The 'Blood' Dragon Slayer
The four dragon slayers were walking through the forest, with their exceeds, with a few scratches on them. Natsu was looking grumpy, sinking his face into his scarf. Happy noticed his unhappiness.
"Hey Natsu, what's wrong?" he asked. Everyone looked at him.
"I want to have dragon wings and a tail," he stated.
"What?" Sienna roared.
"That's what you're mopping about?" Gajeel added.
"I'm not mopping!" Natsu yelled.
"Oh yeah, so what are you doing?" Gajeel enquired.
"He's jealous," Sienna teased. Natsu started pointing at her.
"I'm not jealous, I just want super cool wings is all," he answered.
"In my books, that's called jealously," Sienna commented. Wendy sighed.
"Well, at least we managed to get this back, whatever it is," she said, as she looked at the golden box in her hands. She then put it back into her bag.
"Something doesn't seem right," Carle claimed.
"How so?" Wendy questioned.
"This seems all a bit too easy. This job could only be taken on by dragon slayers, but why?" she queried.
"I know what you mean. Those guys back there were a little tough, but there's no logic explanation as to why another wizard could of done it," Sienna responded.
"Those guys were nothing! I could of done this alone!" Gajeel pouted.
"Says the guy who would have been killed if I hadn't been there," Sienna muttered.
"Hey Sienna, you okay? You're looking a little off," Wendy pointed out.
"Don't worry. I'm fine, but a bit low on magical energy," she replied.
"I think we should all stop and rest for a bit. We did use up magical energy, even if it wasn't enormous amounts. Also, it's likely we won't reach the train station before nightfall," Lily put in. They all stopped in their tracks.
"Yeah, and I can completely heal you guys," Wendy commented.
"You're going to end up using too much magical energy again," Carle criticized.
"Alright, seems most sensible I guess," Sienna responded.
Later on, they had found themselves a lake and had decided to make rest next to it. It was now almost sunset, so the sky was starting to turn orange. Wendy was healing a small wound that Lily had on his arm. Sienna, Natsu and Gajeel were at the water's edge, with Natsu and Gajeel a short way from Sienna. They both were crouched down and put out their hands in the water to clean their faces. Then Natsu noticed something.
"Hey Gajeel, is it me, or is the water level going down?" he asked.
"Huh?" Gajeel said. He then looked at the other side of the lake and saw the water level dropping at a steady pace, revealing more on the bank on the other side. "Yeah, it is. Why the hell is it going down?" They then heard a sort of slurping sound and looked to their right at Sienna who was stood a couple of meters away from them. She had her mouth open and water was gushing in, taking in the water like Natsu with his fire.
"Hey! You can't drink it all!" Natsu shouted. Sienna took a few gulps before she closed her mouth and the water returned to the lake. She had her arms bent over a bit and around her mouth was wet. She then stood up straight and wiped her arm across her face to dry her face.
"Sorry Natsu. That dragon force you so desperately want takes a hell of a lot of magical energy. I needed to build it up again," Sienna replied. She then walked back from the water and went to join the others.
A little while later the sun had almost and they were all lying down in a circle after being treated by Wendy.
"Hey Wendy," Natsu called as he sat up.
"Yeah,"
"Can I take a look at that box thing again?" he asked.
"Sure," she replied. She fished the box out of her bag and handed it to him. Sienna sat up.
"What you thinking Natsu?" she enquired. He examined the box a bit.
"….I reckon we should bust it open and see what's inside!" he exclaimed.
"You have got to be kidding me," Sienna muttered.
"I'm serious! That guy never told us that we couldn't open it, he just didn't tell us what was inside!" he explained. Gajeel was sitting up as well now.
"Idiot! What would that accomplise?" he moaned.
"Genki said that this thing, whatever it is, was important in returning ourselves to our dragons. So why the question is why we haven't tried to break it open yet?" he continued.
"Natsu, just because someone doesn't tell you to do something doesn't give you instant passage to do whatever you feel like," Sienna complained.
"But…it would be nice if we could see our dragons again. I…really miss Grandine," Wendy said timidly. Everyone was quite for a bit. Sienna sighed.
"We have no idea what we're getting into…but….I guess I do have a lot of questions for Biagon,"
"And I have a bone to pick with that bastard Metallica!" Gajeel stated.
"It's decided then!" Natsu exclaimed. He put the box in the middle of the circle so they could all see.
"You're all hopeless!" Carle groaned.
"Aye!" Happy squeaked. They all looked at the top of the box. There was a picture engraved on top. There were some clouds with a ray of light coming from underneath, and below them there was a hill with a tree on. Next to it was a lake of some sort, and below them was some rocks with what looked be something like lava. Around the depiction, there was some bizarre writing. They all stared blankly at it.
