Hello ladies and gentlemen, and I welcome you to another chapter of the Black Dragon Slayer, a rewrite of the original fanfiction crossover Black Dragon Slayer, Kurosaki Ichigo.

Now, there are two things I want to talk about before I let you read the story, unless you decide to ignore me, but that's fine... It won't hurt my feelings D:

First thing is the Ichigo - Acnologia relationship. The relationship is going to start moving from this point on. Also, I'm going to say this now: Acnologia in this story is the name of two different individual, father and daughter. Black Dragon Magic is the father's original magic and Black Dragon Slayer is the daughter's original magic, since she is the one who taught Ichigo the said magic.

Second thing is the timeline. In Fairy Tail original Fairy Tail universe, x782 is when Lisanna goes missing becuase of being sucked up by the Anima. I'm moving that time by 5 years into the past. Which means Lisanna being sucked up happened in x777 and the dragon slayer children being abandoned happened in x772.

So here's a timeline for this story.

x778 - Ichigo arrives in Earthland and has a bout with Acnologia. He wins. Drags her along in his journey. They find Fairy Tail and Ichigo joins. Acnologia is still not a member. Not too long after, Ichigo, Acnologia, and Laxus leave on training trip.

x779 - Laxus returns from training trip early.

x780 - The First Grand Magic Tournament begins. This chapter.

Grand Magic Tournament I

Chapter 6

-Let the Tournament Begin!-

The imperial city of Crucus was, compared to other cities like Magnolia, huge. Boasting a population of 15 million denizens along with forty thousand standing army ready to defend the city, it was the largest populated cities in Fiore. Most of the structures present had either blue and/or red. People were always busy, and outskirts of the city itself was busy with many trade transactions and toll check-ups.

And that was where the guild of Fairy Tail was currently at.

"Woah..." Levy, the walking encyclopedia of Fairy Tail, awed at the city that she was now watching from its gates with her guild. "It's the capital!" she squealed.

Laxus, on the other hand, just grunted. He and the guards were glaring at each other. This was causing some of the guild members behind Laxus and the guards behind the captain to tense up.

"So you came back as you promised, lightning dragon," the captain of the west gate guard growled as he snatched the list of the invited guild members from his subordinate. "You made a huge mess awhile ago."

Laxus growled right back. "Well, what do you expect? I am a Fairy," he said sarcastically.

The captain rolled up his sleeve. "You think you can do what you did a year ago again, punk? This time we trained too, thanks to you. I know I can take you on. I'm just waiting for an excuse to beat your tiny turd making bitch ass."

Laxus headbutted the captain and the two of them glared at each other in that position. "Bring it, capt...!"

Just then a figure appeared between the two of them and gave both of them a headchop. They fell to the ground with a large dent in their heads/helmet.

"Geez. The moment I come back, I see you going at it with the captain again. I told you to stop aggravating him."

Some of the newer members of the guild were confused by the appearance of the stranger while those who were veteran members of Fairy Tail recognized the figure immediately.

"Acnologia!" Levy shouted as she ran up to her. The black dragon, however, just held her arm out and caught Levy before the said girl could hug her.

"Hi to you to, Levy," she said with a small smile. The said smile, however, quickly turned into a twisted snarl as she turned back to Laxus and the captain, who were getting up. She gave them another dual chop to their heads. "Stay down! I'm not done with you two! I told you two to not cause trouble or I'd gut you! But nooo, you just go and cause problem!" She then stomped on Laxus's back when the man tried to get back up. The officer, on the other hand, despite being manhandled by a civilian, stayed down because it was the smart thing to do. Laxus grumbled. Acnologia's temple vein swelled. She stomped on his back. Hard. "I!" she stomped. "Am! Not! A! Fucking! Brute! Woman!"

"Oh, welcome back from the trip, Acnologia," Makarov, who had been watching the event, came to the captain of the gate guard and his grandson's rescue, especially his . "How were you these two years?"

Acnologia gave the old man a grin. "What's up, old man?" she asked him casually.

Makarov sweatdropped. "I was just wondering how you and Ichigo were doing."

"Terrible. The bastard went and got a power boost. Again."

"So those various training had their fruits, huh?"

Acnologia blinked. "You could say that," she said as she remembered some of the things that happened on their journey. She hadn't thought Makarov would have a clue about the training that Ichigo had ... unless Ichigo himself had told him about it.

Laxus grumbled. 'You could say that?'

No, it was a definite that Ichigo had grown. When Laxus first began his travel with Ichigo, he knew that Ichigo was on par with the highest tiers of the Ten Wizard Saints. Half a year and a lot of demon fortresses, Ichigo was beyond them in terms of strength. Around where he left Ichigo's group to come back to Fairy Tail, Ichigo could be considered a Magic God.

