she said with false comfort, before her expression became serious. "It sounds like they'll be having lessons from now on, so it'd be better if you didn't hang around the castle too much for a while. I'll let you know once they have a schedule set up."
Sighing, Gray nodded in agreement. "I was just dropping by... Erza's not even here anyway," he muttered.
"Cheer up," Kamika said, ruffling his hair despite his scowl. "I thought she might take it too seriously again, so I told her that it's okay not to find anything and to come back in a couple weeks. So she'll be back soon and you won't have to be lonely anymore."
"I'm not lonely. You're lonely!" Gray protested.
Kamika narrowed her eyes and raised her fist threateningly. But in the end, she gave up, sighing. She was a bit lonely, true. Getting separate missions from Cosmos was the worst.
Feeling guilty now, Gray gingerly patted her shoulder. They sighed again, in unison.
~.~.~
Erza herself was currently trying her hand at the kind of mission the Garou Knights most often ended up undertaking, the kind they hated the most — the dreaded pointless goosechase of something that may or may not have been magic, or even anything more than some tired, possibly drunk farmer's hallucination.
Specifically, Erza was looking for a dragon.
There hadn't been a confirmed sighting of a dragon in centuries, but there had been plenty of unconfirmed ones. Some had been wyverns, an easy mistake for the common folk to make. Some had been bird monsters in flight. Some had been clouds. Some had been particularly menacing rocks in the twilight.
It was, Kamika explained, another kind of initiation. More hazing, not an actual test, she hastily assured Erza. Well, it was a test of her patience and ability to put up with pointless, fruitless fool's errands.
Perhaps it should have also been a test of her detective and information gathering skills, but given the wide range of... unique personalities and dispositions among the Garou Knights, they relied more on their ability to sense traces of magic to determine if a particular report was the genuine article, a real magical phenomenon that needed further investigation, and Erza's sensitivity to magic was impressive even by their standards.
This particular report had come from a town called Kuchinashi, to the northwest of Shirotsume, in the northern mountain range's foothills. The Katou Knights stationed in the area had been persistently approached by a girl who claimed to have seen a dragon flying overhead when she was out alone on the low mountain slopes.
It would have been unremarkable, the wild imagination of a child, except that the girl had returned every day, insisting that they help her look for it and, after being mocked one too many times, had ended up attacking the knights.
She was just a little girl, so no one had been hurt. But the knights had agreed to file a report to make her calm down.
Well, that was the summary that Erza received when she was assigned the mission, if it could be called that.
Go to Kuchinashi. Question the witness. Scout the area. Make a judgement as to what she might have seen and whether a further investigation was necessary. Go home, make a report.
Erza nodded to herself. Simple — a good trial. Kamika didn't need to have worried so much. Unlike down in the caves, Erza understood the purpose now. She had… probably misunderstood quite a bit, looking back on her training as a knight. She had treated all of it as a test, instead of a way to learn.
She'd just have to make up for it now. She'd succeed — not in tests just to stay alive, but in her duties as a knight, for the sake of her comrades in arms, the king and the princess, and everyone who had accepted her and given her a place to belong.
...In the end, of course, she was still Erza.
Investigation meant striding purposefully toward the first villager she saw, with a look just short of glare, and demanding, "Where is the girl who saw the dragon?"
The first villager proved unhelpful. So did the second, the third, and fourth through eighth, who were in a group. By that point, the entire street knew what Erza was after, and a small crowd of gawkers had begun to gather. With an increasingly frustrated expression, Erza endured their questions — Was she lost? What was with the armor and sword? Why did she want to talk to that crazy girl? — and their jokes.
"You should go home, little girl," one of the villagers finally suggested. "It's dangerous to go chasing fairy tales by yourself."
"I'm not a little girl," Erza declared coldly. "I'm a knight. I've been ordered to investigate — by the crown."
The looks she received were sceptical at best, but apparently that at least was the norm for the Garou Knights. It wasn't as if Kamika or Cosmos looked particularly knight-like, and Kama was more likely to be taken for a criminal. For just such an occasion, when her identity was in doubt, she had been furnished an identifying seal — an emblem the size of her palm, with the king's crest on one side and the Garou order's on the other.
