I am Natsu Dragneel. I am a reincarnation of the flame god, Igneel, a form taken on so that I may exist on Earth properly, and protect humans.

My partner and lover, Lucy Heartfilia, is a reincarnation of the goddess of the universe, Anna.

We are different beings, but at the same time, we're the same as the gods we came from. And to maintain human bodies, we cannot access our true godly forms, and any attempt to do so will lead to certain death.

But because we stand above mortals, we are constantly reincarnated in our human bodies over time, our previous lives being wiped from memory each time, so we won't interfere with the flow of life, and fate.

Forever cursed to rise from our ashes like a phoenix every 100 years, to seal up the king of shadows, Acnologia.

Forever cursed to watch the love of my life die in my arms, and unable to prevent it.

But this time I have retained my memories from the past. 2,000 years of knowledge has been ingrained into my very being. 2,000 years of love, joy, and pain, which continues to haunt my nightmares, even still.

This time I am have the upper hand on fate, and I won't let it take my Lucy from me once more. I won't give the shadows a chance to rise, for this time, I'll destroy them, and scorch them with the years of pain this body has withheld.

I shall deny this fate, even at the cost of my life.

"W-Wait... I need a second... To process..." Lucy panted out finally. Really, Natsu had awful timing, to explain a bunch of important things while simultaneously kissing the daylights out of her. Not that kissing wasn't nice, she would just prefer not multi-tasking quite to this extent.

After a minute of staring down at the mildly annoyed guy she was sitting on (She's not sure when that happened but ok) as she thought about all he had said just said. Sure she remembered definitely spending a lot of time with him, but that was about it... Her being the incarnation if a god? That was just crazy!

But then again, there were plenty of crazy things that had happened in the past few days... Honestly her head hurt so much she was about ready to just kiss him again, and forget it all... But questions still arose in her mind, threatening to eat her alive if she didn't sort everything out now.

"So... You came here to... Save me...?" Lucy asked finally, as she began wrapping her head around it "And we've been lovers close to two thousand times before... So... Have we...?" god this was such an awkward situation.

Natsu raised a brow, lifting himself on his elbows "Well, we have definitely made out numerous times before, gone on plenty of dates, we were also royalty a couple of times, and married loads, and did everything a couple could possibly do. So if you're asking about what I think you are... Then yes. Lots. We're old as fuck Luce, whattya expect?" he stated bluntly, smirked as Lucy's face turned cherry red.

Well he wasn't one to pull punches she supposed.

Sighing, Lucy rolled off him to lay in the bed "So I have magic powers huh..." She murmured more to herself.

Natsu glanced at her from the corner of his eye, before smiling and averting his gaze back to the ceiling "Just get some sleep." He said, sitting up and pushing himself off the bed they had been laying on. "We arrive in Alverez tomorrow, and that's when things start getting serious... You'll need the energy" and with that he quietly exited the room, leaving Lucy there alone to process the situation. She didn't think she would even be able to sleep, but her body ended up being so exhausted, she found herself succumbing to sleep sooner than she thought.

"WOW THIS PLACE IS HUGE!"

That was the first thing Lucy said as they (finally) got off at the Alverez port. Natsu had grew up here, so it was nothing new, but he supposed to Lucy, who had been previously living in Magnolia, it was quite a big deal.

Natsu shook his head, smiling as Lucy ran along the dock, but they both stopped dead at the figure waiting for them.

"Z-Zeref..." Natsu managed, trying for a smile, but faltered as his brother's glare hardened, making Natsu shrink back, and swallow the lump that was now forming in his throat "H-How are yo-"

"Don't start with this 'how are you' shit, Natsu!" The older male snapped, and Natsu flinched "You disappear on your birthday, without even so much as a note, are gone without a trace for a whole month, not even so much as a phone call! Do you realize how scared I was?! Natsu Dragneel I will personally roast you over an open flame in tribute to the stars!"

Lucy and Natsu went silent at the outburst, as the aura Zeref was giving off made it feel like your soul would be sucked out of your body at any given moment. He briefly glanced at Lucy, and his gaze sharpened, but he said nothing as he grabbed Natsu, dragging him away.

Lucy was at a loss of what to do after Natsu was pulled away. She had no clue about anything about this country, and something about the way Zeref had looked at her gave her chills.

Deciding her best bet was to follow after them, that was exactly what she did. Lucy figured she would just sit in the living room of what she assumed was their house, as the two males left to go argue, which could be heard throughout the entire building.

It wasn't until Lucy could see the sun start to set that the two returned, Natsu's clothing looking a tad more rumpled than before. Zeref paused in front of her, looking like he wanted to say something, but instead just left with a flourish of his robes.

"Ok, first things first you need to learn more about your power." Natsu explained as if nothing had happened before "There's a girl who can probably help you, and I'll send her over, but I have to... Take care of some things..."

The look on Natsu's face looked almost confused, but she just nodded in response "Yeah, alright... Will you be ok?" Lucy asked softly, not sure if she should trust his expression right now.

Natsu remained silent for a moment, before he just smiled and shrugged "Who knows?" was all he said before leaving Lucy alone in the house. The house was a simple one, with not much else other than the basics, and Lucy decided she might as well explore the building.

Most of the rooms shared the same aesthetic as the living room, mostly black and white, and very tidy. But there was one room that was a huge deviant from that, which she could only assume was Natsu's room.

The walls were a deep red, with splashes of other paints on it, and there were about 20 canvases, some painted on and some empty leaning on walls and scattered on the floor.

Lucy kneeled by some of the paintings, looking at each one carefully. One was a burning city, another was of a huge black and blue dragon, towering over two much smaller figures. As she scanned the paintings she realised, they weren't just paintings, these were scenes. Natsu had subconsciously known everything from the start, which was made obvious as a majority of the paintings were of her, each one looking like she was from a different era (and she probably was).

Most would've probably found it creepy, but she found it more sad than anything. Sad that he had endured this for so long, alone... And she felt the back of her mind burn with familiarity, as if these paintings were resonating with dormant memories inside her.

Standing, Lucy was suddenly filled with a new kind of resolve.

She had always thought she was doing the right thing by risking her life for Natsu... But the pain of the survivor is worse than the pain of those passed... This entire time she had been taking the easy way out while putting thousands of years of suffering on Natsu, unknowingly.

Lucy wouldn't make the same mistake. She had to change her own fate as well.