He didn't even want to think how strong -how far and unreachable- Ichgio now was.

Perhaps it was a combination of the insane three-manpower fortress raids, ridiculous and inhumane training regimes.

It involved a lot of activities. one -handed Rock climbing, demon hunting, lifting boulders, breaking boulders with physical strength, sparring, sparring, demon fortress raiding, more demon hunting, meditation, runnng (for twenty fucking hours...), sparring, and ect.

Truth be told, Laxus felt like he had entered a personal hell. It was painful. Everyday, his body was screaming at him when he stopped training for the day. He bled everyday. Especially when he followed the two dragonslayers to the demon fortresses that he didn't know existed all over the continent. Ichigo's travels to find the best demon essence for his beer took the group as far as Pergrande Kingdom in the East, Caelum to the West, and some travels led them to the Lost Continent in the South. Even beyond that in some cases, but there ... even Ichigo admitted that some of the monsters in the deep South required that he release his final phase.

And during those travels, Laus even ran into Gildarts along with Ichigo and Acnologia.

When Gildarts acted perverted though ...

Sufficed to say, he no longer wants to be around Acnologia, lest he forsake his life.

And Laxus knew.

He knew he himself had grown stronger. He knew he was now quickly catching up to Gildarts. He wasn't there yet -he wasn't even near the leve of the Ten Wizard Saints- but he was stronger than ever before. Stronger than he could have become on his own in 2 years' time.

Ichigo knew that he was reaching the level he wanted to be as well.

Acnologia was just happy Ichigo got her new demon essence spirits. They really did bring her spirit up.

"Yeah, you could say that," she repeated as she walked away. "I'm going to go find Ichigo. He said something about going to the brewery to barter some money for some of the essences he collected over the years."

"Essences?" Natsu, the ever-so-curious boy, asked. "What are those?"

Levy decided to explain as she turned around from the head of the group. "Essences are like lacrima's except it requires a special magic to extract them. Essences are solids, gases, or liquids that contain the nature of the source that they were extracted from!" she said as she pulled out a small bottle from her pocket. The bottle was like a test tube, except the top of the tube itself was seared shut. Within it was a glowing pink gas that occasionally shifted positions. "This is a essence that Ichigo gave me for my birthday two years ago."

That got the guild to remember. Ichigo had just returned from his third mission when Levy's birthday party was happening in the guild. Everyone in the guild was expected to give her some kind of a gift, small or large. Ichigo didn't have much at the time in terms of money, and he wasn't sure what to buy her. So he pulled out a small backpack he had on him, and dumped the contents within on one of the empty tables, and allowed her to choose.

Sufficed to say, everyone was surprised by what they saw.

Dragon scales. Rare essences. Expensive lacrimas. A hard loaf of black bread. Some artifacts not many understood the values of. Weapons. Magic tomes...

Levy had asked what each were, and Ichigo gave curt explanation for each item present.

And she had chosen the essence that she now held in front of everyone.

A essence of True Fairy. Specifically, the essence of a True Fairy girl.

She pocketed the essence. "Essences can be used for many things, and one thing that Acnologia just mentioned requires special essences for special alcohols. And because of this, essence specialty stores are said to exist in every city, even if said stores are usually trading for low and middle grade essences."

"Ooh..." was the general reply from not only her guild but everyone around. People gave her claps, and she blushed under the attention.

"A-Ah, thank you..."

"What?! This is a A-grade regeneration essence! There is no way that it's only worth fourteen hundred Jewels! I've sold lower grade for more!" Ichigo growled at the owner of the brewery.

"We just don't have a use for it, boy. Be grateful that we're even offering that much," the bulky man with a brown beret on his bald head. He had leather work apron that was dirtied with many alcohol smudges, and he smelled of alcohol, though not from drinking but working around them.

"Then I ain't selling any of my essences!"

That got the brewery manager's attention. "What?! You aren't going to sell the others? I just offered some of the best price you can get on them! Y-You can't do that, we also need some of those essences!" he shouted, a hint of sudden panic in his voice. Then he visibly calmed himself down.

Ichigo grumbled. "Then twenty hundred Jewels for each A-grad Nature Regen Essence."

"That's too high," the manager almost barked back. "I can give fifteen, but anything over that is a deficit trade on my part."

"Well, take it or I'm taking everything to the specialty stores. I wanted to cut the middle man, so I came directly to here, but it seems I was wasting my time. Even they offer more such high grade essences. And the prices you offered for the acid essences and natural growth essences are the prices I could get at the specialty stores."

"...Sixteen."

"Eigtheen."

"No, I ain't trading then. Fuck you, boy!" the manager growled. "Get out my office!" he shouted as he shot out of his chair.

Ichigo scoffed at the man. He gave him the middle finger before stomping out of the office and the man's brewery.

