Chapter Thirty-eight
It was a few hours later when Levy had finally gotten to the guild. The constant questions of what happened and what we had found out from my team, and others brave enough to approach Laxus' glare, had become beyond annoying. The second I saw Levy and Gajeel walk through the door, Levy using Gajeel's arm for support as she limped forward, I said that Levy had been doing all related research so she would have the answers, sending an only slightly apologetic smile in their direction. A glare and growl combination from Gajeel was all that was needed to send the other members of the guild scurrying back to their respective tables.
With everyone else out of view, the Master was able to call Levy's complete attention to him.
"So, Levy," Master's voice was loud enough to be heard over whoever had been speaking, and immediately silenced those people, "tell us what you found in these last few weeks."
Levy hobbled further into the guild, closer to the center to be heard by everyone.
"To be honest, Master, I never found anything concrete while in the Council library." I felt both mine and Laxus' annoyance climb at the mention that all the time we spent there was a waste. "It was all purely speculation, and nothing I didn't already know."
For all we know the council only let two people in to make the process go slower so that they could keep an eye on us longer. I felt Laxus' words form in my mind, something that rarely came in so clear unless it was a powerful thought driven by an equally powerful emotion. I couldn't help but agree with the feeling that it was more than likely true.
"I had been able to narrow possible groups down over those weeks, but today, thanks to the information Lucy gathered when we were attacked, I believe I found the group." The guild broke into hushed whispers upon hearing that someone would attack us while we were in the Council Headquarters.
Levy coughed lightly to regain attention, "From what Gajeel told me about what Lucy had discovered about the group I was able to find that there was a small dark guild that had recently changed it's name when someone else took over. The guild seemed to get super powered overnight, which probably comes from the new master's magic," Levy turned to me for a quick moment, "it was called Share, wasn't it, Lu?" When I nodded and made a noise of agreement in return she looked back to the Master.
"The guild is called Moonlight Reaper, I found a picture someone had taken of one of their members and they have their mark revealed." Levy held up a paper in front of her that I hadn't noticed she was holding. "I was hoping to show it to everyone who fought with the group that attacked us and see if they recognized it before I told everyone about all of this, in case it wasn't the right guild or organization."
Levy quirked an eyebrow slightly and I saw Master nod, giving his consent to stop the discussion for a few minutes. Levy tottered to Jet and Droy first and lifted the page for them to see, to which they both shook their head.
"Sorry, Levy, we didn't get a chance to see." Droy started.
"Ya, we were a little busy fighting a guy who could duplicate himself at will." Jet finished, rubbing the back of his neck.
Levy nodded in understanding, and turned and began walking to the table the rest of us were sitting at. She handed the page over to Freid and he stared at it quizzically, Evergreen leaned to see the image as well, pursing her lips in thought. After a few short moments the paper made its way to Laxus, then to Bixlow, who held it in his left hand at a distance at which I could see as well.
The image was blurry, as if the person who took it was shaking while the person in the picture was moving. It was also taken so that only half the guild mark was visible, if even that much. Only a line and two curving points were visible. Bixlow was beginning to shake his head and say that he hadn't seen it when I spoke up.
"Wait a minute. Bixlow, we've seen this before. It was the brand on Beta's arm." I said, pulling the paper a little closer to me. "It was glowing red at the time though." I added as an afterthought. Bixlow's lips thinned, and I could assume that his eyebrows scrunched together, as he thought and tried to remember. "It was right before they retreated." I paused, bringing a finger to my chin, "Though, you were losing a large amount of blood at the time, I don't blame you if you don't remember." I heard more hushed whispers from the guild at this new information.
"I remember him talking to himself while holding his arm, I don't remember a mark though. You were probably at a better angle to see it."
"I guess that could be it, " I crossed my arms over my chest, "do any of you remember seeing a glowing mark just before they took off?" The entire group who had fought them paused to think before shaking their heads with various grunts and words of denial.
"Hold on, Lu," Levy started, her face grim.
"Levy, what-" Everyone in the room seemed to feel the darkening aura around Levy, in turn focusing solely on her.
"If you are correct that this is their guild mark, then I would have said that the guild is rumoured to be small and we would have been able to handle it with little difficulty," Levy's voice was serious and void of emotion. "but you said that it was glowing red?" I nodded slightly, "So, then, it's safe to assume that their guild mark is also their brand that allows them to share magic between eachother, which means that this new master must have an impossibly large magic storage if he's willing to do that." Levy paused to think about it a second longer, "That is, unless, the guild mark only serves as a brand for their strongest members, a system that would be similar to our S-class system."