It took a moment for the villagers to realize what it was, as Erza held it up, and some still looked disbelieving. But they murmured uncertainly among themselves, and someone finally pointed her in the right direction. Nodding sharply, Erza turned on her heel and marched away.
Inwardly, she almost sighed. The back of her neck prickled with the familiar feeling of being watched, and not by the curious, gossiping villagers.
It was supposed to be a simple mission. She could already imagine the Garou Knights mocking her when she came back a week late, after a fight with… Erza couldn't quite tell. She could feel the presence following her, away from the busier streets, toward the edge of town, but she couldn't hear anyone or see them out of the corner of her eye. Still, their magic was strong, certainly not just a civilian.
Erza was considering whether to turn and force a confrontation, as she reached the outskirts of town, almost to her destination. She stopped, the street that had become little more than a dirt path falling silent as the sounds of her footsteps faded away.
However, she wasn't the one to speak.
"Are you really a knight?"
The voice that called out disparagingly to her was male, but young. Erza turned slowly, studying the teenager that now stood behind her, hands tucked into his pockets — a few years older than her, with messy blond hair and a scar across one eye. His casual clothing was a bit dirty and worn, the way Gray had looked when they first met, like he had traveled a long way with nothing to change into, despite trying to at least maintain the basics of hygiene.
"Yes," Erza answered simply, with no particular intonation.
There was a beat as they both waited, Erza for him to explain himself, him for her to add some justification to the obviously implied question — how could a little girl be a knight?
However, Erza made no move to elaborate, leaving them standing in awkward silence.
Finally, the teenager clicked his tongue irritably and said, "So? You got a name, girl?"
"Yes," Erza said, and waited just long enough for his scowl to deepen. "Erza Senketsu, of the Garou Knights."
"Them, huh?" he muttered, his eyes narrowing consideringly. "I'm Laxus. Just Laxus for now. Remember that, so you know who beat you."
'Rude,' Erza thought absently, as a bolt of lightning flashed toward her with no warning. Presumptuous too — she didn't have time to draw her sword, true, but she didn't need it, not against that level of magic. Lashing out with her bare hand, she batted the bolt aside, leaving it plow into the ground and gouge out a deep, smoking furrow beside the path.
"So the Garou Knights do have some standards," Laxus commented. He didn't seem concerned by her easy counter — that hadn't been anywhere near his full power. Lightning sparked around the fist he clenched, ready to continue. "Good. There wouldn't be any point in defeating you if you're weak."
"There's a point in defeating me?" Erza wondered dully. Her lips twitched down in a frown. Being forced to fight... she didn't like it.
"To prove my strength," Laxus said. "I want to see what the best wizards in Fiore can do. And also," he smirked, "I can't have you stealing my prey. You're looking for the dragon, right? So I am. I'll be the one to find it — and defeat it!"
In a flash of light, he vanished and reappeared where Erza had been standing, but she had already dashed out of the way, leaving Laxus to strike at thin air. She hadn't gone far, only twisting around to his side, left open as he overextended on his punch. Her own fist clenched, Erza backhanded him in the ribs.
Only to find flesh suddenly turning to magic beneath the hand. His entire body transforming into electricity, Laxus flashed a few steps away. He winced as he rematerialized.
'She hit me through my Lightning Body?' he thought. 'Even if she looks like a kid, I guess she really is a knight.'
'I couldn't counter it completely. My hand is numb,' Erza considered, her fingers twitching as lingering electricity sparked between them. It was her right hand, too, but of course she could wield with either. 'That's an annoying ability...'
It was still only magic, in the end. It could be overwhelmed and cancelled out, now that she knew to watch out for it. In the first place, she only needed to trick the user anyway. As opponents went, he wasn't on Kama's level yet, or even Kamika and Cosmos's. It was hard to tell how powerful he was, but it was already clear he lacked serious combat experience. All that talk of beating her, but there was no killing intent at all.