"So, I'm guessing the barter didn't go well?"

Ichigo glanced to his right, where Acnologia was leaning on the wall of the brewery.

He straightened his back.

"So which one are you going to try now?" she asked as he pushed herself off of the wall and wrapped herself around his arm. He groaned at her behavior, but didn't comment verbally.

"I'm going to try the Royal Essence Trader, specialty stores, or some others before I label them for experiment uses," he said as he walked off with her.

Acnologia giggled. "You're too impatient. Why don't just drink them like how I do? You know it makes you stronger."

Ichigo shrugged. "Sure, it'll make my magic stronger, but I just don't like drinking them. Remember what happened when you attempted to drink the Light Essence I got from one of the sacred lakes?"

Acnologia groaned. That had been a nightmare for her. For hours, she was rolling and tossing on the ground, screaming and shouting about the sudden stomach ache she got.

"That happened only once," she pouted.

Ichigo chuckled. "Yeah, and you know that my nature is closer to yours because I trained your magic first. Because of that, I can't drink most of the essences I have with me. And you know that I do drink the demon essences in the form of alcohol. The pure stuff tastes like molten plastic."

"Plastic? What's that?"

"Umm... oil that's been chemically altered to be very solid at room temperature," he explained, scrapping out some of his high school science from the corner of his brain.

"Eh, that doesn't sound bad."

"It doesn't sound bad until you actually try it."

"You did?"

"No, my friend did on a dare from my sister."

"Oh, which one..."

While their conversation went on and on, observers of the Magic Council, Rune Knights, and the Imperial Army listened in and recorded every word they heard.

Org narrowed his eyes as he read the reports that his spies in the city were giving him. He had most of them following Ichigo and Acnologia, the Black Dragonslayer duo, for the sake of discovering more about them. Unlike most of his colleagues in the Magic Council, Org knew that this Kurosaki Ichigo was merely the "Scowling Prince" and the new "Rising Ace" of Fairy Tail. He began suspecting two years ago when he and the others heard about how easily Ichigo took down three top mages of Fairy Tail: Natsu Dragoneel, Gray Fullbuster, and Laxus Dreyar. While the first two held potential, they lacked experience and power. Sure, they had grown in these two years and were now a major pain i nthe Magic Council ass with the amount of destruction they caused, but they were still below in terms of power against ones like Erza Scarlet and Laxus Dreyar.

Speaking -or thinking- of Laxus Dreyar, Org also noted that the boy had returned from a training trip along with the Black Dragonslayer duo. That spoke volumes about how much he would have grown. "Very troubling..." he muttered as he gritted his teeth, a nasty habit he picked up recently.

Back to the Black Dragonslayer duo.

Before they left, Org would have classified the man as a SS-rank mage while addressing the woman as a S-rank. This was a theory, of course, since none of his colleagues took him seriously about them when he told them that he must be holding a large quantity of power. They laughed at him and teased him...

But he had been right.

This new report about the man of the duo visiting one of Carcus's famous brewery proved him. It told him that the man was carrying large amount of A-rank demon essences as well as other high rank -A's and B's- essences.

Unlike the mage ranking commonly used throughout Earthland (which was the S- to E- rank system), the essence ranking system had only A- to E- rank. A-rank essences were extracted from the very best or the most horrifying of sources; S-rank demons, fairy kings and queens, elementals(whose existences were kept secret by both essence hunting guilds and the Magic Council), strongest of humans and giants, and purest forms of elements were sources of A-rank.

And that ... beast of a man carried a bag load of them. That was just insane, even for S-ranks and lower ranks of the Ten Wizard Saints.

'Maybe the Titan of Fairy Tail could do it,' Org thought before shaking his head as he read more of the report.

...Drinking essences? Making demon essence spirits? A/N: spirits as in alcohol

"What the hell...?" he muttered n exasperation. "I just don't know where Makarov finds these kind of mages in Fiore. Even our Rune Knights would have hard time," he grumbled, though this was his form of respect to Makarov.

After all, how many guild masters could stand in front of the magic community and boast about the number of S-rank mages he had in his guild?

Well, one guild master but ...

Org slapped his face as he just realize how the first tournament was going to boil down to.

That guild and Fairy Tail...

"Great... another event involving Fairy Tail that's going to cause a lot of collateral damage," he grumbled as he filed the report he had been reading and picked up the new one. "...He can't absorb Light Essences?"

Now that shard of info had allusion. Most humans are able to absorb Light Essences. Only few recorded creatures couldn't, and all of them were-

Org flinched.

Demons. Creatures created by the Dark Energy. The foulest aspect of Eternano based magic. The foul magic that has connections to Zeref because of the monsters he created

Then he paled at the further implication of such information.

