I don't own Fairy Tail
The next morning the Fairy Tail mages packed up their belongings and got ready to leave the Library of Sorcery. Somehow the structure's lights had turned back on early in the morning. Though strange, the team didn't question it. Gray filed behind the others as they made their way outside the library, the Devil Slaying book in his hands while the rest laid stacked in his pack. Gray looked through the pages curiously, despite not being able to read it. As soon as he walked back through the big entrance he noticed a faint glow coming off the book from the front page. Turning to it he saw that a date had been inscribed into the book, exactly a month from their current date. This must be the due date Gray thought, smirking. How strange.. but considering the books are magically connected to this place and the lights apparently know when you're there, I probably should make sure I don't turn this in late…
"Woah why's it glowing like that?" Natsu asked, hands behind his head and glancing at the book in Gray's hands. The ice mage blinked at his rival, surprised that he was addressing him civilly, or even at all. No one had really spoken to each other so far that morning and it felt strange to have the silence broken. He studied Natsu, not having registered his question, and took in his features. They were in a forest but the light shined through the trees, making the fire mage's skin glow and the light reflect off of his bright pink hair. His dark green eyes glinted with curiosity and Gray felt himself drawn into them. Natsu shifted his gaze from the book in Gray's hands to the ice mage's own eyes and Gray felt as if he was drowning in an ocean of green. His heart rate began to speed up and he felt detached from his body, mind going completely blank and the world around him blinking out of existence. A sharp tap on the forehead however, brought him back to the present.
Gray blinked again, not really sure what was happening to him, but finally seeing Natsu's raised eyebrow and the long finger poking him repeatedly in the forehead.
"You alright there, Popsicle?" Natsu asked, amused but somewhat concerned. Gray recovered and rolled his eyes, frowning.
"Of course I'm okay, idiot. Anyway what was your question?" Gray pretended that nothing had happened and tried to calm his unreasonably quick heart rate.
"I asked why the book was glowing," Natsu replied, still looking at the ice mage curiously but deciding to drop the issue for now. Gray shifted his gaze back to the book in his hands.
"Oh" he said lamely. "Well it's just a due date. Looks like we will have to come back here in a month or who knows what is going to happen?" Natsu immediately paled and gave his rival a panicked look.
"You mean I have to spend another twenty hours on that moving metal death trap?!" Natsu exclaimed, looking like he was about to throw up. Gray rolled his eyes again and playfully hit Natsu in the head with the book in his hand.
"You know you don't have to come, Flame Brain. You didn't even have to come this time! If you hate trains so much then just stay home." Gray said in an annoyed tone. He and Natsu were walking through the forest behind the others. Every few minutes, Erza would turn her head to them and gave a look of mild surprise when she found them talking civilly and not fighting with each other. Gray noticed her behavior and huffed indignantly at her lack of trust in him. He didn't always fight with Natsu, they could get along if they really wanted to… I think.. Actually now that I think about it, we really do never get along, this whole 'real conversation' thing is kinda weirding me out..
"Yeah but I had to, I wanted to know why your lame magic hurt me so bad just as much as you did. And it wasn't so bad really.." Natsu smiled gently and looked at Gray with an intense stare, still walking beside him. "It felt really nice, that thing you did with my hair." Gray's face flushed pink and quickly looked away, not really sure what to say. Thankfully he didn't have to as Natsu ignored his blush and smiled his wide toothy smile. "So just do that again every time and I'll be okay!"
Gray's head snapped back toward Natsu, his eyes wide. He spluttered incredulously, "W-What?!" Natsu just ignored him and hummed happily before continuing his thoughts.
"Anyway did you guys ever figure out what was wrong with your magic?" Gray stared at his idiot rival for a second, having a hard time keeping up with his subject changes and the strange array of emotions they were making him feel.