"If you want to spar, I don't mind," Erza said, her left hand dropping to the hilt of Heaven's Wheel. "But that second thing... You think I'm going to defeat the dragon?"
Straightening while hiding his wince — she'd hit him like a hammer to the ribs — Laxus sneered. "What else are you going to do? Make friends with it?"
"If a dragon really exists, I'm going to retreat," Erza told him, with a small sigh of exasperation, the correct answer now obvious to her. Even just the ghosts beneath Mercurius were too strong for her to face alone, and they were only a shadow of a living dragon's power, a lingering impression of something much, much greater.
She could beat wyverns and perhaps even a wyrm, now that she had a blade for the task. But a dragon? Erza knew she wouldn't win. However, she didn't need to. Her duty as a knight and her mission wasn't to defeat whatever that girl might have seen, but to find out if it existed. If she found it, the path was clear.
Retreat and report back. Erza nodded to herself in satisfaction.
Laxus snorted, straightening. "That's it? So much for the knights. If you're just a coward, then there's no point in fighting you," he said, already turning away. "The old man went on and on about how dangerous the outside world is, and that's it...?"
"You're going to fight a dragon?" Erza asked, her eyebrows rising in what might have been mild curiosity or perhaps surprise.
"Unlike you, I have guts," Laxus shot back. "I'm going to make a name for myself. The quickest way to do that is a legendary feat. If I beat a dragon, I'll be called a Dragonslayer, like the stories. And if it's not a dragon," he shrugged, acknowledging that the rumor could be just a wild goose chase, "I'll still beat it. It'll be good practice."
Erza canted her head to the side slightly, studying Laxus with enough intent to make him pause. Then, finally, she delivered her verdict — a blunt, crushing one. "That's stupid," she judged.
"Wha—!" Laxus tried to burst out, only to end up choking on the words in indignation. "Y-you! How dare you!"
"There's no way you could beat a dragon," Erza pronounced loudly, over his protests. "It's a legendary beast, and you're just a kid. You'll die trying, if you even manage to find one."
Her flat, unmoved stare made Laxus hiss, rage and tension building as he sank into a low stance. Lightning began to dance around him again. "You know, I think I'm going to fight you after all," he said, baring his teeth in something that couldn't be called a grin. "You, the old man, those idiots at the school, everyone's always looking down on me. I'll show you what I can do!"
He threw his arms wide, sending a storm of bolts across their impromptu battlefield. His aim was to leave Erza no room to dodge and no way to deflect them all the way she had before. But this time, she was faster on the draw. Heaven's Wheel already bare in her left hand, Erza slashed across the sky — cutting not only the lightning but the air itself. The gap lingered, like a hole in the fabric of the world, and left the space between Erza and Laxus clear.
A small ripple of satisfaction passed through her battle calm. What a clean, strong effect — this sword was like nothing she'd wielded before.
Erza crossed it in one dash, her blade aloft for a swift strike. As a weapon that channeled magic to the highest extent possible, it wouldn't cut unless she wanted it to, so she only needed to make sure she didn't hit him hard enough to rupture something internal.
This time, Laxus didn't try to turn to lightning to absorb the blow, knowing she'd just use her magic to overcome his defense. Instead, he ducked, dropping to his knees, and the sword flashed over his head. His fist was already cocked, wreathed in crackling electricity. He drove it toward Erza's exposed side, as she had done for him.
Erza countered with her right hand. Normally, she would have caught his fist in her palm, but her movements were clumsy from the lingering numbness, and she could only deflect his strike slightly. Lightning surged up her arm, deadening it completely and leaving it to drop uselessly. It licked at her side too, but most of the magic slid off the armor Gray had made her, her torso and upper legs well protected.
She would have followed up with a kick, but the threat of being countered with more lightning made her wary. Her legs weren't armored, after all, and losing mobility would be worse than losing an arm.
"You won't get away!" Laxus yelled as she tried to dash back, out of range. Activating Lightning Body again, he chased after her, a bolt of lightning that aimed behind her, to strike at her unguarded back.