"They aren't just called the 'Black Dragonslayer' duo..." He and the others in the Magic Council believed that to be some name they came up by themselves to make themselves look stronger like many other groups or guilds do.

No, though they didn't realize the truth behind it, the media called them the Black Dragonslayer duo for the name of the magics they used; they were dragonslayers of Acnologia, the Black Dragon of Apocalypse.

Org slouched in his chair as the report in his hand dropped in sudden shock of realization.

That demon had dragonslayers of its own?!

Acnologia's ear itched, and she frowned. "Someone's talking about me..." she whispered to herself quietly.

"And I say that's a good deal, young man," a bourgeoisie essence trader of the capital's Lavigold Essence Guild said as he pulled out a piece of paper from suitcase he carried. He quickly wrote down several numbers here and there before he slid it across to Ichigo, who took the piece and the pen the man offered. The man looked over the paper before signing it.

"Was the paperwork necessary?" Ichigo asked.

The merchant, a man taller than Ichigo and on the well rounded side -not fat or chubby- nodded. He wore a standard business suit, though it was green, and a matching green silk pair of silk pants. "It helps to keep track of where the money was spent. I don't like it too, but since essence trading is heavily scrutinized in this kingdom, it's better to be safe than sorry by keeping these paperwork."

Ichigo shrugged. He couldn't argue with that.

After he had left Bronstod-Lowry Brewery, he came across a large guild building with few corked bottles as their insignia. Curious, he entered it, and as his luck would have it, it was a essence trading guild.

Essence trading guilds were like the middle man when it came to essences. As a commodity that only a few could offer, essences are worth as much as rare eastern and southern spices as well as gold. As such, essence trade was a subject of heavy security and national policy in Fiore. Tax from essence trade alone reached up to the hundreds of millions of Jewels each year, and the actual profit that the government invests in with essence traders, guild, independent, or bureaucratic, reaches into tens of billions of Jewels. It often makes other trades like salt, spices, lacrymas, wools, and lumber unimportant financially. Of course, financially unimportant did not mean that those commodities weren't in dire need in large quantities.

Despite being surrounded by salty sea, Fiore had inferior domestic technology when it came to manufacturing salt and producing lumber. Most of the trees in Fiore were of inferior quality and maturity. It imported most of its lumber from its neighbors, and that costed a lot of money. It also had to import tons of grain because lumbering and then cultivating forestland was also slow in Fiore. Slow growing farmland with fast growing population had always been an issue, which was the reason why grain had been imported in vast quantities.

They stood up and the merchant led Ichigo to the guild's vault. They twisted around the corners once to the right and then to the left. It was after these turns that Ichigo and Acnologia saw the round iron door frame with bars with multiple magic seals drawn about the area. Behind the iron bars, there were hills of gold coins as well as chests filled with valuable spices, lacrymas, essences, and magical items. Overall, it looked like a proper merchant guild's vault, though the entrance looked more like that of a prison.

"Containment and Repulse seals," Ichigo commented offhandedly.

The merchant looked at Ichigo with a surprised expression. "You can read seals?"

Ichigo shrugged, and refrained from answering.

The merchant just shrugged too. He walked up to the entrance of the iron bars and held his hand out. "Release."

The iron bars bent towards the sides, creating an opening. The merchant stepped in an walked over to a pile of gold bars. There he counted out the bars. Midway in his count, the merchant looked back to Ichigo and Acnologia. "Do you two have a way to carry over 40 kg's for a prolonged amount of time?"

Ichigo nodded. "I got storage seals," he replied shortly.

The merchant nodded before he picked up twelve gold bars. He stacked them on top of each other carefully before he came out of the vault, causing it to close on its own.

"Each of these gold bars are worth twelve thousand Jewels as of yesterday, approximately, rounded down by few Jewels. The tax, in terms of bars of gold, is one per ten bars, in counts of ten, which is why you receive exactly 12 bars of gold. So the total here 144,000 Jewels," the merchant said as he gently handed the gold bars to Ichigo, who took it equally gingerly. Then he opened up his storage seal drawn on thee underside of his wrist and pushed them into it. He dusted his hand before offering the merchant his hand.

"It was well doing business with you, sir," he said politely. The merchant smiled. He took the man's hand. "It was a pleasure for me as well, young man. It has been a while since I saw a youngster with your politeness in your line of work."

Ichigo chuckled. "Being nice isn't part of the job description, especially when you're hunting Essences."

"True, that is," the merchant chuckled as well. He then gave a small bow before escorting the Black Dragon Slayer duo out of the vault's immediate area and into the guild's lobby. Once they were there, the merchant bowed again. "Please do use our services again, Mr. Kurosaki. And as I said before, it was a pleasure doing business with you."

Ichigo grinned. "As it was mine."

While Ichigo and Acnologia had been bartering, the rest of the Fairy Tail guild had found themselves a bar to party in.