"Well" Gray finally said with a sigh, "unless you're a demon of some kind, no we didn't figure it out. There shouldn't have been any weird side effects. My guess is that it has something to do with my inexperience with the magic, maybe I did something wrong.." Gray looked at the book still in his hands and clutched it tight, frustrated that he had hurt someone because of his stupid new magic. Frost started to coat the book, and Gray briefly wondered if he could just throw both it and his magic away and forget about the whole ordeal. Suddenly he felt a warm hand on his shoulder and he lifted his head to meet the intense gaze of the Dragon Slayer.
"Maybe you did, maybe you didn't" Natsu said seriously, and playful tones to his voice now absent. "Whatever it is, we'll figure it out. You have a job to do with that magic so you can't just get rid of it." Gray's eyes widened. It seemed like Natsu had just read his mind. Then again they had known each other since they were small kids so it really shouldn't have been all that shocking. "Besides," Natsu continued, "maybe I am some super cool fire dragon demon, then I would have two types a magic anyway and there's no way your sorry ass could beat me!"
Gray immediately fell into his habit of rivalry and shouted, "What are you talking about Flame Brain!? You only wish you could have two types of magic! Demon my ass! You couldn't be strong enough to be a demon even if your magic was unlimited!" Gray tossed the book in his pack and took a fighting stance, his hands beginning to frost over.
"You kidding Ice Bastard?! I can beat you without any magic at all!" Natsu shouted back, flames igniting into fists, ready to attack his rival.
"I wish you were a demon just so that I could have a good reason to kill you!" Gray created ice lances to throw at Natsu.
"I don't know about me but looking at your ugly face is a reason enough to kill you!" Natsu drew his fist back ready to run at Gray
"NATSU! GRAY! What are you two doing!?" In slow motion the two boys' heads turned toward the scarlet haired requip mage who had interrupted their fight. She stood in front of them, hands on hips and giving the boys a death glare. Her armor glinted in the sunlight and her very aura seemed radiant and dark at the same time. The boys simultaneously acted on their fear and were suddenly next to each other in a tight side hug.
"Oh nothing Erza, just being the best of friends back here!" Natsu said quickly. Gray nodded fiercely in affirmation. Erza gave them a piercing look and nodded her approval.
"Good" the scarlet mage said, turning back around to catch up with the others and lead the group through the forest. "It better stay that way. Or else.." Gray gulped, hearing Natsu do the same before he roughly pushed himself away from his rival. The two continued walking behind the others, Gray keeping his eyes firmly locked on Erza's armor-clad back.
Something really weird has been going on lately.. Our recent battle with demons and my growing power with Demon Slaying magic and the whole Natsu problem are in some way connected, I can feel it. Grays mind flashed to images of Natsu on the train and the weird feelings he had been experiencing over the past couple of days. I especially can't afford to be thinking of that crap right now. I'm not sure I even want to know what's going on, and it's not important anyway. He probably has just been smelling more disgusting than usual, that's why my stomach keeps turning. Yeah that's it. I bet he hasn't bathed in days, stupid unhygienic dragon slayer. Gray pressed into his closed eyes with his hands and sighed exasperatedly. This is dumb. I have so many more important things to think about. Maybe I should take a long mission when we get back to figure out my magic. I know gramps said not to use it, but this research seems like a waste of time and maybe I just haven't practiced enough. Practice makes perfect after all, and maybe with enough of it I can figure out what went wrong.. Gray thought about the possible missions he could take while the team continued to walk. The group overall seemed disheartened by the lack of helpful results in their search, though Lucy and Levy had found some other books they were eager to dive into. The two chatted quietly at the front of the group but the rest walked in solemn silence, not looking forward to the train ride ahead of them.
The woods around the group, however, were filled with vibrancy and life. Contrary to their mood, the birds chirped happily in the canopy above them and the light breeze in the air ruffled the bright green leaves of trees surrounding them. The trees were thick, but light reflected from dew that had collected over the night, causing glints of sunshine from all directions.
The mages continued walking through the forest and were about one mile from the train station when Erza stopped and held up a hand, gesturing for the group to halt. Her eyes scanned the forest as the others looked at her in confusion.