'Foolish,' the thought slipped through in the bottom of Erza's mind.
His movements were too easy to predict. As soon as she feigned the dash back, she cancelled her momentum and spun around, sword flashing toward the place she knew he would reappear.
In the brief moment as he begun to rematerialize but before he became completely solid, Laxus noticed the attack, his eyes widening. His body twisted aside as he forced himself to become lightning again — and succeeded, the yellow bolt darting around Erza's sword, only slightly disturbed by the magic trailing around the blade.
But Erza too avoided his attempt to strike her, and the two pivoted toward their next move.
Strike, dodge, miss, counter, dodge — the battle became a running game of tag without either being struck. Their figures flashed across the empty village outskirts, kicking up scattered clouds of dust and ruffling the weeds with their passing.
"Stay still!" Laxus yelled, his voice echoing between two positions.
Erza didn't bother to respond, but her eyes narrowed in equal frustration. Neither of them was able to gain the upper hand, and it was becoming a battle of endurance — or chance, waiting for the moment one of them slipped up.
It would be close. Laxus was stronger than she'd realized at first, and their magic power was potentially closely matched. There was no telling if perhaps his was even greater. It was a strange, new realization for Erza, that she could fall short in such a way.
But that aside, the longer that the battle stretched, the more it became a matter of chance. If, for example, she slipped again, as she had down in the cave...
'I'll lose,' Erza acknowledged. And then—
—And then what?
She'd noted from the start that Laxus had no killing intent. His magic was powerful, but he wouldn't do more than knock her out, if that. Her life wasn't in danger, and she could continue her investigation once he left.
So why was she fighting?
The reason was...
...She didn't want to lose.
Was it pride in her skills? Was it a desire to uphold the honor of the knights she represented?
Erza didn't think so. She had never really held something like pride, and she didn't see any point in defending it against someone she had only just meant, whose opinion didn't matter to her.
Then, what was the reason? Was it because...
If she lost, he'd go on his way. Maybe he'd find a dragon, maybe he'd fight his way through other monsters, but eventually he'd find himself faced with an opponent that he couldn't defeat. It wouldn't even take that long. Many monsters were resilient against magic, and some would only grow stronger from electricity.
If she lost here, Laxus would just charge ahead, not realizing what he was risking, seeing only his goal, not the danger. Erza could tell, he didn't really understand. He had never been face to face with death. He didn't feel that crushing weight, didn't know down to his bones what the cost of failure would be.
As a knight, she had a duty. Not just to her mission, but to their purpose, to protect the people and uphold justice. Rather than pride in her strength, if she let herself be defeated here, what she would lose was her pride in upholding that duty.
Even so, she could back down. She could afford to lose. Most likely likely, she would be the only one to know.
But this time, it was her choice. The familiar thought—
'I will win,' Erza decided.
Yes, she would win and stop him here.
Lightning flashed past her as she twisted out of the way, her sword relentlessly turning toward the place where Laxus would go next. But as every time before, he slipped back into Lightning Body, avoiding the blow.
That spell was troublesome. It gave him a range of movement that was too broad, letting him escape from any single swing, not only sideways but also up and down...
So she needed to close off every direction. A sword slash would always only be a line — as long as it was a single one, that is.
Imagine was forming in her mind. Erza knew what she needed to do. Pivoting to avoid the next flash of lightning, she planted her feet.
This time, she didn't follow up with another strike, instead swinging her arm wider to prepare her next move. The small breather was time enough for Laxus to rematerialize completely. He appeared in front of her, both arms raised up, fists locked toward and about to come down in a devastating hammer blow.
He really didn't have enough experience with combat, not thinking to be cautious when an opponent suddenly changed tempo. Even if he realized it might not be an opening, he was counting on his Lightning Body to let him escape again...
Frustration flashed across his face as he nearly ran into Erza's fast upward diagonal, before he vanished into lightning once more. But even as the bolt he'd become shot away, Erza swung a sharp horizontal and a mirroring downward diagonal. Her movements were almost too fast to follow, only the trail of light her blade left showing where she had cut.
