I'm back with Chapter 1 of Flames of the Familiar!
Please let me know how I'm doing with my writing. I'm looking for ways to improve.
!!!!ALSO!!!!
Instead of only TWO ARCS, there will be FIVE ARCS! I just figured there would be too many loose ends, and it'd be easier for me to wrap things up in different situations in the fic. Hope this won't bother anyone!
IMPORTANT: If the lines are stuck together, I'll try to fix them as soon as possible. It's hard trying to upload chapters when everything is glitching out on you.
Previously on Flames of the Familiar,
The powerful winds stopped, and silence had returned. The man stared at Lucy, who gaped back.
He suddenly bowed.
"I have come to answer your call."
"He's no spirit, he's a demon."
Flames of the Familiar
Chapter 1
Dazed and Confused
Lucy froze on the ground as the strange being bowed to her. Fear was in the air and some students tried to leave in fright.
Realising that he wouldn't move unless she did something, she decided to try to talk to him.
"W-Who- What are you?" The blonde finally managed to squeak out.
His eyes remained trained on her as he answered, "Etherious Natsu Dragneel. You may call me END or Natsu." he slowly rose from his bow, "I am here to answer your call, as I have just said."
Lucy's mouth opened and closed like a gaping fish, unable to form any coherent words.
Mirajane watched the strange exchange with her eyes popping out. 'What magical power!'
Lucy started trying to say what she wanted to say through her hands, but that had only make Natsu cock his head sideways in confusion.
"Al-alright then!" The principal cleared her throat uneasily. "Keep your familiars out for the rest of the day, it'll train your magical power up."
Every student went to their classes scheduled at this time. Class was already uncomfortable with the Heartfilia name weighing on her back, but now she was attracting even more attention now that she had this strange spirit.. even the weakest mages could sense his magical power, but it seems like he was concealing it for now.
As they made their way to the classroom, Lucy noticed something. Her magical power wasn't draining? "What kind of spirit are you? And aren't you going to give me a key?" She questioned curiously.
END looked at her with a puzzled expression. "Spirit? I'm a familiar... a servant?" His walking slowed. "Aren't you my creator? Don't you know what I'm meant to be doing?"
Lucy appeared to be thinking for a moment, but then shook her head. "No, I just called you out of the spiritual realm." She muttered the second part under her breath, "this must be some mistake."
The demon slowly blinked, trying to understand the situation at hand. "If you don't want me here, you can't exactly just make me go away with a flick of your hand. I'm bound to you by magic, and it's as possible for me to go back to this 'celestial realm' as you; I can't."
The girl sighed, "We've got not choice then; looks like we'll just get to know each other then," her expression shifted from a dreary one to a delighted one. "Nice to meet you! I'm Lucy."
"Greetings, Mistress," the demon replied after a few moments, "I am END."
Lucy looked a little surprised by the formality. "What's with your way with words?" She giggled. "About your name.. I'll just call you Natsu. Sounds like a normal name."
Natsu eyed her curiously before entering the classroom after her. She looked like a fun person.
This was definitely new.
"He doesn't seem to be causing any trouble... however, if he causes any problems I might be forced to take action.."
"We'll watch from afar for now. Keep watching him from here, Virgo."
"Yes, brother."
Boring.
Boring.
Boring.
Apparently this was a normal thing for people Mistress's age to be going through every day, but it was hard to bear with when there was nothing interesting going on.
And he was really hungry too.
Natsu sniffed the air in search of food.
Plue smelled like... plastic. Ew.
The book in front of Lucy smelled fresh and new, barely any stenches of ink on it yet. The exercise book seemed new and edible.
Anything that wasn't poisonous was as good as normal food to him.
Although it was slightly selfish, Natsu wanted to eat it. If he couldn't eat, then he couldn't server or protect his Mistress. Simple logic.
Natsu snatched the notebook from under her elbows, and stuffed it in his mouth greedily.
Lucy jumped up and screeched from sheer shock and stared at Natsu, infuriated.
The demon gagged at the sogginess and hardness of the book. What the heck was this?! Dirt?! He spat it back out.
"Sorry Mistress," Natsu choked out, "but I have no magic power right now. If I could recharge, I could prote-"
"Natsu!" Lucy exclaimed, "That was my only mathbook! Why would you do that? Now I'm going to ask father to buy me another one!"
Natsu rose an eyebrow. "Math sucks. I did you a favour."
And that's how they landed after-school detention with Miss Olietta.
"Brother.. does this count as.. trouble?"
"...what the... how does he even know what math is?!"
"And now we're in after-school detention! Can you believe it?!" Lucy waved her arms around frantically as she ranted.
"Mhmm," Yukino half-heartedly replied as she fed Pisces more berries.
On the blonde's lap was Plue, who had a lollipop stuck in his mouth. Next to her, Natsu was greedily filling his stomach as her lunchbox emptied.
When a bit of rice somehow landed on Lucy's hair, Natsu reached out to grab at it and licked his fingers. Lucy screeched, startled.
"You eat like a friggn' pig!" She squealed, embarrassed. Yukino and Pisces watched the situation with smothered laughs. "Why are you eating so much anyway?!"
Natsu stopped chomping for a second and started talking with his mouth full. "Bell, oi beed du wejawje- (Well, I need to recharge-)" He began and not even a second later, Lucy's hand was clamped on his mouth. Mischievously, he licked it.
"EEEEK! Don't do that!" As fast as she had thrust it out, she retracted it as if he had burnt her. "Swallow before talking! For a 'servant', you sure are cheeky..!"
