Hey guys I'm so sorry for the huge delay. To answer a couple of your guy's questions, yeah that was Silver in the last chapter. AND OMG THE NEWEST CHAPTER SCARES ME! Although… That newest chapter puts a huge split of canon for a lot of my Fairy Tail writing for some reason. In both this story and my upcoming one.
And that new opening from yesterday's new episode rocks too. If the future openings are going to be like the two ones that we have seen so far in this series of Fairy Tail then I'm definitely gonna love this series's openings as much as I loved the previous ones!
I hope you guys enjoy this chapter, this is going to clear up a lot of mystery of the story probably.
Gray stiffened and turned around. Apollion stood there with a cold expression on his face.
"I was wondering how you managed to take so long Gray. I mean we left from the same place, you left before I did! And I still got back here way before you did." The man gave a proud grin that quickly reversed into a frown. "But who are these two?"
Gray cleared his throat, but Juvia moved forward. "Juvia and Megan are Gray-sama's teammates. We helped him along the way here and wish to join the guild with Gray-sama." The blue haired woman didn't notice Gray facepalming behind her or Megan's awkward look.
Apollion looked her over carefully, perhaps with a little more attention then a man should have given a woman. Gray noticed this with narrowed eyes. Then Apollion brought his gaze back to Gray's. "Okay then, lets talk about it more inside. I'm sure you three have been outside and traveling for long enough, especially after a fight."
The man turned and stalked away, leaving the three to follow him inside the dark base. Juvia felt slight chills down her body and wondered briefly if her body could possibly freeze from water to ice. She dismissed the thought and braced herself for what could possibly happen inside the Hellfire Imp headquarters.
The halls were dark and although there was faint noise that could be heard from up ahead their footprints echoed around them. Juvia glanced at Megan; the ring mage was staring at a dark mark on Apollion's shoulder, the smirking face of an imp sat on his skin in black. Is it their guildmark? She seemed unusually pale and stiff while she stared at it. Juvia felt slightly confused.
"Umm Megan— Are you all right?"
The woman jumped slightly and gave Juvia a nervous look. "Of course!" Her voice sounded a little too perky, like she was trying too hard to sound alright.
They reached the end of the hallway and a brightly lit room greeted them. Juvia looked around. It was full of dark mages and she felt hairs rise on her arms from the cold looks they gave her. Tension floated around the room until Apollion laughed.
"Come on guys, no need to get quiet all of a sudden. We just got some new recruits, that's all." The guild master waved a hand and the sound level in the room went from silent to shaking with noise. "Now listen up." He didn't bother to glance over his shoulder or look at them in any way as he continued. "Gray will come with me. We have some… things to discuss. You two girls can stay and get comfy with your new guildmates. I'll have someone escort you to your rooms later."
He walked off with Gray following him, leaving the two girls behind.
"Hey there." They turned to the voice behind them and saw a girl with a couple of piercings and a pink Mohawk. "You're newbs right? Welcome to Hell." She smirked. "Name's Amy."
"I thought you were determined to save your guildmates, instead you let one of them join you when you know what's going to happen?" Apollion asked Gray. He closed and reopened his blue eyes with a sigh.
"It's not as if I chose her to follow me… She did it of her own accord, and I can't just let her rot away from being heartbroken."
A hard chuckle followed that. "So you like her?"
"What no!" But Gray glanced over his shoulder to make sure that the said stalker wasn't listening it; he could never tell if she was.
"Well then leaving her shouldn't be a problem now should it? I'm really surprised that you think your old guild really stands a chance against us, or the prophecy." Apollion lifted his hand to his head and scratched it half-heartedly. Gray felt a ripple of disgust, his body twitched in reaction to the emotion.
"Fairy Tail can do anything if they need to; I only wish that I would be alive to join them against you," Gray said, his voice was frigid and lined with a razor sharp edge. They continued walking.
"Wow, for a traitor you sure are loyal, it's a good thing that you only need to fulfill the prophecy." His head turned and met Gray's gaze. Distrust was exchanged faster than light and within the speed of a second his head turned back around.
Stupid prophecy, I know it's lame to believe that it will come true but I just feel it. I'm not sure I can really fight it. And my only hope of it ending is Fairy Tail realizing what the danger is and overcoming it? He shook his head. There was such a small chance of that happening.
"I am still doing it aren't I?" Gray growled. The two lapsed into a tense silence. Gray observed that they were taking different directions then he did in the one previous time he was here and shot Apollion a questioning look.