"WEEE!" Natsu shouted as he did a double flip before crashing feet first into a wall and then head first into the ground. He quickly sat up and cradled the back of his head with his hands.

"Wohahahaha!" Gray laughed at Natsu's drunken antics, though he was no better than Natsu, for the ice mage was naked as the day he was born.

Erza was sitting to the side of the party with a cheesecake in her lap with a fork in her right hand, and Mirajane sitting to her right.

Unlike most of the guild, which was parting or eating to their heart's content, Laxus and Makarov were sitting in a corner with several sheets of pictures with their competitors' faces on them.

"Apparently, the tournament added a new rule to their system. All of the participating mages will be publicly announced. They reasoned that they initially feared a refusal from many of the prestigious or upcoming mages for the lack of privacy, but the media publicity craze has changed that last two years. Is that part about the craze true?" Laxus asked his grandfather.

Makarov shrugged with a expression that said 'How the hell do I know? I'm drinking or drunk half the time or looking at butts the other half.' "Magic guild magazines, many of them in fact, have been growing in popularity; I know this much. However, I didn't think such popularity actually affects mages. Perhaps the Council thought incorrectly of the correlation between mages and popularity?" Then he hummed a bit before he answered himself. "No. I'm going to go with the reasons why my guild's mages are attending: because they want to. I'm sure there are one of the reasons why they participate in the games is to make fame for themselves and/or their guilds, but there are sure to be others that just want to see how strong they are. After all, the difference between the top five guild is the number of S- and A-rank missions they accomplished as well as the number of S-rank mages and fighters..." He took a sip. He burped. "Ah, that hits the spot."

Laxus just grunted at the end of Makarov's translation and perspective. "So tomorrow, we get to go into an arena and have fun throwing fists."

"Lightning bolt in your case, but yes. That's what's going to happen." Makarov yawned. "I'm already tired... Keep an eye out for any troubles here, eh?" With that, Makarov headed to his room.

Laxus watched his grandfather leave before he took a sip from his grandfather's mug before making a "ewww" face. "Ichigo's beers are way better," he grumbled as he turned around in his seat to look at the entire guild ... barfighting.

He blinked.

Ah, he missed this. "Hey brats, let me in too!" he shouted before throwing off his jacket and jumping into the fray.

Ichigo and Acnologia sat close to each other on top of the inn that Fairy Tail was having fun in. Acnologia was leaning her head on his right shoulder while he was yawning.

"Maybe I should handicap myself for the tournament," Ichigo muttered before he took a bite out of the soft bread he had in his free left hand.

"But your already handicapping yourself for the tournament because of the deal between us," Acnologia said with a raised eyebrow. "What was the handicap again..? Oh right, no magic whatsoever. But then again, you trained in more arts than just Eternano based magic ... Ugh, forgot that there could be more than just the magic I used... And I'm a dragon who's supposed to know all the stuff going on around here. Hell, I even knew about the demon fortresses, which is what I told you and got you started on this journey!"

Acnologia pouted, still not happy about the incident last year when she got her ass handed to her by the loch ness monster like thingy with four floating eyes in the seas beyond the Lost Continent. Ichigo just laughed quietly.

"But I know that it'll be unfair for all of the contestants if I don't give myself more handicaps ... so ..."

"But I did say it was only physical strength and endurance," Acnologia commented. "What else can you be handicapping?" There was a moment of silent contemplation on both their parts. Acnologia grinned as she quickly slid over and straddled him. "Are you suggesting that we do something ... tiring?" she asked as she pressed herself against him.

Ichigo stared up to her with a bored face. But slowly and surely, his eyes wandered down, and his face grew hot red. "Gah..." he muttered before quickly moving his eyes back up. "Keep those humongous mounds away from me..." he grumbled.

Acnologia grinned. She bent her back more inward, reducing her only slightly higher eye level down to Ichigo's eye level. Her arms slung over and wrapped over his broad back. "Remember what I told you, Ichigo?" she asked as she slightly let her appearance change to a more draconian form for emphasis.

Ichigo felt his mini-me harden as he took in her appearance. Gone were her black one piece. In its place were black scales that dimly lit up like individual candle lights.

At least that's what they seemed like to him.

The scales only covered the most arousing parts of her body. Much of her legs, hips, and breasts were bare to him in the night. Rest of her body - her back, her abdomen, and her forelimbs- were also all naked to him.

This wasn't her usual dragon scale armor...

More like kinky scale armor.

'I think I'm going to have a bloody nose soon...' he muttered.

"...I did tell you what I really wanted from you, right?" she asked. Her voice was soft and quiet, yet strangely firm and determined. "In that forest after Laxus left to go back to the guild?" She pulled herself tightly against him.

Ichigo began to sweat. "Ah ... that..." he muttered.

