Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail. Hiro Mashima does. This story was made for fun, and not for cash. (How unfortunate.)
Chapter 21: The Last Seal, The First Master
Sting had awoken to the sounds of birds chirping on the ledges of his room's balcony, along with light shining through the windows while the sun was rising into the sky. That signaled the end of the third night and the beginning of the fourth day of the Grand Magic Games. Sting knew the sponsors had never changed how the battle format went, even though they changed the events, and this was the day for the tag-team battles to occur. Instead of battling alone, people had to battle in teams of two.
He still remembered how he and Rogue lost to Natsu and Gajeel last year, causing Jiemma to be extremely angry with them. Sting wanted to win against them as payback for Fairy Tail having Mavis to give them an easy strategy for victory. That was certainly an unfair advantage, was it not? He didn't want to just win for his sake, but he wanted to be partnered with Lucy because she had her reasons for wanting to get back at her brash ex-boyfriend. Natsu kicked her off of his team, and Lucy thought that by beating Fairy Tail that she would be stronger than how she was in the past.
Also, Sting had the intent of winning in his blue eyes from witnessing Natsu's brash and dense attitude firsthand during the Pillar Battle event. The fire dragon slayer referred to Lucy as useless, which definitely prompted him to get first place. Not only did Sting detest Natsu's attitude towards Lucy, but the fact that he had been bullying her around like she was weaker than him and showed no remorse whatsoever about the whole situation only fueled Sting's drive to win today. He was going to make his girlfriend proud, especially if they were partnered up today.
Drifting his negative thoughts and passionate drive aside for a moment, Sting smiled a little when he saw his girlfriend sleeping and snoring softly while having her head on his chest while her hands were on the white dragon slayer's rock-hard abdominals. Lucy was smiling and blushing happily while she was still getting her energy back from using the spells of Heavenly Body Magic, and she let out a blissful sigh while she appeared to be having a wonderful dream. When she unconsciously planted a kiss on Sting's chest, he chuckled a little bit and ran his fingers through her long blonde hair.
The soft and warm feeling caused Lucy to slowly open her cocoa brown eyes, and she blushed a deep shade of red while gasping a little when she looked up at Sting to see him chuckling happily from her lips giving soft kisses to his skin. She released her lips from his skin, and smiled when Sting put his arms around her waist. The duo laid under the white bed sheets together, realizing they were both nude, but they had trusted each other immensely to know that moves wouldn't be made in any way unless they wanted to reach that point in their relationship.
"Good morning, Sting. It's a beautiful morning for the fourth day, and that sunrise feels so renewing. Fate might truly shine on us today." Lucy told him while smiling and speaking in her beautifully calm voice, before looking into her boyfriend's enchanting blue eyes and happily giggling.
"The sunrise isn't beautiful like you, though. Anyway, I hope you know that today is going to be where people battle in pairs for the tag-team battles. It's been like that ever since the Grand Magic Games first began. I just know it'll be some far from random matchup, since Sabertooth fought against Fairy Tail last year. Good morning to you, too, by the way." Sting replied with his usual cocky grin, as he looked into her brown eyes that were filled with determination and caressed her back softly.
Lucy had remembered last year's tag battle between Fairy Tail and Sabertooth, and she had been cheering for Natsu. This year, as a member of Sabertooth, she was no longer weak like how she had been back then. If she were to compete alongside Sting, with Natsu and whoever else as her opponents, if would definitely be a test to herself to see if her future could officially overcome her past. It would also be pretty lucky, if the matchup perfectly ended up in her favor. Wouldn't that certainly be a gift from fate?
Now that it was the fourth day, she also wondered what the event would be like. She knew from personal experience how Minerva had almost killed her in the Naval Battle last year, but Lucy also knew that was ancient history. Minerva had not been seen since last year's Grand Magic Games, making some people wonder what had happened to her, and not a trace of her had been found anywhere. What would the event for the fourth day be like, with the past three events being different for the competition this year?
"Well, no matter who it is from Fairy Tail, we're going to win this thing! I might not be as strong as Erza or Laxus right now, but that will not stop me from trying my best to wipe that arrogant grin off of my jerky ex-boyfriend's face! He may think that it's funny to refer to me as weak, but I can tell you right now that I will definitely show Natsu how much of a threat I can be to him in a battle!" Lucy responded to Sting with confidence in her voice and strong sense of ambition in her cocoa brown eyes.
Sting could only smile at how much more emotionally strong Lucy had become, ever since the first job they did back in the sewers of Castelia Town, and her confidence and strength in herself had really been improving. In fact, when she had been sparring with Sting after the games were held on the first two days, their battles ended in a draw both times. Lucy had been getting physically stronger as well, most likely because of the power of her spell book, and all of her new strength was also improving the power of her Celestial Spirits as well.
Lucy got off of Sting, and she got out of the bed to stand up and stretch her body out. She felt her muscles pop and relax, before proceeding to walk over to the brown bureau in the room to get her pink spell book and pick out some cute clothes. She had now swapped rooms with Rogue, since Lucy had wanted to be closer to Sting, and she was very happy that Rogue agreed to the swap without any debate. Calm people like him and Yukino certainly got along fine, so there was nothing to worry about.