'That's... A spell?' Laxus realized.
Too late. Two more lines completed the shape — a five point star that became a net, or a cage. He had dodged wrong, avoiding the first swings only to end up trapped in the center. As the star shone, the magic complete and closed, his Lightning Body destabilized and was torn away.
The five slashes crashed against his physical body, throwing him back and into the ground. Laxus groaned, struggling to at least lift his head, but his limbs wouldn't respond right, twitching from the shock of the spell.
Slowly lowering her blade, Erza studied his prone form. "Not bad," she judged. "Spells should have names... so I'll call it Pentagram Sword."
"So this is the power of a knight..." Laxus gritted out, forcing himself up on his elbows. True to Erza's intent, he wasn't bleeding or cut. Even his shirt was still in one piece. But the damage went deep. It felt like she'd cut the flow of magic in his magic, impossible though that should have been.
Erza still regarded him with a blank, unreadable look. Then, her posture shifted, something changing — a tilt of the chin, a loosening in her stance, some aspect of her entire demeanor. Her eyes were cold, and there was no emotion anywhere in her face. Laxus found himself pinned.
As she prowled toward him, he felt cold sweat break out across his back. Every muscle clenched, while his mind went blank. There was a crushing pressure holding him place. He didn't recognize it, not consciously, but some small, instinctive corner of his mind knew — this was what a human's killing intent felt like.
"You said you wanted to make a name for yourself," Erza said tonelessly as she approached. One foot, then the other, planted on either side of his torso, and she looked down at him with the same empty expression. "I was given my name, you know. Senketsu — it's a Yakuma word. It means 'fresh blood.' They called me that because, no matter who my opponent was, I would paint their blood across the arena."
She lifted her sword, the sharp, gleaming point aimed at downward.
Laxus choked, his throat closing, his lungs paralyzed. But at least, at least he wouldn't look away.
The blade came down—
A thin line of red opened across his cheek. The tip of Heaven's Wheel crunched against the earth next to his head. Erza had missed. No, she'd never intended to deal a killing blow.
Finally managing to draw a gasping breath, Laxus shuddered as his body slumped in relief. "Th... that was..."
"Facing death," Erza said succinctly. With a small flourish, she lifted and sheathed her sword, then looked at him with a quiet huff. "Do you get it now? That's what you're risking when you go chasing monsters. Is becoming famous worth the gamble?"
Her lips pursed, brow furrowing in annoyance, as he didn't respond.
"Well, is it?" she prompted, raising her voice.
"...You don't understand," Laxus muttered, turning his head away. "My family... My grandfather was a Saint of the Runic Order. My great-grandfather was one of Fairy Tail's founders, and they still tell stories about him. But even though they're that famous, even though that's my legacy, I can't even use their family name! All because—"
He gritted his teeth, stubbornly looking away.
Because of the tradition on Tenrou. All the other students were orphans, not even remembering their parents, or disowned, even driven out of their homes. None of them had a name to use, so even the adults had followed suit.
All of them, the headmaster had declared, were each other's family now — and, implied, they didn't need another.
Everyone else received something at Tenrou, training, a refuse, a new family, but for him it felt like something had been taken away. Maybe Laxus had never been explicitly forbidden from using his grandfather's name, but he had always known that everyone would frown and resent him if he did so. Even though Tenrou and magic had been his family's heritage for nearly a century, he could never claim it.
And at the same time, he could never be just one of the students. No one ever forgot that he was the headmaster's grandson, always glancing at him when they brought up yet another story of Makarov's or Yuri's exploits, always commenting how it was "as expected" whenever he achieved anything...
So a crazy idea had settled in his head, becoming louder and louder with every year — he needed to do something even greater than his grandfather. Something that would outweigh that legacy, make everyone forget whom he was related to.
"If I beat a dragon, I won't need their name anyway," Laxus muttered, his voice dropping and his eyes sliding shut in exhaustion. "That's what I thought..."