"Uh Erza.." Lucy asked, "Why'd we stop?"
Natsu looked at the red-haired mage in annoyance. "Hey Erza, what the hell?! I just wanna get back home alrea-"
"Shhhh!" The Requip mage interrupted, "Listen!" All the members in the group strained their ears to hear anything out of the miss.
"I hate to break it to ya, redhead" came the gravelly voice of Gajeel, "but I got superior dragon senses and I ain't hearing a thing." The others nodded in affirmation and Erza simply glared at them.
"Exactly."
Quiet fell over the group as they realized their surroundings were not just quiet, they were eerily silent. Not a sound could be heard.
Suddenly Erza heard a slight swish in the air from somewhere nearby and acted on pure instinct.
"Everybody down!"
The whole group, knowing better than to disobey any kind of order from Erza took to the forest floor and covered their heads. The whoosh grew louder until a small thunk could be heard in a nearby tree and a millisecond passed before the portion of the forest they were stuck in exploded in bright purple flame. The mages shielded themselves as best as they could from the onslaught of debris from their surroundings and stood up wearily as the explosion died down, still surrounded by purple flames. Each Fairy Tail wizard had their magic at the ready and scanned the trees where the attack seemed so come from. Natsu of course was the first to act and threw some of his own fire in that direction.
"Come out you bastard!" he yelled, "stop being a coward and come fight us!" Natsu's hands were flame-covered fists taut at his side and he balanced on the balls of his feet, ready to move at a second's notice. The fire all around them cast the forest in a smokey purplish haze and the team struggled to see through it to the foliage beyond. A dark form seemed to be materializing in the distance and slowly walked toward them. Natsu, getting impatient, threw a Fire Dragon's Roar at the figure but a purple shell of light shimmered around it and easily deflected the orange flame. The figure continued walking slowly toward them and the group kept their eyes trained on their attacker, making out nothing but the outline of a figure in a black cloak.
"What the-" Gajeel started. Another figure materialized behind the first, then another and another, until figures in dark cloaks littered the visible space around them. Natsu growled and fired another larger roar attack at them but they all seemed to be protected by the transparent purple barriers.
"They must have some kind of protection mage, I've seen Freed create barriers similar to this, they could be runic" Levy inferred, talking quietly to her teammates, "if we want to beat these guys, considering they have bad intentions, which seems likely, we need to take out the mage casting those protection barriers." The figures were fast approaching and the group stood on edge, ready to rush their opponents.
"Here's the plan," Erza said hastily while she requipped into her Heaven's Wheel armour, "Lucy and Levy you two go take out the one casting the barriers. Happy you go with. Gray and Natsu, you two take the wizards on the left, Gajeel and I will take the right. Try and figure out a way to put the purple flames out, and Natsu try not to use your fire too much, the more smoke in the forest, the harder it is to see."
"Aye Sir!" everyone shouted. The figures were coming in close and another explosion sounded off to their left.
"GO!" The red-haired mage yelled and everyone sprung into action, Lucy and Levy running around the cloaked figures in order to flank them and uncover the protection mage they were sure must have been nearby. Happy flew behind, attempting to search for the protection mage from the smoke-shrouded skies. Gray and Natsu rushed to their left and prepared to face off their enemies. Gray stood on the balls of his feet, hands poised to throw an ice attack. He watched with confusion and irritation as the cloaked figures continued to slowly advance.
We can't hit them, so I need to fire low-energy attacks until Levy and Lucy can take out the one protecting them. What a cheap way to fight anyway.. And who the hell are these guys?! Why are they walking so damn slow?! Gray tightened his fist and stared down the coming figures. "Hey Natsu, make sure to conserve your energy. We need to distract as many of these guys as we can to divert attention from Lucy and Levy but until those barriers drop we're just wasting energy."
Natsu nodded and smirked in reply. "I'm all fired up now," he said with a bright glint in his eye.
"Fire Dragon-"
"Ice Make-"
"ROAR!"