She had now put on a red T-shirt with a pink miniskirt to match, and Lucy also put on some black flat shoes as well. She always had a tendency to look her best in almost any outfit, but stylish clothes were not complete without a sweet smell to greatly go with them. Lucy had secretly put away the black bottle of perfume in the left pocket of her pink miniskirt last night, wanting to save its supposed power for when it would be needed by her, and she smiled happily at the thought of using this new gift that Karen had given her.
Sting had now gotten his usual clothes on, and he narrowed his eyes while looking at the alarm clock in the room that he now shared with Lucy. The Grand Magic Games started at 9:40 in the morning today, and it was now 8:50 in the morning. He smirked at the amount of time that him and Lucy had, prompting him to challenge her to another race to the Domus Flau. He kissed her lips softly, kissing them with passionate ease to get her psyched up, and Sting ran out of the room with a smile on his face. Lucy ran after him, not caring about the race, but to return that nice kiss.
15 minutes later...
After getting some bags of chocolate donut holes and mochaccinos to drink for breakfast, Sting and Lucy were on their way to the entrance of the Domus Flau. Feeling the warmth from the shining sun, the blonde girl had a poised smirk on her face. Even as she walking towards the day that could take any kind of turn, Lucy still had the belief that a sunrise foreshadowed great things to come her way. Would she be correct about this belief, and would Sting's prediction about the match-up also be correct?
As they made their way towards the entrance, someone quickly appeared in front of them with an awesome-looking black camera that had a great lens and other features like zooming in on things or changing the colors of things in the photos before they would be taken. Upon seeing her outfit and her long blondish hair that looked strangely familiar, Lucy got a much better look at the person and gasped in shock when she was able to recognize exactly who they were. Sting also looked surprised to see this woman, too.
It was Hikari, the villain who had a specialty for Lightning Magic, and Sting had remembered how she had trapped all of those people in her electricity for her training. They had fought her in the amusement park, getting on her nerves with Lucy's spells of Fire Magic, and Sting's strategy back then had really worked for the two Sabertooth mages. Sting narrowed his blue eyes while sternly glaring at Hikari, ready to strike her if she was going to use electricity from that camera to charge up one of her attacks.
However, Hikari giggled at the sight of both Sting and Lucy looking ready to try and strike her down. She smiled nicely while speaking in a calm manner, assuring them that she was not in a life of crime anymore, and that she had been working as a photographer for Sorcerer Magazine. This job had actually paid more money than what Hikari could get by using electricity on a slot machine to make all of its jewels come out for her, and all that she had to do was simply take photos of anyone who wanted their picture taken.
To make things even weirder, Hikari had let Sting and Lucy know that she was going to be the guest judge for the fourth day of the Grand Magic Games. Sting widened his eyes in shock, wondering how a former criminal got her name on the list of guest judges, not even knowing that Hikari had secretly put Rabian in a sphere of electricity when he was directing a scene in a theater of Nimbasa Town. Everyone thought that Hikari had been some new actress on the scene, but she just wanted a lighter reputation to match her name's meaning.
Lucy nicely told Hikari to take some pictures of her and Sting, prompting the blonde woman to smile confidently while she told the two mages to smile for the camera. As Hikari got to see Sting and Lucy kiss, do victory poses, make funny faces, and look flirtatious, she flashed the camera while turning it at different angles to get the best shots of the mages. Sting certainly had the confidence like a model to be in Wizard Magazine while Lucy had the beauty to become Miss Fiore. After a few more pictures were taken, the happy couple went on their way towards the arena and also knew they were on their way to winning.
10 minutes later…
Sting and Lucy made it to Sabertooth's booth where their teammates had been waiting for them, and they also looked over at the booths where the other teams were located. While Team Quatro Cerberus looked saddened about their losing streak happening once again, Team Sweet Melancholy looked pretty content about the fact that they had been keeping fourth place for a while now. Karen did not even seem to care about winning the trophy, by the way she was so fixated on Lucy, but seeing that new power would be like the victory of having a plan come to fruition.
Her shadowy pawns were actually not there to just take up filler battles, but they would eventually find out what Karen needed to know about the sweet blonde maiden. Lucy still had unreadable spells in each type of magic, so she was not exactly someone to be crazily excited over. Her level of power had been increasing to higher levels, reaching a bit farther each time, and Karen smiled with confidence in her silvery-blue eyes while she knew that the seventh seal on the spell book would soon be broken.
Karen had not even told Lucy about the story behind the book, not wanting her to have a great shock come at her with so much, and the woman with silvery-blue hair knew that Lucy was still developing nicely. From seeing her spells yesterday, it looked like Lucy was beginning to understand how much power she was truly wielding. That level of power from her fourth spell of Heavenly Body Magic was enough to certainly rival Jellal, if she ever had to fight him, but the next section of spells would certainly be a real eye-opener.
Lucy shifted her attention from Team Sweet Melancholy to the booths where both of the Fairy Tail teams were located, seeing her main rivals for the day, and Natsu continued to look pretty scared of Erza. She had threatened him to not forfeit anymore challenges for the duration of the Grand Magic Games, or else he would receive a pretty severe punishment. Natsu had truly wanted to do his best this year, but he was held down by the deal that he had made with Lisanna. If he continued to break it, then he would be broken.