As if reading his mind, the man spoke. "There's someone who needs to talk to you, you'll know him when you see him. But there is business that be discussed right away." Gray suddenly felt a chill, which was strange considering that his body was already as cold as ice. There was a sinking feeling that whoever this man he had to speak to was, both him and the conversation wasn't going to be pleasant.
They reached the room and Gray watched as Apollion tersely opened the door. It was large and black and radiated cold magical energy.
They walked in. Gray saw the one man he never wanted to see again in his life and stiffened. His fists clenched and his nails dug into his cold skin. "Deliora!" he spat.
Silver, or Deliora as he really was, smiled. "Good to see you again, son."
"I'm not your son you bastard." Silver's eyebrow rose at that and he let out a chuckle.
"I see that you haven't changed since the fight that we had a while ago."
The sound of a slap was left hanging in the air as Gray strode up to his "father" and struck his face with his hand. "I see that you are still alive after all of it." Gray's voice was cold and unpleased, and he eyed at the man in front of him with obvious distaste.
"It's not as if I am exactly pleased at you still being here either Gray. Unfortunately I need you to accomplish something for me, otherwise I would like for nothing more than to destroy you." Silver said testily. He matched word with action and shoved Gray away. He had done it with more force than intended and the ice mage stumbled against the wall on the opposite side of the room.
Gray leaned away from the wall and prepared to use his magic, but was stopped with a loud coughing from Apollion. "I thought we were actually going to get something done this time?" He glared icicles at Silver. "You asked to see him, don't kill him now that he's here. It's bad enough you can't do the damn thing! Don't kill the only other known one who can."
"Psh. It's not as if I'm anything special, there's nothing stopping you two from finding some other ice make mage around. It's not a lost magic." Gray stuck his hands in his pockets. He raised an eyebrow at the demon in front of him. "Hey wait a minute… Deliora. You're an ice mage yourself, why can't you do it? Haven't you thought of doing it, or are you too afraid of losing your own life again?"
Both Gray and Apollion both fully expected Silver to get mad and do something. Instead the man just stood still and smiled. He chuckled and stared Gray in the eye coolly. His black eyes met Gray's dark blue. "Yes while I do desire keeping my own life throughout this prophecy. I'm afraid the main reason I cannot be the one to fulfill it. After our last fight I've been severely drained of my former power, and in this case I cannot supply the amount of strength needed to cast the final spell. Also, while the prophecy might be vague and simply mention ice magic, I'm sure that my ice demonslayer magic counts."
He moved quietly over to Gray. The action was so deftly done that Gray didn't even realize that Silver was in front of him. "And you are the only one who can do this. You were taught by Ur herself, and Ultear unfortunately is not here now nor did she inherit her mother's skill with ice make. We need you to do this."
"So let me get this straight," Gray started. "You want me to sacrifice myself with a reverse Iced Shell to summon Acnologia, and you are going to use my sacrifice to cause the end of the world. How the hell does that benefit you anyway Deliora? Doesn't that mean that you lose your life anyway?"
Silver shrugged, and a gleam of fake innocence sparked in his eyes. "I'm too weak to do anything anyway. There can be no world domination when I am trapped in this form and my magic is significantly weaker. Our last fight guaranteed my days of being a large, mass murdering demon were over." He gave a light smile. "Besides, humans are on the verge of wiping each other out soon. Demons are plotting as time moves on and things are happening that not even we demons have a clue what is going on. Destruction is a part of life and if it doesn't come one way, it comes another. You mortals have known this your whole lives, after you live you die. The earth would be the same."
Gray was stunned, speechless, unable to act. The amount of lies that he could so blatantly see through. Did this demon really believe that Gray would buy it? No. Deliora was smarter than that. Or was he being honest. Why were demons so fond of mind tricks? Gray's mind stumbled through the thoughts and he wished that the demon would reveal his deep intentions.
A scoff from Apollion seemed to signal agreement with Gray's thoughts. Silver clearly didn't give the full answer. Although… His words had a shred of sense in them, something that made perfect sense, something that Gray already knew.
Silver seemed satisfied. "But the ritual to use reverse Iced Shell isn't for another few months at least, I suggest you spend some time with these teammates of yours for that time. Besides we still need to still track down the relics."
"Relics?" Gray asked. This wasn't something he had been told of before. Despite being the key part of the plan he had only been told little of it. Apollion nodded his head a little.
"The relic we need to control Acnologia. If we just summon him without it then it will be mindless destruction, which will lead to the world being wiped out. But with the right artifact…" He glanced at Silver.