"Blizzard!"
The two mages worked in complete unison, firing on the mysterious figures ahead of them. The figures in response all rushed at once as the attacks were blocked by their magical shields. Hundreds of spikes came from all directions and Gray and Natsu barely managed to dodge them with only a few scratches. The spikes each burst into purple flame around them and the smoke in the air worsened.
…
Lucy ran through the forest alongside her best friend and the blue feline, dodging silver spikes that came from behind them. The trio was rapidly scanning for anything out of the ordinary as they searched the forest from the enemy lines.
"Lucy! Levy! Over there!" Happy shouted from above them. The two girls followed the line of his paw and spotted another cloaked figure, this time one who seemed to be hiding behind a tree trunk, watching the battle intently from afar. The figure turned around at the noise and stood up, taking off the hood of his cloak. The man standing in front of them had long sleek purple hair and dark grey eyes, and observed them with a smirk. He wore all black robes underneath his cloak and had a short silver sword attached to his hip.
"Ah what do we have here?" He asked with an amused tone, "A couple small girls and a flying cat. Ha! How adorable!" His arms crossed and he stood with nonchalance. "Don't bother trying to fight me. I can deflect any magic you cute little mages throw at me."
Lucy seethed, pulling out her keys. "Open, Gate of the Lion! LEO!" With a burst of golden light, the lion spirit appeared in front of her, standing feet apart and ready to fight. "Leo take this loser down! He's getting on my nerves!" Leo glanced back at his master and winked.
"As you say, my Princess." The lion spirit refixed his gaze on his opponent and charged forward. "REGULUS IMPACT!" His fist lit with yellow light as he prepared to hit. Within seconds there was a massive explosion of light and the three Fairy Tail members watching winced and looked away. When Lucy could see again she gasped in surprise. The purple haired mage was standing there the same, Loke's fist stopped by a shimmering purple barrier. Grey eyes met her brown ones and the man cocked an eyebrow.
"I told you it wouldn't work" he said with an air of arrogance, "Your spirits use magical energy. They can't touch me."
Lucy's glared at the man. "Fine then. We will just have to beat you with brute force!" Leo apologized for being unable to help and returned to the spirit world. Lucy pulled out her whip threateningly and the man sighed, pulling out his own sword and stood waiting.
"Levy, our magic isn't going to work against this guy, I'm not sure how effective your solid script magic will be, if at all," Lucy said to her companion.
"Solid Script, Sword!" The blue-haired mage shouted as the words materialized with a metallic glow. She took hold of the solidified word which was warped in a sword-like shape. "Well, there's only one way to find out!" Levy and Lucy simultaneously rushed forward the arrogant mage in front of them, Lucy thrusting her whip forward towards the man and Levy running with a yell to swing her word-sword at him. Lucy's whip was hit away by the man's sword and Levy was stopped by the barrier surrounding him. He quickly moved to swing his sword at the now vulnerable solid script mage and she screamed as she was thrown back by his attack, crashing into a tree behind Lucy.
"Levy!" Lucy started to run back to her friend.
"I'm fine Lucy! Your whip is the only thing that can seem to touch him! I'll try and find a way to help from back here!" Levy yelled back, slowly picking herself up and dusting herself off. Lucy hesitated but then nodded turning back to her attacker with a fiery glare.
"I won't let you hurt my friends!" She yelled, charging again. She drew her hand back as the purple haired mage did the same. She threw her whip forward and the protection wizard deflected it again, somewhat surprised by her ferocity. She continued throwing her weapon forward as the mage got closer. He deflected every attack of the whip and charged in close, slicing at her chest. Lucy ducked underneath the swing and kicked out, landing a hit to the other mage's knees. The purple haired mage was forced back and his eyes hardened as he prepared to charge again.
"What a pesky little girl," he said, clearly annoyed. "I'm done going easy on you, let's finish this." He stalked forward slowly.
CRACK! The purple haired mage stopped in confusion at the strange sound and looked around before a large structure moving in on him quickly took up his field of vision.