Natsu had definitely been breaking the deal that he had with Lisanna, even though her team had second place while his team was in third place, and he had only thrown one challenge so far. He had either not been doing the events, or other people had been chosen to fight. However, as much as he wanted to earn Lisanna's trust back, Natsu also looked pretty glum while knowing he could not get that past Erza. She certainly would not let that slide, if Natsu was going to throw challenges on purpose.
He had been trying to worm his way out of the deal, telling Lisanna that he would rather get disqualified instead of throwing challenges, and it had not been working at all. She was going to hold him to deal until it ended, and Natsu could not say a thing that would help him get out of it. He even promised to be nicer to Lisanna, but she had not believed that his words had any truth to them whatsoever. After all, it would be hard to gain the trust of the white-haired mage since Natsu had treated her like a tool.
Lucy had looked in her pink spell book to see that the other four spells of Heavenly Body Magic had been written, meaning that they were ready to be used, and she smiled at the thought of getting to try them out in the upcoming tag-team battle. Of course, she first had to see if she would even get to be in it. Lucy had really wanted to show off her teamwork with Sting in the tag-team battle, knowing that she could do a good job with him at her side, and they would definitely win that battle.
However, before the battles could even transpire, everyone would have to get through the event first. What kind of event would be, and how exactly would it go down? Lucy remembered yesterday how she had almost gotten eighth place in the card game event that required pure luck, and Karen's cheating ways were the only thing that kept her from losing. She had not even properly thanked her new ally for what she had done, making a risky move like that to help Lucy, and the blonde girl saw Karen as a true friend now.
"Welcome to day four of the Grand Magic Games, ladies, gentlemen, boys, and girls! So far, Sabertooth is keeping the lead, but the Fairy Tail teams are right behind them with Sweet Melancholy following them! Can anyone rattle the standings in the tag-team battles and the event today? Will Sabertooth keep this consistent streak of good fortune? Let's see what happens!" Chapati shouted while having a smile on his face, knowing one of today's battles would be the best in the history of the Grand Magic Games.
Everyone looked curious as to what the event would be, since the last three had been pretty thrilling. What was going to happen? Would it be like the Naval Battle, or would something else transpire and be just as exciting to watch? Either way, the event would probably test the physical and mental abilities of the participants. Sting wanted to handlebthis event, thinking that it would make for yesterday's disappointment of him not getting the chance to battle, but he received a kiss on the cheek from Lucy while kindly telling him that he just needed to have some patience.
Chapati immediately stated that the event for the fourth day would be known as "Treasure Master", The game, as weird as it sounded, would be mentally and physically challenging. The game involved turning the sandy battlefield of the Domus Flau into a place of treasure, filling it with many treasure chests, and only eight of them had a lot of golden jewels inside of them. Each participant would be given one key to help them, but they could only use it on one treasure chest. If they guessed wrong, they'd get eliminated from the event.
The competitors could also eliminate each other by using any kind of magic to attack each other, since spells could also be used to open chests without any drawbacks. However, someone would be eliminated from the event after being attacked three times. This event was basically a mental, physical, and luck-based challenge all put into one bigger challenge. Someone could also get eliminated if they happened to run out of magical power, too, which really set the difficulty of this event to a pretty high level. Who would step forward?
"I can totally rock at this event, guys! Leave it to me, and I'll get all the bags of gold before anyone else gets to them! Things like gold, silver, rubies, sapphires, emeralds, diamonds, and pearls are pretty shiny like light. Since that works with my magic, I'm going to get them all. I'll make Sabertooth totally rich." Sting told everyone in Sabertooth's booth in a confident manner, totally ready to do his best in this event, and he had blinked his charming blue eyes at Lucy in an attempt to get her to go along with his idea.
Much to his surprise, however, Orga spoke up about competing in this event. He was grinning with a pretty positive attitude about this, stating how he would turn the other competitors into piles of black lightning chili, and the Lightning God Slayer was also confident that his type of magic could easily beat anyone else's in a contest like this. After all, did he really need to use a key when his Lightning God's Charged Particle Cannon could easily destroy every single treasure chest on the battlefield in a swift manner?
Orga assured his team that everything would be fine, and he jumped down on to the battlefield while volunteering for Team Sabertooth. The fact that he was competing made Laxus Dreyar from Team Fairy Tail A volunteer to do something like this, knowing full well that he could easily take out the other competitors and take advantage of any electrically-charged treasure chests, but Erza had decided to do it in his place because she wanted him to keep a close eye on Natsu. She knew that something was up, but she could not get him to spit it out. Plus, with her many swords, Erza could easily win.
Lisanna volunteered once again for Team Fairy Tail B, knowing fully well how she had done such a good job yesterday, and Mira saw no problem with it. As the younger Strauss sister went down to the sandy battlefield, she glared at Natsu once again for what he had done. He certainly was not following the agreement that they had made, making her really start to despise him, but then she saw something interesting. Natsu was giving her a happy smile, almost like he was glad to not be with her, and that just made her feel annoyed by him. His conflicting emotions, combined with the opposing wishes of Erza and Lisanna, were definitely making his love life become complicated.