"So…any ideas?" Natsu questioned.
"Nope," Sienna replied.
"No," Wendy added.
"Not a freakin clue," Gajeel put in.
"I think our best bet is to try and decipher the text around that picture," Sienna suggested.
"Sounds good, but I can't do that," Natsu responded.
"Not me either. I don't really understand that crap!" Gajeel commented.
"And I'm no expert either," Sienna said.
"Don't worry guys," They all looked at Wendy as she dived into her bag, and brought out some reading glasses. "I'm okay at this kind of stuff,"
"Wendy! You're amazing!" Natsu exclaimed. She picked up the box and looked at it with her glasses on.
"It'll take a bit of time though. Give me 30 minutes," she stated.
30 minutes later, and the sun was gone now, and a small fire was now in the middle of the circle. Everyone except from Wendy looked completely bored stiff.
"Yes!" she squealed.
"You've cracked it?" Gajeel questioned. Wendy nodded.
"Let's hear it!" Natsu replied excitedly. She placed it where everyone could see.
"Okay, from what I can gather it reads: To those who want to see the land of beasts, four keys must unlock with desired strength. Bind the heavens with the earth and it's oceans with hell, and the path will become clear," she recited from a piece of paper in her hand.
"A riddle?" Lily pondered.
"Count me out!" Natsu and Gajeel said together. Sienna and Wendy looked at them with a 'how useless can you guys be' look.
"Don't worry, Wendy. I'll try and crack it for you," Sienna claimed. She took the piece of paper from Wendy and studied what she had just read out. "Well, the 'land of beasts', probably refers to the place where the dragons have disappeared to," Sienna claimed.
"Oh yeah! How did I not see that?" Natsu asked himself.
"Maybe because you're an idiot," Sienna responded.
"That's cold!"
"The next two lines though are the most difficult. 'Four keys must unlocked with desired strength', and 'bind the heavens with the earth and the oceans with hell'. Hmmm…" Sienna wondered.
Over the next hour or so, she was still having trouble deciphering it. Eventually, she decided it was best to call it a night, and slept on it. The next morning it was bright and crisp. Sienna was the first one up, followed by Natsu. When Gajeel awoke, Sienna was sitting cross-legged on her blanket, but Natsu was nowhere to be found. He sat up, feeling a bit foggy. He noticed Sienna hard at work, not noticing that he had woken up.
"Any luck?" he asked. She snapped her head up surprised by his sudden voice.
"Gajeel, hey…No, I'm getting nowhere with this. There just doesn't seem to be any logic to it. Seriously who writes instructions in a riddle AND an ancient language!" she complained exhausted and fed up.
"I see," He looked around. "Where's the pyro?"
"If you mean Natsu, he went into the forest to try and find something edible," she explained. She was still studying the words. Gajeel got up and went to the lake to freshen himself up. When Natsu returned, Wendy and the exceeds where up and he had found a dead rabbit that he cooked with his fire, but everyone except form him and Happy turned it down. After he had eaten, he and Gajeel managed to get in to a fight.
"Can't she go any faster!" Natsu yelled.
"Shut up! It's not like you can do any better!" Gajeel retaliated.
"Oh yeah says you!" Natsu threw. Sienna stood up angrily.
"Look Natsu I'm trying my freaking best here!" she shouted.
"But we can't keep waiting like this! Sooner or later someone will come looking for us!" Natsu explained.
"So what do you suggest Natsu? Any bright ideas coming from that thick skull of yours?" Sienna asked angrily.
"Yeah!" He snatched it off the floor with one hand and with the other he produced some flames. "I'm gonna break it open with a little fire!"
"Idiot! You can't solve everything by burning it!" Gajeel shouted. He managed to snatch it out of Natsu's hand. As he did Natsu's fire covered hand almost touched the box. As it did, Sienna noticed something; the part of the picture that looked like some rocks with lava on it lit up a bit. Sienna's world went silent apart from the words inside her head that Wendy had recited before.
"…To those who want to see the land of beasts, four keys must unlock with desired strength. Bind the heavens with the earth and it's oceans with hell, and the path will become clear…" A light bulb went off in Sienna's head.
"THAT'S IT!" she cried. Natsu and Gajeel stopped fighting.
"What's it?" they asked together.
"Natsu! You genius! I could freaking kiss you!" she cried.
"…Well I'm not gonna shy away from things," Natsu said smugly.
"I'm not gonna kiss you," Sienna muttered. Natsu looked disappointed. "I can't believe I didn't see this before! It's so obvious!"
"Come on then. Let's hear it," Lily said. They all huddled a bit closer together.