"What the-?!"
BOOOOM!
Lucy screeched and jumped away as a large tree came down on them, almost crushing her and filling the air with dust and leaves. She got up wide-eyed and looked around to see Levy jumping up and down excitedly next to a tree stump, a solid script "A-X-E" in the air next to her. Lucy whipped back around to where the protection mage had fallen and only saw some stray purple hair peeking out from underneath the massive tree trunk. Levy came running up beside her and examined the crushed mage as well.
"I can't believe that actually worked! What a dumb wizard!" She shouted happily. Levy and Lucy pushed the tree over, the mage underneath completely unconscious. The blue-haired girl summoned some rope with her magic and the two tightly tied their enemy to a nearby tree. Happy, who had been hiding out nearby, flew up behind them and congratulated the two girls.
"Way to go, guys! This guy's a real dummy!" he said in his high-pitched voice, laughing. Lucy looked at the blue exceed.
"Hey Happy you watch this creep while we help fight with the others," Lucy commanded.
"Aye, sir!"
…
"Natsu, this is useless! With these barriers none of our attack are going to hit and we're going to be suffocated by smoke!" Gray yelled, panicking at their situation. Though they were being consumed by smoke and fire, Gray strained to see his other comrades to their right. It seemed Gajeel was having a similar problem, his metal was also deflected.
"Gray! Natsu!" he heard Erza shout over the cackling fire, "Magic doesn't work! You have to use hand to hand!" He couldn't see her but he could hear clinks of metal, which he attributed to her attacks with a sword.
"Oh you've got to be kidding me," Gray grumbled to himself, taking in the dozens of figures around him, "this is gonna take forever.." Natsu with his superior hearing gave a challenging smile to the ice mage.
"I bet I can take out more than you can, Ice Princess!" the dragon slayer taunted. Gray's eyes narrowed and he smirked as well.
"Yeah right! You're on Flame Brain!"
The two mages rushed forward, fists and feet flying as they attacked the mysterious enemy figures. The cloaked beings would not be easily defeated, however, and fought back viciously. The cloaked beings got in some hits but were no match for the competing wizards and the Fairy Tail companions quickly took out many of them. Gray ducked under a kick and punched one of his enemies in the abdomen, making in fly backward and into a tree. He growled in frustration as a dozen more took his place. The mages were also struggling to dodge the obnoxious silver spikes that kept flying past them and exploding in purple flame. Gray kept pushing forward, fueled by an instinctual fear of the encroaching purple fire. The air was beginning to smell rancid, as thought the very earth were decomposing at a rapid rate around him.
"Hey Ice Princess!" he heard Natsu shout.
"What dumbass?! I don't-" Gray said breathlessly, ducking under a punch and kicking an enemy off of his feet, "-have time for pointless conversation!" He could hear the panting in Natsu's voice as well as they conversed.
"No need to be such an asshole. Magic's back on! Lucy must've kicked that protection mage's ass!" Gray saw an orange flame explode a few yard to his right and smiled.
"Now we're talking! Ice Make, Floor!" Gray turned the surrounding area into ice and made himself a blade of ice and some skates, skating around and slashing bad guys as they slipped on his magical flooring. He smirked as the number of enemies seemed to be diminishing and gracefully continued slashing his enemies until some started to regain their footing. Gray stopped and put his hands together.
"Ice Make- FUCK!" Gray's attack was cut short by a sharp pain in his shoulder. An explosion from the point of contact blew Gray backward and he yelped as his body crashed heavily into a tree trunk. Gray, vision hazy from the impact, attempted to stand, using the tree behind him to stabilize him. As his vision cleared, he realized he was surrounded by purple flames and steadied himself, preparing to jump over them and continue his fight. The ice mage ran forward and vaulted himself over the flames.
…
An ear-splitting scream invaded Natsu's ears and the dragon slayer froze.