Karen had made a blue-haired girl named Mable do this event for Team Sweet Melancholy, having a deceptive smirk on her face while knowing that cheating would be involved once again, and the strange woman knew that no one really paid much attention to small shadows. Mable had shoulder-length blue hair, cerulean blue eyes, and she also wore a light blue T-shirt while matching it with a pair of Daisy Dukes. She also wore some dark blue flat shoes as well, and they went well with the rest of her outfit.
Team Lamia Scale had chosen Yuka Suzuki to participate for them, since he could easily open each treasure chest by sealing away the magic that was on each one of them, and he grinned with overconfidence while going out on to the battlefield. Jenny Realight from Team Blue Pegasus knew that she could transform numerous duplicates of the same key into her hands by using her Transformation Magic, and sneaky tricks like that would surprisingly be permitted in this event that involved probability.
Kagura strangely stepped forward for Team Mermaid Heel, really feeling like she had to do this for her team to get some points, and the other girls allowed her to try and win for them. She also wanted to see how powerful Erza would be in their rematch, even if it could not wait until the final day of the Grand Magic Games. Team Quatro Cerberus selected Rocker to try and get them a win that they desperately needed, and his drilling skills could prove to be useful on any treasure chests that weren't infused with magic.
When all of the competitors were out on the field, Mato had a happy smile on his face while he commanded the field to open once again. The sandy ground changed into a tiled white floor while small black chests began to be magically created, each chest being only a few inches apart from another, and everyone looked surprised to find golden keys appearing in their hands. The keys were only good for one try, so getting careless in a situation like this would be a pretty bad idea. Who would find the treasure first?
As a gong was struck for the event to begin, Mable smirked a bit while lifting up the blue hair that had covered her left eye. This eye was surprisingly a lighter shade of blue, not a normal hue of blue like her right eye, and she had kept it concealed because of its very impressive ability. Mable looked at Rocker from Team Quatro Cerberus for a few seconds, making him look curious as to why she stared directly at him, and she winked with her light blue eye. It began to glow, similar to when Lucy used Dark Optica, and a light blue beam was shot out from Mable's left eye. The beam hit Rocker, having high-powered damage like a laser, and it also stunned him. She was about to hit him again, but Karen silently and motionlessly manipulated the shadow of a nearby treasure chest to swallow up Rocker.
Team Quatro Cerberus looked stunned at this, seeing Rocker now back in their booth, and they received zero points once again for coming in last place. Mable had done the same thing to Kagura, who tried to kick Erza in her left side while she tried to open a treasure chest, and the purple-haired woman was sent flying backwards against a wall. Mabel's beams did not just have stunning properties, however, since this beam had made a cold and icy wind blow Kagura all the way back to her team's booth. Team Mermaid Heel only received one point once again, making Kagura wonder about the blue-haired girl from Team Sweet Melancholy.
With Kagura now out of the event, Erza had quickly used this chance to oust Jenny Realight from the game by simply giving her three soft hits on the head. Anyone who was hit three times would be eliminated from the event, and Jenny got sixth place. Team Blue Pegasus got only two points once again, much to their frustration, but Hibiki comically hugged Jenny while being glad that she had not been targeted by Mable's strange beams that could paralyze a person or blow them away while dealing some serious damage.
Yuka had been using his Wave Magic on every treasure chest on the battlefield, sealing away all the different kinds of magic that would serve as booby traps, but he had not managed to find any of the chests that were filled with the golden jewels. Taking a risk, he looked stern while using his golden key on the treasure chest in front of him. The key fit perfectly into the keyhole, opening the treasure chest, but Yuka did not find gold. Instead, he received a harsh punch to the face by a springy boxing glove. He was sent all the way back to his team's booth, earning only three points for Team Lamia Scale, and Ooba spun around in frustration.
Wanting some payback on Natsu for breaking the terms of their deal like a rebellious idiot who would not pay for his mistakes, as she had also realized that her cards had also been switched in yesterday's event to thankfully make her get first place, Lisanna gave some silent hand signals to Mable while having a sly grin on her face. Mable winked with her light blue eye in response, sending a laser beam towards Erza, but the scarlet-haired mage saw the attack coming. She dodged the first laser beam, only to have Mable fire another one that melted Erza's golden key like it had acidic properties this time, and the disintegration of a key was also a cause for being out of the event. No key, no truly fair chance.
While Erza had gotten only four points for Team Fairy Tail A, she narrowed her brown eyes at the sight of Lisanna giggling about something. Erza knew that both teams from the same guild were also competing against each other, but Lisanna seemed to have some ulterior motive that Erza did not know about. Lisanna was able to fit her key into a keyhole, and she looked a bit content with the fact that she found a can of Coca-Cola and a bag of potato chips inside of it. Since she had used the key and had not found the gold, Lisanna gained six points for Team Fairy Tail B.
Orga and Mable were now the only ones left in the game, and the Lightning God Slayer looked very puzzled while he could not even decide on which treasure chest to choose first. He was at the third row out of five, each row having eight treasure chests in it, and only one had not been opened by a golden key or by magic. He looked a bit nervous while thinking about whether or not to open it, and Orga looked up at the other members of Team Sabertooth. Lucy and Sting were cheering alongside Lector, Frosch, Happy, Carla, and Wendy. All of them wanted him to open it, so he gulped nervously and went for it.