"Okay here goes, listen up. The heavens, the earth, the oceans and hell. Don't you think they're a bit of an odd choice of words?" she asked.
"Well I guess so," Natsu replied.
"I'm still not getting the point," Gajeel stated.
"Okay. I noticed this when Natsu tried to touch the box with his flames. When he almost touched it, that part..." She pointed to the bit that lit up before. "Lit up,"
"But what does that mean?" Wendy asked.
"It means that, these different places as it where represent something; they represent the elements!" Sienna squealed. She pointed to the individual parts of the picture as she spoke. "The heavens, is air. The earth, earth. The oceans, water. And hell, fire," she continued.
"Go on," Natsu commented.
"However these are not just the four elements. As it says before '4 keys must unlock with desired strength'. Another word for desired, could be required. And that required strength is…dragon slayer magic!"
"Hang on where did that come from?" Carle asked.
"Think about it. Last night it was close to that fire right? But nothing happened. That's because the fire wasn't made by Natsu. But when Natsu tried to touch it with dragon slayer magic, it responded to it,"
"Wait a second. Does that mean…?" Wendy pondered. Sienna nodded. She looked at the individual people as she spoke their names.
"Yeah. Wendy, the sky dragon slayer, you're the 'heavens' part. Gajeel, the iron dragon slayer, you're the 'earth'. Me, the water dragon slayer, I'm the 'oceans'. And you Natsu, the fire dragon slayer, you're the 'hell' part of the riddle. But if you consider all of this, then it's no wonder Shin Hirako only wanted dragon slayers for this job. The job wasn't to try and get this back to him, it was to return it to us,"
"Wait a second. How does that make the job aim change?" Natsu questioned.
"Well, think about it. Those runes outside his house, they were designed so that no other dragon slayer could enter, apart from us. Meaning he only wanted us in particular to complete this. If he didn't want us to get our hands on this, then he would have simply asked any old wizard for the job," Sienna finished explaining. Everyone looked at her with amazement.
"Woah…" Wendy said in shock.
"I'll say! You got all that from just Natsu trying to break it open. That's pretty damn impressive," Lily added.
"Nice work there!" Gajeel commented.
"Wait, wait, wait!" Natsu called.
"What is it?" Sienna enquired. He was looking down.
"Why…?" he asked. Everyone looked at him. He looked up. "Why am I being called 'hell'?" he questioned as if he was about to cry. They all gave him a dumbfounded look.
"Natsu…please sort out your priorities in life…" Sienna muttered. The atmosphere then got a lot more promising.
"That doesn't matter now. All that matters is that we can open this thing," Gajeel stated.
"Yeah. But how exactly?" Wendy wondered.
"At a guess, we all try and put our magical energy together," Sienna claimed. Gajeel placed the box on the ground and they all crouched down. Wendy put her hand out and summoned a bit of magical energy in her hand and placed it over the top. The heaven part lit up. Gajeel then put his hand on top of hers, and the earth part lit up. Sienna then placed her hand on top of his and the ocean part lit up. Lastly, Natsu put his hand on the top and the last part lit up. The light being emitted was intense, but after a few seconds dies down. They all took their hands away and saw that the box now had a lid on top. Wendy took of the lid, and they all looked inside. There was nothing in there but a piece of paper.
"A note?" Natsu questioned. Gajeel took it out and unfolded it.
"Well done Dragon Slayers. Now that you have opened this box, you'll now have the chance to reunite yourselves with your dragon slayers. However, you'll have to fight every step of the way. This is not something that can be accomplished with pure strength. You need to trust in yourselves and in your allies. I trust that you'll have more success than I did. Good luck. Signed, Shin Hirako," Gajeel read.
"Wait, does that mean he's already gone where ever it is before?" Sienna asked. Her questioned was answered as a huge yellow light poured out the box.
"What the…?" Natsu cried.
"What's happening?" Wendy called.
"Natsu!" Happy yelled. The bright light then radiated everywhere.
Natsu opened his eyes. He could tell he was not in the same place as before. He lifted his head up, and saw the landscape had completely changed. They were no longer in forest. They were on a peak of some sort with a mountainous landscape out in front of him. He stood up and looked around and saw everyone else with their eyes closed lying on the ground around him.
"Happy! Wake up!" he called as he went over to Happy and shook him. Happy woke up.
"Natsu…?" Natsu just smiled. The both of them went around waking everyone up. Natsu woke up Wendy and Sienna, and Happy woke up Lily, Carle and Gajeel.
"Man my head is killing me!" Sienna moaned.
"Where are we?" Wendy asked.
"Not a clue," Natsu responded. Just then they all heard an almighty roar. It sent a shiver down their spines. They then saw in the distance, from behind a cliff, a dragon's head emerged.