Flashback

Laxus had decided to leave the training course. Acnologia objected because she would be losing her precious 'student' but the boys knew she just was not happy with losing her 'slave.' In the end, Laxus left the group to return to Fairy Tail, and they were left alone in the forest where they said their farewell to Laxus.

The moment Laxus was out of sight and hearing range, Acnologia jumped him. She knocked him down unto the dirt and grass.

"W-What the hell are you doing?!" Ichigo shouted in panic when her voluminous breasts were pressed against his chest and she looked up to him with a pair of draconian eyes. She was silent. "...What is it?"

"...I'm a dragon, you idiot," she said. "Because we dragons are superior to humans in every way that you can possibly name, we also have a culture where the strongest dragon mates with the females, especially since the females also want to mate with the strongest aside from those in her family..." she drifted off from there, her face lighting up in red slightly. She didn't tear her gaze from his own eyes despite her embarrassment, but she knew she had to do this, lest she go crazy. "I ... want to ... h-have a baby with you, Ichigo."

And in her own embarrassment, she buried her face in the crook of his neck.

"I tired t-to hold back ever since we met, but I-I can't hold it anymore. I-I was always the strongest after my father, s-so I never felt any urges like this before in front of o-other dragons... I d-don't even have fucking defenses or patience to wait any long-ger..." she said stuttering out as best as she could without just taking Ichigo right there. She was even trembling.

Ichigo then realized she was completely serious about this and was not just using her body to tease him like oh so many other women he met.

She was at the end of her rope.

'Gah...'

Truth be told about Ichigo, he had yet to completely escape his ridiculous' prudeness' as Acnologia commented less than a day ago. At the same time, however, he had already done the deed with several women who was looking for a good time and a handsome Ichigo nearby.

Yes.

Ichigo was not a virgin.

Acnologia also knew this.

And this also explained why every time he came back after spending a night with a stranger, Acnologia's vocabulary was much more colorful and her behavior more aggressive...

"I .. I really want to mate with you... I need it," Acnologia said. And she looked back up to him as he sat up with determined eyes. "And I'll do anything to be with you that way and stay that way..."

Determined...

She was determined.

But on the inside, she wasn't.

She was waiting for his verdict. She knew it was sudden and she knew it was rough, but she didn't know how to get to Ichigo without being rough or sudden. The man simply showed no interest when she gave him signs that she wanted him. And then he goes and ... sleeps with other women.

She was scared, too. She was scared of being rejected. Rejection, even the possibility of a rejection, was a strange experience for her. It made her heart, whether she was in dragon form or human form, squeeze and hurt. When he returned the first night from a nearby town after successfully raiding a demon fortress, and she smelled a woman's scent on him, her heart bled and hurt more than she had in their first fight. She was scared of the rejection. She knew that Ichigo would start to act different should the answer be rejection.

Ichigo was simply like that. He always changed. He never remained the same after a big event.

Never.

So she waited his verdict.

Ichigo slowly left her back unto the grass, and she felt her heart jump. He grabbed her dragon scale armor and tore them off like fabric, exposing all of her body to him with a single pull.

He leaned in, placing his head beside hers.

"I'll satisfy you today, Acnologia."

Her heart squeezed.

No, no nononono...

Please no...

"But please give me time to think on this situation," he said quietly as he lifted his head back up, and placing his forehead on hers. "Alright?"

Tears welled up in her eyes. And for the first time in her life, she felt like crying her eyes out because of ... an emotional trouble. 'Fucking embarrassing...'

Then he kissed her.

Her arms snaked around his chest and around his neck.

He broke the kiss and began to kiss her jaw. And he slowly began to move down. "A-Are you going to leave me after this?" she asked, jumping to the worst conclusion.

He immediately stopped and pushed himself up, hovering over her. "What?!"

"Are you going to leave me...?" she hiccuped. "I just - I just ruined our re-relationship. We were l-like-"

Ichigo just growled. "Why would I leave you because of this?!" She flinched. Unknown to him, he was becoming angry over what she was suggesting unintentionally. Was he going to leave her after taking advantage of a lovestruck girl (or the closest situation for a dragon)? No! She should know better than that! And that got him really angry. "Why the hell would you think like that?!"

Acnologia growled, her dragon instinct taking the forefront at being challenged. "I j-just fucking said I ruined this thing between us!" she shouted with tears spilling over. "We were p-partners and friends, a-and because I couldn't keep my fucking mouth shut, I-I just changed that relationship! And I know you, Ichigo. When you change, just like when you have after meeting me and getting along with Fairy Tail, you change f-forever!" she growled out, her voice stunted by hiccups and sobs as well as occasional growls. "I-I don't fucking know what the hell you're going t-to do after this, damn it! I'm fucking scared right now!" Then she finally broke down and began to cry. She used her forearms to cover her face, but Ichigo could clearly hear the crying and the sobbing.