As the green-haired male turned his key in the keyhole to open up the treasure chest, he gasped in shock at the sight of Mable happily laughing while she had opened up another treasure chest. She was oddly enough being shocked by electrical eels that had been in a treasure chest that was filled with water, giving her second place in this event, and Orga opened up his treasure chest to find the golden jewels. He looked triumphant while beginning to sing about the many golden dollar bills, and he would spend them on many things. Team Sabertooth received ten points, and Team Sweet Melancholy earned eight points in the event.
Since the event was now over, the tiled floor and the treasure chests vanished while the battlefield turned back to being sandy with the ground having a brown color. While the crowd was cheering for Orga, even though he had won by doing almost nothing and not getting involved with the quarrels of the others, Rogue and the other mages in Sabertooth's booth were waiting for the tag-team battles to begin. Lucy and Sting both looked eager to find out if fate would smile on them today, giving them what they wanted.
15 minutes later…
The tag-team battles of day four had finally come around, with Bacchus & Nobarly from Quatro Cerberus going up against Kagura & Arania from Mermaid Heel. Kagura defeated both of the males with one slash of her unsheathed sword, possibly causing an airwave to strike them. Mermaid Heel won the match, and now had 24 points while Quatro Cerberus had zero points. Even though Mermaid Heel now had their second victory in the Grand Magic Games, it still was not enough to really reach up to Kagura's high expectations of her team.
The second battle had pitted Eve Tearm and Ren Akatsuki from Team Blue Pegasus up against Lyon Vastia and Chelia Blendy from Team Lamia Scale The match had started off with Ren trying to use Aerial Phose to send Lyon into the air for wind to attack him, but Chelia had just inhaled Ren's attack because she was a Sky God Slayer. Chelia managed to overpower Ren with Sky God's Boreas, effectively knocking him out with the black winds, and Lyon had struck Eve head-on with some of his ice eagles. Team Lamia Scale won the match, earning ten more points.
The third battle put Mable and Karen from Team Sweet Melancholy up against Mirajane Strauss and Cana Alberona from Team Fairy Tail B. Mirajane had started off the match by going into her normal Satan Soul Take-Over, and she flew towards Karen at high speeds to deliver a punch to the face of the woman with silvery-blue hair. Karen surprisingly went into the shadows to quickly evade the attack, and Mable winked at Mira with her light blue eye to make a laser beam emerge from it. The laser beam did not hurt Mira, but it nullified her magic while also making her pass out. Karen quickly used her shadowy abilities to make Cana's own shadow grab her, and it threw the card mage out of the Domus Flau. Team Sweet Melancholy won the match, earning ten more points.
Chapati announced with a thrilled expression while he looked at the names for the final match of the day, "This last match is sure to get all the couples in the stadium excited! You think Lacrima Vision screens are only in the arena, but they aren't! We've seen one of these duos making out around town while the other duo is pretty dysfunctional, and this is sure to be a good match! Just like last year, it's Fairy Tail versus Sabertooth! The best guild in Fiore once again, versus the guild who was the greatest last year! The match is Natsu and Erza versus Sting and Lucy!"
Upon hearing their names be announced, along with the names of their opponents, Lucy and Sting happily smiled at each other while also looking determined to win. Lucy had been reading the new spells of Heavenly Body Magic, so she easily memorized them all well enough to test them out in this battle and she took her spell book with her. After all, if one type of magic ran out, another type could end up being pretty useful against someone who was as powerful as the mighty knight known as Erza Scarlet.
This battle meant everything to Lucy, and the time had finally arrived. Would she able to gain a victory for her guild of the present and future, and defeat the dense idiot from her past? Could she also manage to defeat his scarlet-haired companion, the same person who could rival Kagura in terms of swordsmanship? Had she finally become a stronger person, the exact opposite of her past self? She walked down the dark hallway with Sting while holding his right hand in her left hand, and the light leading into the battlefield came closer into view.
"All right, this is it! This is finally the moment where Sting and I show off our chemistry, our bond, the results of all our training, and we'll teach Natsu and Lisanna a lesson or two while we're at it!" She thought while fierceness found its way into her cocoa brown eyes and light began to shine on her beautiful blonde hair. When everyone saw the four mages come out on to the battlefield, roars and cheers shook the stadium. Lisanna and Cana were cheering for Sabertooth, being Lucy's friends and disliking Natsu, despite the fact that they were in Fairy Tail.
Sting and Lucy could only harshly glare at Natsu and Erza, obviously having their motives for wanting to win this match. They made eye contact with each other for a few seconds, having the loving bond to communicate fast and effectively form a beginning strategy. The wind blew through the stadium, as everyone could feel the sudden tension in the air. Clearly, these two teams had some conflicts that needed to be resolved in some way. Lucy and Erza were definitely friends, but that did not mean that they would go easy on each other.
"You're about to lose again, Sting." Natsu said coldly, as he glared back at the white dragon slayer.
"It looks like you now wield a pink book of spells, Lucy. I don't know what kind of techniques you have now, but come at me seriously with everything you have." Erza told her friend in a calm manner, smiling confidently while wanting to see Lucy give it her all in a fight like this.
When Mato allowed the match to begin, the Fairy Tail mages were astounded to see that the Sabertooth duo had suddenly vanished from the spots where they had been standing. Natsu and Erza both widened their eyes in shock, as Sting and Lucy immediately appeared in front of them and both started off the match with punches to their opponents' faces. Natsu and Erza were sent sliding backwards, the latter quickly requipping into her Black Wing Armor with a sword in each hand, and the scarlet-haired mage decided to really get this battle started.