"-we'll be able to control the damage, and rule this world." The demon finished.
"But you guys said that the world would be destroyed!"
"And it will, but if we do this right there will still be people left over to revive it afterwards." Silver said. He gave him a slight wave of his hand in dismissal of his anger, which only infuriated Gray more. His fists clenched. How could they be so nonchalant about this? "We will still rule and rebuild."
"But all I'm doing is dying to serve your guy's intentions. Like this even Fairy Tail will be obliterated. And you guys said that they would be left out of it."
"No. You're the one who said that they would make it out of this and stop us Gray. Did you really guess that we would leave Fairy Tail unharmed? They've interfered with plans before, nothing is going to stop them from interfering again because of their friends," sneered Apollion. The dark guildmaster folded his arms across his chest. His amused expression caused his cold rage to continue to bubble. Not how rage. All of him was cold at this point. Except for a small ember a hope that sparked when Apollion mentioned Fairy Tail. Gray guessed that maybe he wasn't frozen solid inside after all.
"It doesn't matter what I do, because they will stop you in the end. Whether I die or not," Gray said. He held both Apollion's and Silver's stares and made them understand. He was not doing this willingly. But he could tell they weren't convinced.
"What about your blue-haired friend who was eyeing you fondly," it was more of a statement than a question. Gray stiffened. Juvia was the kind of person who would stop at nothing to save him, and follow him to the afterlife if he died. He had foolishly taken the one person who would try to die with him-if not for him-when he died, instead of leaving her at the guild. He couldn't do that. He cared for the water mage too much to let that happen.
But she has Megan, and I'm sure Fairy Tail would happily take her back after this whole thing is over. She is one of us after all. There it went. He said us. He thought it as if he was still one of them. Maybe I still am. He thought amusingly. But I can't count myself with them anymore. Juvia's heart may break, but he hoped that somehow she might actually find the love that she deserves.
He realized that one of the guys in the room said something, so he tuned back into them to hear. "What?"
Apollion sighed and Silver kept his motionless posture. He didn't even move with breath. Why should he? He's an ice demon with a dead body as a vessel, it's not as if oxygen was on his list of needs.
"I said, Fullbuster, that by your silence then obviously she wouldn't take your death very well." His the edges of his mouth lessened slightly in their frown. "That makes more enjoyable suffering to see."
"Juvia will manage just fine with my death. She has Megan to help her through everything." Gray purged any emotion from his voice with his statement. He was starting to lose the frozen ice wall he had adopted to make his decent into darkness easier, but being around Juvia was starting to soften it. Which was a bad thing to do here of all places. He would have to be more careful.
"Anyway, onto your mission Gray. I trust that by your leisurely pace getting here you do have enough energy by now to do another mission?" Silver asked.
Gray nodded. "Yea, what do I need to do?"
"It's not something you need to do on your own, I think that you might have more success with your friends helping you on the mission."
"Okay." Gray nodded. There wasn't much time to waste if they had to find a set of relics in a few months. "Where's the first one?"
Apollion chuckled and beckoned Gray over to the desk him and Silver now stood at. Gray heeded the gesture and looked down at a map of Fiore.
"This is where the first one is believed to be." He pointed to an area on the map. Gray looked at it with a raised eyebrow.
"So you're only sixteen, and you've already destroyed half of a legal guild?" Juvia asked. She felt a small weight in her stomach at the thought of a legal guild, one that could have possibly been one of Fairy Tail's allies, attacked. With half of their members murdered in the end by the earth make mage. She gave a proud grin.
"Yup!" she shouted over the loud partying noise of the background. Most of the other members of the guild were hanging out and chattering, leaving Amy, Juvia and Megan to their own little conversation.
Juvia shuddered slightly. She glanced over at Megan to see her reaction. The ring mage had visibly relaxed, although there was still a hesitant gleam in her eyes that showed her resistance to calm down.
"Oh both you and Juvia are so young, and so powerful. Meanwhile I can hardly do much more than keep a few rings activated over a little while," Megan said. She glared at them with eyes full of playful envy.
"How old are you Megan?" Amy asked. Whatever happened to don't ask a woman her age apparently was never told to her. Although Megan didn't seem to bothered by it.
"Thirty-four." She answered. The two offered surprised looks at the ring mage.
"Juvia is surprised, Megan looks so young!" Juvia gushed. Megan laughed and smiled. Apparently the phrase "never ask a girl her age" was never taught to Juvia. Thankfully Megan didn't seem to mind much.