Ichigo clenched his jaw. "Please stop crying," he said softly as he tried to pry her arms open to see her face. She whimpered and shook her head and tightened her arms around each other and around her face.

'Fuck, this is killing me,' Ichigo thought. He was still an amateur dealing with emotions, because he never dealt with his own emotions as well. Nothing had been sensitive to him until now. All of a sudden, she spills her heart out to him, and then cries because she doesn't trust him enough to stick with her.

That fucking hurt.

"Please stop," he pleaded quietly. With a sigh, he pried her shaking arms open to see her tear striken face. He scowled before he just hugged her. "I'll stick with all the way, Acnologia," he whispered to her as he brought them both up into a sitting position with Acnologia's legs wrapped around his waist.

She just kept on crying, this time on his shoulder.

Flashback End

"Yeah ... I remember what I said," he replied with a nervous chuckle.

She smiled with a look that could be described as sad ... almost. "You aren't going to push me away now, are you?" she asked softly as she leaned in.

He sighed with his eyes closed. "No," he replied and then opened his eyes again. He wrapped his arms around her waist and midback and slowly allowed them to fall backward unto the roof of the inn.

She giggled before she kissed him.

Next Morning...

x780, June 1, the Day of the Tournament.

It was morning. Ichigo watched the girls and boys and the adults of Fairy Tail sleep away the early morning. Acnologia was sleeping on the roof of the inn, which he let her because she began to complain about human pheromone when he tried to have her sleep on a bed.

It was morning. The boys and girls of Fairy Tail had yet to wake up.

It was morning...

"GET UP~~~~~!" he shouted at the top of his lungs.

Laxus, who was already up because of the early morning training Black dragon slayer duo ran him through, cringed when those two simple words vibrated like a shockwave throughout the inn, which was thankfully only occupied by the Fairy Tail as they had completely booked it. Beds that were attached to the floors vibrated as if there were earthquakes. Beds that weren't bounced up and down from the severe vibration. Those on the floor had their head bouncing up and down, smacking the back -or front- of their head on the floorboard continuously from the sudden vibration.

"I'm up, I'm up!" Gray shouted as he quickly jumped out of his bouncing bed. But when he hit the deck, he himself had trouble standing.

Natsu, who had been sleeping on the floor, kept himself on the floor, because the vibrations were giving him a good shake throughout his body. Erza was already up with a sword in her hand, her battle senses already alert and blaring.

Then it was gone like a breeze that never existed. A sudden stop that just ... stopped. Beds that had been bouncing quickly settled about, even if their bed sheets hadn't.

There was a brief moment of silence before everyone slowly began to file out of their rooms.

"What the hell was that for, Ichigo..." Makarov, who was still in his pajama, grumbled as h walked up to Ichigo with his sandals making cute bunny sounds into the lounge.

Ichigo glared at the man. "Master..." he began, his tone dark and deep.

Makarov flinched right there in front of everyone present in the inn lounge.

"Master, the tournament begins at 9 A.M.. This gives us exactly one hour and twelve minutes. Yet despite the fact that such amount of time is lacking to prepare the entire guild, you let the guild sleep in. What is the meaning of this," he growled as he moved his glare from the guild master to the guild members. "I already saw more than four guilds head out to the arena, yet our guild is still ... sleeping ... " he trailed off. "I better not find anyone still sleeping." With that, he stomped upstairs to where the rooms were.

It was the day of the Grand Magic Tournament, and as such, the Magic Council had come to watch their first ever sponsored tournament.

Gran Doma sat in the shadows, keeping himself concealed to the rest of the council. Org sat quietly next to Michello and Yamija, latter who was discussing possible outcomes of this tournament along with Ultear, Siegrain, and Belno. They even had a small bet going on regarding which mage would come out of the tournament as the "champion" of the year.

"I'm going to bet on Phantom Lord's Iron Dragonslayer," Belno told of her bet. She then eyed Siegrain, who sat next to her.

Siegrain took this as a signal to call his bets. "Well, I am actually unsure whether I should place my bet on Fairy Tail's Black Dragonslayer Duo or Phantom Lord's Element 4. From what I heard, the dragonslayer duo have been on a training trip throughout the continent and beyond... At the same time, I am very apprehensive about the damage the dragonslayers present in this tournament will incur should things go out of hand."

Everyone present, except Ultear and Gran Doma, shivered. When a mage incurred damage on civilian areas, it usually resulted in one of the members of the Magic Council to receive a very large stack of paperwork...

Even if they were members of the bureaucracy...

'Damn bureaucracy...' was the single most consistent thought that went through everyone's mind when such paperwork landed on their desk.