Dragonslayer — a title revered even in legends. Compared to that, Saint, adventurer... none of it would matter.
Erza sighed. "And that's more important than your life?" she said, finally stepping back and dropping to sit on the grass next to him. "The way you are, if you rush off to fight, you'll die."
The only answer was a frustrated silence.
"I don't know anything about your family," Erza said bluntly. "Even if you told me your family name, I wouldn't know. If you've only ever met people who recognized it, you've lived in a very small world."
Pushing himself up painstakingly, with a clear wince, Laxus sat up beside her, both of them staring into the distance, at the blurred shape of the houses on the outskirts. "...I don't really remember back before Gramps took me to Tenrou," he admitted reluctantly. "I only heard about the mainland from the adults."
Erza nodded. "But now that you're out in the world, things are different. It's hard to understand just how different at first. I didn't understand either, for a long time... That's why it's no good to rush ahead based on what you thought back when you were living in that small world. First, you should go further and see more, before you decide what is worth risking your life for."
"Or I'll die for real, huh?" Laxus muttered. He swallowed heavily, remembering the crushing pressure of her killing intent. He had to clench his fists to keep his hands from trembling.
He'd thought he was ready for any battle, but...
"Yes," Erza said simply.
Silence fell between them, until she finally pushed herself to her feet and headed back toward the path.
She'd won, and she'd said her piece. Now, all she could do was continue on her mission. Laxus remained sitting on the field beside the dirt road for a long time.
~.~.~
"I see," Erza said, giving away no hint of her feelings, or perhaps she didn't feel anything in particular at all about the story she had heard.
The girl sitting across from her was about the same age as Erza, but her simple dress and the way she hunched in on herself uncertainly made her seem younger. Sneaking a glance at Erza from behind her dark bangs, she quickly ducked her head again.
Her name was Daphne, and she was the witness Erza had come to Kuchinashi to see.
"Do you... believe me?" she asked.
"I don't know yet," Erza replied honestly. "It doesn't really matter. My mission is to investigate, that's all. If I find it, I'll report back. If I don't find it, I'll report that too."
"I really did see it! I'm not lying!" Daphne burst out.
"Okay," Erza confirmed. "Which direction did it go?"
"...Northeast, deeper into the mountains," Daphne said, eyeing Erza uncertainly, as if trying to figure her out. "I wanted to go look for it, but it's getting late in the year, and the passes higher up are dangerous now..."
Erza nodded slowly. Kuchinashi was already in the foothills, and the mountain range grew steeper and wilder to the north and east. There could very well be a mythical beast hiding there, beyond the reach of human civilization.
The snow never melted at some of the summits, and they were already well into autumn. Conditions would certainly be rough. She hated to admit it, but the wilderness survival portions of the knight training had been some of her weakest. Hunting, she could manage, but everything else... If the locals thought it was too dangerous to climb now, Erza would be a fool to try it. She'd have to consult the map to see if there were any more settlements in that directions, check if there were any other witnesses, or maybe local legends about large flying beasts...
"Could you tell where it headed more precisely? Which mountain?" Erza asked, shaking away her thoughts for now.
"Are you really going to go after it?" Daphne asked in return.
"Which mountain was it headed toward?" Erza repeated.
For a moment, the two of them stared at each other. Daphne cracked first. "Mount Zonia," she said. "It was headed toward the tallest mountain."
Erza stood. Pausing as she turned to go, she glanced back and said, "Not now," — the answer to Daphne's question, whether she would go after it. With the mountain passes beginning to get snowed in, it seemed like the rest of the mission would have to be put on hold.
'...Frustrating,' Erza thought. Maybe it really was pride, but she didn't like to lose, even when she could afford to.
~.~.~
Letting out a slow breath as the light of magic faded around her, Hisui climbed to her feet and curtsied. "Thank you for the lesson," she said, as she had every time she and Makarov finished for the day.
He'd told her it wasn't necessary, but she was a polite, well-taught girl. "It's fine, it's fine," Makarov still waved to her. "You're getting the hang of it now. Keep practicing, and I'll see you next week."