"GRAY!" Natsu yelled and ran toward the scream, nothing on his mind except his clearly wounded companion. Natsu quickly disposed of every mage in his path and his eyes widened when he found his companion sitting in pain on the ground, purple flames crawling up his pant legs. Gray was panting and making strangled sounds of pain as he weakly attempted to cover his legs with dirt to put the fire out. Natsu ran to his side and immediately reached out to help the ice wizard when Gray shouted at him.
"Don't!" Gray exclaimed weakly. "The fire.. It's not.. Normal!" Natsu paused and examined the fire. His eyes widened when he saw the fire wasn't burning Gray, it was breaking down his skin, similar to acid eating him away. Natsu's eyes darkened as he grew furious at the enemies that dared hurt the ice mage. He felt an animalistic need to protect his friend and felt nothing but rage as his nails grew into talons, his teeth elongated and the pupils in his eyes expanded to make his eyes completely black. Gray looked at him in wide eyed fear but Natsu was too full of anger to notice. Natsu, out of pure instinct, blew his own flame onto Gray and Gray yelped before watching in disbelief as the orange flame engulfed the purple and soothed the pain in his injured legs. Natsu stood up and snarled at the attackers around him, before taking off in a whirlwind of speed and punching his taloned fist straight through the chest of the first enemy unlucky enough to stand in his way. The dragon slayer surrounded himself in flame and let out a massive carnal roar before breathing fire, a Fire Dragon Roar bigger than any that the other Fairy Tail members had ever seen before. The fire reached the entire area the team had been fighting in, completely disintegrating every living piece of greenery in sight. All the team members ducked as the intense heat infiltrated the air.
When each of the team members looked back up they let out loud gasps.
The area around them, nearly 1,000 square yards of forest, had been desecrated. The ground was ashy and grey, completely devoid of life. In the middle of the newly created clearing was Natsu, splayed haphazardly on the ground, completely unconscious. Erza crept forward cautiously and looked around, noticing two other figures in the clearing. All the cloaked figures were gone except for one, lying motionless. The mage who had been tied up also was unconscious on the opposite end of the clearing. Lucy, Levy, Gajeel, and Happy all stood in the clearing staring at Natsu's still form in shock. Gray was sitting on the ground, still injured, trying to make sense of the situation around him, but found himself too exhausted to move. He slumped to the ground and his vision faded to black.
"Lucy," Erza said, snapping all the conscious members of the team out of their reverie, "go check on Gray. I'll see to Natsu. Levy, Gajeel, take care of our attackers." She rushed to Natsu's figure and knelt beside him, turning him to lay on his back and checking his breathing. The requip wizard sighed in relief when she heard his weak but regular breathing and picked up the wizard after deeming him unharmed with the exception of a few shallow wounds. She carried him to where Levy and Gajeel had taken the two enemy mages and addressed the two of them. "It seems that the army we faced was in fact one wizard all along" she said sternly. Levy took the hood off the culprit of the attack and uncovered a very average looking man, tousled brown hair and nondescript features.
"He must be some kind of mimic mage that can copy himself into an indefinite amount of identical people. What should we do with them Erza?" the blunette inquired.
"We should take them to the authorities in Beliran, the closest town. We have to catch the train there anyway, and it's only about a mile out." The team nodded and Erza left them to go to Lucy and Gray.
"How is he?" she asked, walking up to the blonde who was kneeling by Gray and wrapping his legs in bandages she had acquired from Virgo.
"He's unconscious and pretty hurt but nothing seems vital," Lucy replied solemnly. Erza explained the plan to her companion and picked up Gray on her other shoulder when he was fully bandaged. When the group reconvened together, Levy scripted some rope and a large cart into existence so they could pull the Natsu, Gray and the two enemy wizards to the nearest town. The group gathered their scattered belongings, which were somehow unharmed, and walked in silent contemplation, hoping their friends would awaken soon so they could get a complete story about what had actually happened during their fight. All of them had a sense of dread looming over their shoulders. There was no doubt more trouble on the horizon.