Ultear gave a look over the front rows set apart for the participants and their guilds. To her surprise, Fairy Tail's reserved seats were empty. "Uh ra? I expected Fairy Tail to be here and to be the loudest."

Org gave a look too before he scoffed. 'Probably sleeping in and late,' he thought jokingly. He didn't know how accurate his thoughts were.

"Ah, they're just coming in," Ultear remarked as she watched them enter the arena.

The attention of the entire Magic Council present turned towards the entrance, and all of them frowned for one reason or another.

~Moments Earlier~

The arena upon which the Grand Magic Tournament was to be held was a octagonal coliseum with ten meter high walls separating the circular stage from the audience seats with the closest audience sitting right by the wall.

Fairy Tail, as the guild that has more than five participants, were granted reserve sitting in the front.

Makarov grinned as he and his guild cheered for their champions, though still waiting for the said champions to reveal themselves when the time came.

They weren't the only ones cheering for their champions, however.

Phantom Lords sat across from them on the opposite side of the arena. To Fairy Tail's right were the Quarto Cerberus. Lamia Scale and Mermaid Heel were left and right of Fairy Tail and Quarto Cerberus, respectively. To Phantom Lord's sides were minor guilds that could not fit in the small space between the large guilds on the other side of the arena.

Exactly at 9 o' clock, a small hole appeared in the middle of the arena, and a mage wearing pumpkin for a head and a broom for his ride shot out of the hole and spun around the arena while making words appear in the air.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I, Mato of the Imperial Judge Guild, welcome you all to the first ever Grand Magic Tournament!"

The crowd went wild as confetti and hats flew all over the place. Cheers rang throughout and beyond the stadium, much to the delight and apprehension of some of the champions you were waiting for the cue for their appearances.

Mato held his hand up, asking the audience for silence.

"Now, before we begin the tournament in earnest, I will explain to you, our beloved audience, the rules, events, and the participants by the name they want to be known and a little intro from the participants themselves, within which they will state which event they want to participate.

"First, the rules!

"Rule 1: You may not kill other mages. Rule 2: You may not attack the Judge. Rule 3: You may not receive help from outside sources. Rule 4: Each event will have its own rules! Rule 5: There will be point system to determine the overall winner in each event.

"Second, the events!

"First event to be held is the Magic Chart Event! There will be a lacrima at the center of the arena, and participants will have to pour their best amount of magic into the lacrima! This can be simple ethernano, the basis of magic, or a magic spell you feel like using! The points of event will depend on the rank of the highest power output! Simply put, magically strongest wins this event. Additionally, any other participants who had not been invited to this event can still join to show off, but not win.

"Second event to be held is the Mob-Dungeon Tournament! In this event, participants will enter the arena, where a giant dungeon will be prepared with hidden streaming lacrima crystals installed at every corner of the dungeon. The point system of this event will be determined by how much mobs, or monsters, you dispatch within the dungeon and how much destruction you can avoid while fighting them! This will be the one you mage employers will want to watch for because it is very, very similar to many of the jobs that mage guilds take and execute!

"And the last event is the Spar Tournament! Mages participating in this event will be paired up into groups of either two's or three's. Winners of each fight will climb to the top for the title of the Best Mage of the Grand Magic Tournament: x780!

"With this, I shall now show the participants in!"

There was another roar of cheering for the champions.

It was damn loud and heartfelt too.

Mato raised his arms again, asking for silence.

"Before I being, though, I'd like for the audience to give a round of applause to the Magic Council, various merchant and magic guilds, and finally the Royal Family for hosting the event!"

The roar of cheers became even louder.

And all of the Magic Council members were thinking of how sly the judge was. This was sure to gain the judge some favors since mentioning the hosts weren't part of the program, and it was a very unexpected but pleasant surprise.

"Now, the champions!" Mato shouted as he pulled out a thick book. "First up! Please welcome, Natsu Dragoneel of Fairy Tail!"

And CUTTTTTTTT~!

So how did you like it?

The list of participants and their introduction will probably take up the entire next chapter, and there will be some surprises here and there in the introduction.

Remember, remember!

The story you're reading.

The Black Dragon Slayer of Fiore and beyond.

I know of no reason,

Why this story

Should ever be forgot!

Arms of Loneliness and his hands

Did the scheme contrive,

To make this story for thee and himself.

Months of work and long nights

To prove the story to be true.

And, by God's providence, he did it well!

A finger and a laptop.

For Queen Elizabeth's sake!

He will write one more

Then write two.

He likes to write,

And show the world his dreams!

A laptop and a finger to write this story.

A Slim Jim to keep him fed.

A pint of Naked to keep him sated.

Holloa, boys! holloa, boys! make the bells ring!

Holloa, gals! holloa, gals! God save the Fanfic.

Hip, hip, hooorrraaay!

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