"Sho you shee me azh auh sherbent?"
Lucy glared at him and sighed, "of course not. But for all your talk, you seem really strange." Natsu hummed, dismissing her statement.
After obeying, he continued. "Sorry Mistress," he grinned widely, she was sure his cheeks hurt. "Well, I need to recharge my energy by eating flames, but since there are none, I substitute it with normal food." Natsu explained at pointed to this now-empty lunch box.
"Eh?! You eat fire?!" Lucy leaned in, intrigued. "Is this a joke?"
"Nope," Natsu shook his head. "I'm a fire demon, so I use fire as my magic."
"So why can't you eat your own fire?"
Natsu looked genuinely shocked at this question. "What?!" He spluttered out. "That's the same as eating your spirits!"
At that, Lucy looked at the spirit in her lap, who looked up questioningly as he gave up trying to pull out the lollipop. Wrinkling her nose, her lips formed an 'o' and nodded in understanding.
After minutes of chatter, the bell for the next class rang. All the 18 year olds had the same topic next: spirit training.
The year group came from all different directions and made their way to the large field, all equally excited to train with their spirits.
The teachers organised them into alphabetical order, but once again made Lucy stand in the back with Natsu following her.
"Now, we're going to test your spirit's level," Mirajane set down a strange machine onto the grass, "with this magic tester!"
Several ooh's and ahhh's sounded from the audience.
The machine was simple: a lacrima was underneath a sturdy, flat cylinder which stayed horizontal.
"To find the value of your spirit's power," the principal transformed into one of her weaker demon forms, "you strike the magic tester here!" She slammed her fist into the machine.
A 6000 flashed in the air above, collecting more gasps from the crowd of young adults.
"Strauss-sensei is really powerful!"
"Amazing!"
"Wow!"
The principal smirked proudly, and reverted back into her normal form. "Now, take turns and strike the machine when I instruct you to! Try your best everyone!"
Everyone cheered, now motivated.
Some people had hit 1000, and some had gone as low as a 12. The highest score was by Yukino, who had scored 5621 with Pisces; the fish had attacked from directly above, spinning together as it built up momentum and magical power before ramming into the machine.
The number flashed brightly in the air and Yukino cheered, exhausted by the amount of magic power it had costed her. Mirajane handed her a potion with a smile before writing down something in her notebook.
As everyone had their turns, the noise got louder and louder as the cluster of students gathered together and discussed their scores. Some wailed and some bragged.
Lucy prayed that they would be loud enough to drown out the sound of her name being called out for her turn.
After what seemed like an eternity, she was called up.
"Since you have 3 spirits, you'll take a potion after each one's turn. That way, you won't get ill from magic deprivation!" Mirajane spoke enthusiastically, obviously excited to see the blonde's results.
The noise suddenly ceased to exist, and all eyes were on her.
Lucy fidgeted anxiously, and set down Plue from her arms.
"P-Plue! Umm... attack it..?" her order came out weak.
"Puun puuuun!" the spirit responded happily. He skipped forward and slapped the lacrima with all his might.
"1 !"
Laughter echoed in the crowd, and Lucy picked up and smiled at Plue, who immediately got upset after realising how weak he was. "Don't worry, you tried your best!"
The spirit shook in her arms but managed a strange smile.
Mirajane noted down another thing before handing Lucy a potion.
Next was..
"Open! Gate of the Water Bearer, Aquarius!" Lucy stuck the key in the fountain and twisted it, as if unlocking a door.A golden flash, and the mermaid appeared, hovered threateningly.
"What's this?" She growled. "You may be Anna's descendant but that doesn't mean you can summon me whenever you need to."
"I-uh..." Lucy started, but was too embarrassed to say anything. Natsu watched with an irritated expression. This mermaid was unnecessarily rude to his Mistress, but decided against speaking out.
"I told you not to summon me for anything stupid," Aquarius ranted on. "and what do you do? Summon me for a stupid magic tester! I'm very confident in my ability, and I don't need some machine to tell me that."
She began to fade in a golden light. "And get a boyfriend before ordering me around."
"Boyfriend."
"Boyfriend."
"Boyfriend."
..Aquarius, you overreacted. Look at how upset she is."
"You better make it up to her if she summons you a second time."
"The brat summoned me at a bad time, Scorpio was sighted with another woman again."
"Well, you don't need to take it out on the girl."
"Brother is right."
"I know that! Just shut up!"
Like last time, the word seemed to echo in her mind. It drove her crazy.
Everyone broke out into snickers, whispers and giggles, and Lucy kept her head down. Natsu frowned. This was strangely cruel.. nobody was like this from where he came from.
He stepped forward, shaking his head at Mirajane who offered Lucy another restoration potion.
"I can handle this."
Natsu moved in front of Lucy and gently pushed her back. Understanding it as a sign saying 'move back more,' she complied and moved a few metres back.
He was all fired up now; even without a full belly, he was going to protect the Mistress who had freed him from his deep sleep. He barely knew her, but the trust they had in each other made him feel like they had known each other since the beginning of time.
Is this what it meant to be a spirit?
No matter, because nothing could stop him now.
Natsu was determined to protect his Mistress's dignity.
Woo! Just barely hit the 2000 word mark :)
Special thanks to my friend, Z for proof reading this!
The plot is still tangled out, it was easy making this chapter because I already have the idea of the first few chapters. The other chapters aren't going to come out as fast as this. This fanfic will update every 2-3 days, but its latest will be a week.
Looking forward to the journey of the progress of this fanfic with you readers! Leave a review, seeing everyone's had brightened up my day!