"If either of those are the case, if we go after that guild haphazardly then we'd be extremely outclassed." I jump on Levy's train of thought, "An entire guild able to share their magic with eachother, assuming they know how to use the magic, well..." I trailed off.
"It would be impossible to predict what they would do and what magic they would use." Freid picked up where I left off. "We were only up against four mages and we barely stood on equal ground with them. The mage we were up against barely used the other's magics, as well."
The entire guild seemed to stop breathing at the fact that the Raijinshuu, one of Fairy Tail's most powerful teams, along with Gajeel, myself, and Team Shadowgear couldn't defeat these unknown mages, these four mages, with ease and still have magic and time to spare.
Minutes, or maybe only seconds, passed by before Master cleared his throat to garner the attention of the downtrodden guild.
"You keep speaking of your fights with these mages, and the rest of us don't have a clue what you speak of. Would you care to fill us in?"
Freid nodded and began giving a quick summary of what Beta had told me of the Share magic. Freid stood, taking the floor, motioning for Levy to take his seat, to which she gratefully accepted with a smile. If I were more like Mira, and less worried about Gajeel's fierce dragon possessiveness, I probably would be coming up with different matchmaking scenarios in my mind for the two. I felt eyes on me and looked around the table to see Laxus focused on me with a single brow raised in confusion. I felt a light blush form on my face as I realised he probably felt my enjoyment at the thought of Levy and Freid becoming a couple. I shook my head quickly, hopefully telling him that it was nothing important.
Maybe I'm a little more like Mira than I thought.
"Jet, Droy, Evergreen, and myself were up against a young mage, no more than sixteen, who had the magic to duplicate himself at will. Since he was able to make at least a dozen copies of himself at a time we assume that his true magic was the Multiply magic that Lucy had been told about. He didn't appear to use the other magics besides the Speed magic to attack us and get away from us before we could attack."
"We did manage to hit him on several occasions thanks to Droy, Evergreen and I having magic that doesn't need us to physically come into contact with him and Jet being able to keep up with his Speed. Though, everytime we did manage to cause damage to him, he got rid of that particular duplicate and the damage was spread and lessened across the rest of the duplicates." Fried continued to tell the guild of his and the other's fight against the Multiply Mage, with commentary from Evergreen, Jet and Droy.
Bixlow spoke next, telling everyone about what happened while fighting and I interjected occasionally when I had seen something that he didn't.
Laxus and Gajeel were straight to the point when telling us about their fights with the last two mages.
Gajeel said that he had gone against the speed mage, which was apparently fast enough that even his dragon enhanced eyes had difficulty keeping up. The speed mage used an O Katana, a longer form of a katana, to attack, though he also had a Kodachi blade. The only other magic the mage used was Portal magic, which was because Gajeel had begun separating iron from his body to create walls and other obstacles to try and slow the Speed Mage down.
Laxus told us that Adrian was the Portal magic user, and the apparent leader of the small group. Adrian used small throwing knives, creating portals to change their trajectory or to hit a blind spot. Laxus also said that the knives could change speed depending on how many portals Adrian created, and how far apart the portals were. According to Laxus, Adrian could create any number of portals and correctly determine which ones to send the knives through to get a hit on him. I think the only people who noticed the guilty glance that was sent my way were myself, the Raijinshuu and Master.
Master sat thinking amongst the guild's hushed murmurs, all pertaining to Moonlight Reaper and their abilities.
After a few moments longer, Master released a long breath and opened his eyes, staring at our group, "You are the one's who fought against them. What is it you think we should do?"
Nobody said anything for an instant until Bixlow nudged me in the back with his good arm.
"Oh, right!" I stood looking at the Master, "This is what I wanted to talk to you about." I took a few steps closer so that I could look at him more directly, coughing to clear the sudden lump in my throat, feeling nervous about voicing my opinion. "I was thinking that, maybe, we should go to another guild for help. Well, not really the guild, but one specific member."
Master looked at me for what felt like a long while, seeming to think over my proposal. After some minutes, or maybe only seconds, he sighed and ran and wrinkled hand through what little hair he had left.
"Who did you have in mind?"
"Hibiki of Blue Pegasus." A shot of anger and jealousy shot up my spine at the mention of the most flirtatious guild in Fiore, along with it's most flirtatious member and number one bachelor.
"I'll be back soon." ... Two months later.
Anyways, hello, my dear muses. So, I have a general idea for what I'm going to do next, but it's basically just an outline. I have a little written out, but not really all that much. It will probably still take me a while for chapters to come out, SO, if there is anything, anything at all, that you all would like to read happen, review and let me know.