She flew down towards Lucy, attempting to strike her with powerful attacks and confound the blonde mage with her impressive speed, but Lucy smiled at the sight of this. She quickly used her non-spell ability of Earth Magic, getting some sand in her right hand before turning it into a solid rock, and then she followed up with her non-spell ability of Heavenly Body Magic. She threw the rock high into the air where it became surrounded by a pink aura, and the rock quickly came down in the form of a meteorite! It struck the spot where Erza had once stood, creating a pink blast of Heavenly Body Magic, and the crowd looked surprised.
Erza wondered what had happened, realizing that Lucy's meteorite missed its intended target by about two-hundred feet, and she could see that the aftermath of that blast had simply made a crater appear in the sand. While Erza was caught off guard in that one second, Lucy unleashed her fifth spell of Heavenly Body Magic. It was known as Heavenly Sphere, and it simply made a pink sphere appear in the palm of her right hand. Lucy threw it towards Erza, missing her by a few inches, but that was actually Lucy's intention.
Another pink blast of Heavenly Body Magic transpired, this time in midair, and Erza screamed in pain while she was taking damage from the spell destroying the space around it. She was in its radius, taking damage from the attack, and Erza flew down to the ground while requipping into her Heaven's Wheel Armor. She looked at her two swords, seeing that Lucy's spell of distorting space had twisted up her swords so much, and the scarlet-haired mage requipped those out for two new ones that looked much heavier with the power to slash through iron.
She charged at Lucy, seeing that distance attacks were possibly not her specialty at all, but Natsu and Sting got in the way while delivering punches of fire and light to each other's faces. Erza couldn't stop in time, and she had almost stabbed Sting with one of her swords. Not seeing that as a total accident, Lucy narrowed her cocoa brown eyes at her scarlet-haired friend while she called upon the sixth spell. It was known as Heavenly Wave, and this spell caused Lucy to shoot out a pink heart-shaped beam of energy from her mouth. It grew larger with distance, since she had leaped away from the situation, and Sting had gotten out of the way of Lucy's attack while he pulled Natsu into its path. The fire dragon slayer was struck directly, being slammed into Erza, and they were both slammed against the wall while a large pink blast of energy occurred once again.
However, Lucy and Sting both looked serious while knowing that their opponents were durable. Natsu only had a few minor bruises, and Erza had requipped into her Purgatory Armor to defend against Lucy's strong attack. Natsu and Erza both looked at each other while nodding, quickly moving to take their opponents on alone, and Natsu decided to attack Lucy this time. He fiercely glared at her while swinging punches at her with flames engulfing his fists, and Natsu looked even more pissed off by the fact that Lucy was dodging each of his moves with ease. She could easily read his movements, knowing that his style of attack was far too direct, and Lucy delivered a kick to his face while sneakily picking up some sand in her right hand.
She slammed it all into Natsu's eyes and poked them a few times, making him scream in pain while the audience laughed at such a comical trick, and Lucy read the seventh spell in the pink book. It was known as Cosmic Shield, and this spell was perfect. Natsu angrily growled in frustration, seeing that close-range attacks would not work on the blonde mage, and he leaped back before jumping high into the skies above the Domus Flau. He unleashed Fire Dragon's Brilliant Flame. He created a large fireball in his hands, making it grow large enough before throwing it down at Lucy, but she smiled at the sight of her large star-shaped shield floating into the air to absorb the impact of the fireball while Natsu came back down to the ground.
The fireball was reflected back into outer space in the form of a large pink beam of Heavenly Body Magic, and it quickly exploded while its side effect was coming down on the battlefield in the form of many meteors. Cosmic Shield could reflect projectiles back at anything, and the side effect of this spell turned the projectiles into pink meteor-shaped projectiles of Heavenly Body Magic. They came down on the battlefield, making numerous pink explosions occur, and one meteor even sent Erza and Sting flying away from each other while they had been locked in hand-to-hand combat. The crowd gasped in awe, seeing this as a pretty real battle going on here.
"Well, look what we have here. It looks like the shitty little weak-ass loser can actually do something. Those spells of yours sure know how to think outside the box, Lucy, but all of that smart creativity won't help you now!" Natsu shouted at her while looking furious, the smoke clearing up quickly to reveal that he had very bruised up by that powerful barrage of meteors, but he kept putting his pride and arrogant attitude over the fact that her creativity with those spells was what had helped her become stronger.
Natsu looked over at Sting to see that Erza kept him occupied while requipping into her Black Wing Armor again while he unleashed his White Dragon's Roar into the air to strike her down while she was flying around, and the fire dragon slayer saw this as the perfect chance to try and strike Lucy with his Fire Dragon's Roar. He unleashed a large vortex of fire from his mouth, attempting to burn Lucy to a crisp, but she used her non-spell ability of Fire Magic to inhale all of his flames to replenish most of her magical power. Wow, now wasn't that a real slap in the face to him once again?