Hisui beamed, ducking her head in a shallow bow as Makarov let himself out of the small, private library they had been using for their lessons. He could have just ended the Thought Projection, but he had been raised old fashioned — to properly excuse himself, not vanish in and out like those flashy youngsters. There was no harm in acting with basic politeness.
Unfortunately, it also left him open for a few moments to be waylaid by other, less welcome individuals.
Makarov bit back a sigh as he closed the library door and glanced over his shoulder at the figure waiting there. Seeing the expression on Darton's face as the defense minister stood in the shadows, he knew this wouldn't be a conversation he'd enjoy. "To what do I owe the pleasure?" he asked dryly.
Darton's habitual frown twitched, reading some — perhaps present — mocking there, but his response was even, if gruff. "There's something I want to ask you," he said.
He sounded a bit like he was choking on something just forcing the words out, and Makarov felt a very inappropriate urge to needle him further. But he wasn't a child, and he was well aware of how little Darton liked or approved of him, so anything that could drive him to approach Makarov could only be important to the entire kingdom.
When Makarov nodded, his expression serious, Darton approached, reaching into the folds of his coat. "Do you know anything about this symbol?" he asked, showing Makarov a scrap of tattered cloth.
Stitched into it was a mark vaguely in the shape of a V with a horizontal slash through it. It was the symbol Kama and the Garou Knights had brought back from the phantom tower. Since then, Darton had been trying to pin down why it was so familiar. Copies had been drawn up and passed to his most discrete contacts, but no one had been able to turn up anything.
Asking Makarov was unideal, but as a former Saint and an adventurer before that, he had seen much of the dark side of magic. And despite Darton's many justified complaints against Fairy Tail, their core morals had never been in doubt.
Even before Makarov responded, Darton could tell from the look on his face that he did recognize it — and that it was a far graver matter than he had hoped.
"...I do," Makarov said slowly. "You know of it too, even if you haven't seen their emblem before. This is the crest of Avatar."
Darton drew a short, sharp breath, shock momentarily leaving him speechless. "Them? Are you sure?" he said finally.
"Yes, there's no doubt," Makarov said. "So they've reappeared again... You probably don't realize just how broad their reach is and how numerous their followers are. Every time we thought we'd finally hunted down the last of them, another group would be found, usually behind some horrible incident..."
The dark magic cult Avatar. Yes, it was coming back to Darton. "They were behind that incident with the woodworker girl," he recalled slowly. "I saw the emblem before too, in the oldest files about the unexplained destruction of villages and missing caravans. But what are they after?"
"They're after the same thing as back then with Laki. They were trying to have her create a new body for Lullaby, and that's what Avatar always aims for, ultimately," Makarov said, "the incarnation of Zeref's demons."
"That's—!" Darton choked, his expression horrified. "That's insanity!"
Makarov nodded slowly. "Yes, they're quite insane," he agreed. "But that's what they've been after, in some way, every time they've appeared, back when I was in Fairy Tail and when I was in the Runic Order. They don't have a single base of operations or even a proper leadership. They're split into cells, and every cell pursues their own method — most often requiring mass murder to amass the raw power necessary to attempt it."
His tone was heavy with old disgust, and his hands clenched together tightly behind his back. There was silence between the two men, as Darton let out a heavy sigh and reached up to rub at his brow.
This was worse than he'd imagined. It was still possible, of course, that everyone involved had died at the tower, but it was equally possible that some of the cultists had escaped and that whatever their experiments had created was still out there.
Their experiments to awaken one of Zeref's demons... The level of destruction on that island...
Was it possible... that they had succeeded?
"Where did you get this?" Makarov asked. "I've kept an ear out, and I haven't heard about any incident that might be connected to them, not in this part of the continent."
Darton hesitated for a moment, but there was no point in holding back from telling him now. If Makarov wanted to, he would find out through his own sources in the Runic Order. And Makarov had honestly answered Darton's questions, so doing the same was only fair return.