"Well of course! How else do you think I would find a boyf-" she broke off and averted her gaze. Juvia could see that she was still not entirely over her boyfriend. She wished that her new best friend would find love like her and her Gray-sama.
What was her Gray-sama talking about in the other room with that scary looking man? Juvia found herself instinctually looking in the direction he went in. Should Juvia be worried about Gray-sama?
"Hey Juvia." She turned back to the two girls. Megan smiled at her, although the stress generated from the last question still showed plainly on her face. "How old are you?"
"Juvia is eighteen," she replied with a smile of her own.
"Really? Argh, that means I'm the oldest, and by a lot too!" Megan said, gaping slightly. What age did Megan think Juvia was? Juvia gave the ring mage a weird look.
Before Juvia could bring it up though Amy drew the focus back to herself, her expression serious. " You two seem pretty decent, actually you guys seem like you would be in more of a light guild than a dark one. Why here"
"Megan is helping Juvia, and Juvia goes where her Gray-sama goes!"
"Who's Gray? That guy you guys came in with. I've only seen him here once, and you say that he's already apart of the guild? Weird… Although he has some pretty dark plans with the guild master, that much I know."
"Juvia will assist Gray-sama however she can, Juvia loves him too much to let her darling's plans fail," she declared.
"I will assist him as well, as far as Juvia wants us to," she said with a slight blush on her face on the conversation of Gray.
"Hey Amy, that auburn hair looks familiar, I've seen her somewhere before," said a green haired girl who had just sauntered up to them. She placed stood partially on one of the seats and stared intensely at Megan. "What's your name?"
"Megan, Megan Wish," she said, narrowing her eyes as she did so. She appeared tense and hostile. Her arms were crossed and her expression was calm but expressionless. Juvia was confused. Megan once said her last name was Foxlord though, why would she lie here?
There was something more to Megan, and Juvia wasn't sure whether to press it or leave it. She decided to question her about it later.
"Oh okay, I remember having a super rich client long ago, I don't really remember the first name… I suck with those; I only remember that the last name was Foxlord… Oh and her name started with M!" A ball of frozen water plumped into Juvia's stomach harshly at that. It sounded like it was Megan, but not only was Megan denying it but if it was Megan she was requesting help from a dark guild.
Apparently the ring mage had a lot more of a past then she let on.
"But your memory is extremely buggy anyway Jeskyre, even if you can remember last names it's amazing if you remember much else. Which is rather hilarious considering your supposed to use northern solid script!" Amy said with a chuckle and gave her friend a teasing look. "I bet that you can't remember half the words that you have to write!" Her friend gave her an annoyed look in return.
Juvia looked between the two other member's exchange and Megan. She stood up and peered down at her feet. She needed to think about these things. She heard the scuffle of feet and a hand gently placed on her shoulder. She glanced back up and stared into Megan's green eyes.
Juvia thought she saw Megan give a slight smile at her, perhaps an attempt to reassure her? However there was an indescribable gleam of emotion that darkened her eyes to a dark green. Juvia gave a slight nod to the ring mage, words being spoken silently between each other. Then Megan removed her hand and Juvia coughed, to both clear her throat and to gather their attention.
Juvia opened her mouth slightly and the girl named Jeskyre perked up slightly. "Oh yeah, I need to give you guy's your Hellfire Imp guild marks!" She withdrew a stamp from her leather jacket and asked, "what color?"
Megan moved forward first and slipped down the left side of her shirt so that her shoulder was showing. "I'll have it here, in light green." She got herself stamped with the face of a smirking imp. Then it was Juvia's turn, she moved over and silently hoped that she could hide her Fairy Tail mark. Unfortunately it would probably fade off when she got the new one.
Suddenly the doors burst open and the guild fell into silence again, before the noise levels shot through the roof as Gray and the creepy man from before walked out. Gray walked by them, grabbing the back of Juvia's shirt and pulling her away. This drew Megan away from them as well as they started to leave the building. She noticed that his zodiac blue eyes were careful… but tired.
"Hey, Juvia hasn't gotten a guild stamp yet," Megan said but Gray interrupted with a wave of his hand. Juvia then noticed the crumpled paper in his grip.
"Doesn't matter, she can get one when we get back. We have a mission to do."
"Already?" Gray nodded and they walked out. They walked out but as Juvia glanced behind her she saw concern in Jeskyre's and Amy's eyes. And pleasure in the creepy man's gaze. She shivered in dread, not anticipation, at what was ahead of them.