Lucy responded sternly, really hating the fact that Natsu was underestimating her once again, "It seems that you and your stupid brain just can't realize that I'm not the same girl that can be pushed around, Natsu. I am much stronger than I was in Fairy Tail, and you're about to go down! Prepare to see another one of my new moves, since it will shut you up! I call upon thee, the eighth spell of Heavenly Body Magic, Spacial Wrath!"
This spell caused the seven clouds in the blue sky to become pink, and they unleashed eight pink beams that came down in a curved trajectory to strike their target. The beams were spiraling at high speeds while moving fast to strike their target, and this spell gave Lucy an interesting ability. Similar to Dark Optica, this move made her brown eyes become light pink while they glowed with power. She could now distort or change the space around her with a single blink of her eyes, and something had told her to not end this with Natsu so soon. She blinked her pink eyes once, making Erza switch places with him, and she gasped in shock while the pink beams of Heavenly Body Magic struck her directly.
A massive pink blast of spacial energy filled the Domus Flau, its power only concentrated on the center where Erza was located, and Sting used this moment to eat the light from Lucy's blast. He simply opened his mouth to consume it, smiling about how it tasted so good, and the light quickly faded away to show everyone in the Domus Flau that Erza had managed to survive by requipping into her Adamantine Armor at the last second. She stood in an extremely large crater, wincing in pain from the spacial distortion breaking her armor apart, and the scarlet-haired mage only had enough power left to requip back into her Heart Kreuz Armor.
From here on out, Natsu would have to fight by himself. Erza knew that none of her other armors or swords could stand up to the power of that eighth spell, and she wondered if Lucy really had been on a whole new level. While the blonde mage panted heavily, seeming exhausted from using that last attack, she pulled out the bottle of black perfume from the left pocket of her pink miniskirt to make herself smell good like the sweet smell of having a pretty good victory over Natsu. As she sprayed it on herself, however, Lucy's thoughts of an easy victory were enough to tempt fate.
Natsu would not accept a defeat against someone who he thought was really weak, and the fire dragon slayer slapped the bottle of black perfume into the air. He did the same with Lucy's pink spell book, and something began to happen. The black liquid poured on to a few blank pages in the book, seemingly the eighth section, and the book began to become surrounded by an ominous black cloud of smoke. The shadows of everyone and everything in the arena were entering into it, and the book itself began to have black beams of light glowing from the new spells that had been unlocked.
Karen was up in the stands, shaking with excitement from the fact that the seventh seal had finally been broken, and she grinned in pure delight from what was about to happen. She noticed that Natsu had his left hand on Lucy's neck while he slammed her against the wall, attempting to make the blonde mage surrender by choking her, but the fire dragon slayer released his grip when the black smoke began to enter his opponent's ears, nose, and mouth. The book floated into her hands, having now turned onyx black, and Lucy could feel something pulsating from inside her.
She looked shocked while this feeling pulsated inside her once, making both Natsu and Sting wonder what was wrong with her, and the large pulsations happened two more times. Lucy stayed frozen in place for a while, almost like she had lost consciousness when Darcy would take over, and her teammates in the Sabertooth guild were wondering why she began to suddenly giggle a bit. She had a very disturbing smirk on her face while her blonde hair was now covering her cocoa brown eyes, and Sting wondered what was wrong with her.
"Salamander, what the hell did you do?!" He angrily asked while activating White Drive, preparing to use Holy Nova if Natsu had messed up Lucy's brain.
Natsu responded defensively while turning around to shout at his rival, "I didn't do anything! Lucy's just giggling like something seems to be funny. It better not be me, or she's going down!"
Lucy responded in a dark manner, as a black aura began to engulf her body, "At last... At long last, I am revived."
Natsu stepped back a few feet while looking curious, wondering what exactly was she talking about, and he didn't even notice that the booth of Team Sweet Melancholy was right behind him. Karen kept on shivering excitedly at what she was seeing, and the smile on her face could only mean one important thing. With the final seal broken, her master had finally been summoned from the book. Natsu had indirectly also caused the master's revival by spilling the shadowy liquid on to the book, unleashing what was actually the master's darkest set of spells for this next half of the fight, and she was now alive once again without her magic being sealed away in the book.
As the black aura faded from being around the body of Lucy, Sting and Natsu were both shocked to see what had happened to her. She had been transformed into a slender young woman with black hair and red highlights at the roots and ends, pale skin and blood red eyes. She wore a black and red dress with red sleeves draping down her shoulders, the dress having both legs showing, and she had a red sash around her waist. She had black ankle shoes with red tints, red and black fingerless gloves that end at the elbow, and a red bat necklace. Her make-up consisted of no eyeshadow with red and black lipstick. She also had red nails, too.
Sting looked puzzled, wondering who exactly this woman was, and he knew that the book had not given any Transformation Magic to Lucy. She now had fanged teeth, something that Sting had never seen before, but the judges still saw this as a transformation of some kind. The mysterious woman looked at her hands and down at her legs, almost like she wanted to see if they were truly real, and she let out a sigh of satisfaction from seeing that her black hair with red highlights was real as well. Who was this woman?
She told Sting in a dark tone of voice, sounding completely different from Lucy like she was in her twenties or something, "You really shouldn't be staring awkwardly at a woman, you know. It's rather impolite, which is ironic since that does not suit someone like myself. My name is now Thorn Heartfilia, and I am finally awake. If you want to win this match, then let me show you how it is done. You take far too long and toy around, sweetie. It's better to destroy pawns after you play around with them, you know."