"There was a tower," he explained reluctantly. "Have you heard of the legends of the phantom tower in the south sea? A year ago, it was destroyed. The barriers finally fell recently..."
Makarov was silent, his expression pensive — and oddly regretful. "Is that so..." he murmured slowly. "Did you find anyone there...? No, of course not. If you had, you wouldn't need to ask me." He ran a hand over his eyes, suddenly exhausted.
"Do you know something about it?" Darton asked, his jaw flexing an effort to keep himself from sounding accusing.
"No, not the way you think," Makarov said. "One of my old team, Rob... He went looking for it. He had a theory, that it was tied to some of the slave traders. Something about their routes and dealing with someone who wasn't in their record books... This was all years ago, before I even founded the academy. He went on another round of investigation and just... disappeared. I regret not keeping in touch more, now."
"...There was no one alive there," Darton said. "But they could have left before our people got there."
Makarov shook his head, but he didn't say anything, either in thanks for the rare show of kindness or to point out the obvious unlikeliness of it. If Rob had been alive, he would have contacted someone long before.
"If that's all you wanted to ask, I'm going to take my leave," he said finally.
Forgoing manners, Makarov let his Thought Projection dissipate without waiting for a response.
~.~.~
Appendix: Organizations
Runic Order - The AU counterpart of the Magic Council and the Rune Knights. They are an international organization that monitors and controls the flow of magic across the continent Ishgar. However, their influence is weaker to the far north and east. The original order was monastic, being followers of the divine, but over time they became more secular and focused on hermetic studies and the accumulation of magical knowledge. Combining the two, they are a stabilizing force that deals with dangerous magic phenomena and wizards who cannot be controlled within the boundaries of normal law. Era, the Runic Order's headquarters, is an independent city-state. Due to their power, they are respected but also distrusted by national governments. In recent generations, Era has become the goal of every young wizard as a place where mysteries of magic await, leading to a drain on the wizard populations in other nations.
Katou Knights - One of the formerly four, now two, knight orders in Fiore. They are by far the most numerous and so ubiquitous that they are referred to as simply "the knights." Their duties include patrolling the main highways, conducting kingdom-wide operations, resolving complaints brought directly to the king, hunting monsters, maintaining a presence in each region as representatives of the crown, and others. The squads are each named after a flower and headed by a captain. The Cherry Blossom squad is charged with directly protecting the royal family and led by the overall commander of the knights, to whom captains report. Katou means Flower Light or Lamp. In canon, it's the moniker of Mercurius.
Garou Knights - The other remaining knight order. They are traditionally magic users and thus charged with handling magic-related issues. Because of their small numbers, each member automatically gains a rank equivalent to a captain in the Katou Knights. In the past, the members have been recruited from the ranks of wandering wizards and even criminals. Combined with their often secretive missions and the rough temperaments of the members, they have a shady reputation as a whole. Garou means Hungry Wolf.
Fairy Tail - A band of self-styled adventurers, technically freelance mercenaries who accepted odd jobs, which operated in Fiore and the surrounding areas. Founded in X686. It disbanded in X736, by agreement of all core members to pursue other paths. However, they are still well-remembered in Fiore, mostly as a rowdy bunch who did whatever they pleased but carried a spirit of adventure with them. The band's base of operations was on Tenrou Island, the home of the first leader.
Tenrou academy of magic - A school for magically-inclined children, founded by Makarov on Tenrou in X772. The goal was to create a place that children newly awakened to their magic could go to learn and, more broadly, a home for those who had been cast out by their families. Since most of the students are orphans or disowned, at best, it is an unspoken tradition to discard family names. The first "class" graduated in X777, though it consisted of only a handful of students. The island is protected by a natural barrier that makes it difficult to find, but there is nothing to prevent residents from leaving.
Avatar - A dark magic cult. Their aim is to summon and incarnate the demons from the Books of Zeref. To this end, they use various methods, most involving experimentation on humans and mass human sacrifice. Their origins are unknown, as is their exact number of followers and area of influence.
~.~.~