The white dragon slayer asked curiously, looking a bit shocked at what was happening here, "Lucy... What's happened to you?"
She responded while smirking evilly, having strength entering her blood red eyes, "I'm all right, Sting. It's just the power flowing through me, and I've never felt better."
(Note: This half of the battle is violent.)
Natsu shouted at them while looking impatient, knowing that this match had a time limit of thirty minutes, "We don't have all day to fight, you know! Are you going to stand there and talk just because Lucy has changed into some new girl, or are you going to fight? Come on, already! You weaklings are really beginning to piss me off, and I'm fired up for this!"
Hearing him call her a weakling certainly made Thorn turn around to slowly face the fire dragon slayer, and she had heard all about what he had done to Lucy while she was being sealed away in the book. It was only natural to return the favor to a worthy chess piece that had importance, and Thorn was going to show Lucy how to really get revenge. She looked at the black spell book to see the eighth language written in black text, and the unreadable spells were in white text. Thorn simply focused her hatred on the book, and it began to glow with black beams of light coming from the dark words.
The first spell was known as Shadow Beam, and it simply allowed Thorn to fire a large black beam of Shadow Demon Magic from her left hand. This attack struck Natsu quickly, slamming him against the wall, and it hit him with tremendous force. Some shadows stretched out from the rubble of the wall, creating miniature black blasts of energy, and they left Natsu immobilized while a shadow began to spread out around him. He couldn't move at all, and those miniature blasts were actually doing massive damage with each one that occurred to boost its power like in a chain.
Sting turned to where Lucy a.k.a. Thorn had been standing, but she was gone. His blue eyes looked shocked to see her appear in front of Natsu, seemingly moving at extremely high speeds, and the black-haired woman had silently called upon a spell known as Shadow Speed. He could see Natsu trying to hit her with flames now surrounding his fists, but she evaded all of his attacks by using Shadow Speed to confound him. He couldn't even smell where she was, since Thorn did not smell like Lucy at all.
She maliciously giggled while activating the next spell, Shadow Smoke, and this spell had allowed her to exhale smoke from her mouth. It wasn't ordinary smoke, though, and the attack had surprisingly been directed at Erza. The scarlet-haired mage still had not recovered yet from the effects of Spacial Wrath, only having enough magical power to try and crawl away, but the black smoke engulfed her while it made large black explosions occur. Erza was screaming in pain from feeling the power of this attack, and it had left her skin looking pretty charred.
The scarlet-haired mage could not move at all, and she let out another cry of pain from the fourth spell that Thorn had activated while she moved around so quickly. It was known as Dark Misfortune, and it caused shadows to come from underground. Erza looked pretty scared of what was about to happen, and the shadows grew spikes while slamming themselves down on her body with vicious amounts of power. They even turned into drills that pierced through her skin, making her scream in pure terror from the pain that caused her to bleed. Erza quickly felt herself losing consciousness, unable to even move now, and she blacked out while breathing painfully.
Natsu had tried to attack Thorn with a simple fiery punch from his left fist while she stood over the unconscious body of Erza Scarlet, only for the black-haired woman to vanish into the shadows before she appeared 100 feet away from him. She used a spell known as Shadowy Flash, and it caused a black sphere to appear in front of Natsu. It flashed a blinding white light, making his shadow appear, and the sphere was pulling him inward by making a shadowy black hand grab his shadow. He was pulled into the sphere, and it exploded into a massive blast of black energy. Black smoke filled the battlefield, and Sting looked pretty scared about what was going on here.
He could sense that Lucy's magical power had completely changed, feeling it to be much darker, and he heard Thorn giggle evilly while she inhaled all of the black smoke to give herself some more power. She used her sixth spell, Shadow Snatch, and it made a shadowy hand with supposedly long feminine nails pass right through Natsu. It appeared to do nothing at first, but the shadow was actually absorbing half of his magical power. It also sealed his power away in the shadows for a while, turning him into nothing more than a harmless teenager.
Thorn then proceeded to use her seventh spell, Shadow Punch, and it caused her fists to be surrounded by a black aura of malice. She stretched her fists out towards Natsu, confusing him while he didn't see the shadows of her fists extending towards him. This attack would cause two black blasts of shadows to occur, if they hit him, but Thorn had a better idea. She made her shadowy fists turn into claws that stretched far to grab Natsu's arms from behind, and she showed Lucy how to really get revenge by evilly grinning as she instructed her shadows to break Natsu's arms before breaking every bone that he had in each arm as well.
The fire dragon slayer was screaming in pure agony while this was going on, and even the audience looked horrified to see what was happening. One mother even covered her daughter's eyes while she was still cheering for Sabertooth to win, but the person who was the most surprised had to be Sting. He had never seen Lucy get like this before, not even in the fiercest fights that they ever had against any previous villains or monsters, and he looked completely shocked to see her transformed into someone who was so vicious. She even threw Natsu down to the ground, before devilishly giggling as she proceeded to use her final spell.
It was known as Shadow's Dark Light, and this spell caused Thorn to stretch out the shadows of everyone while honing them all in on Natsu to create what would be a pretty massive explosion that could presumbly kill everybody in the Domus Flau. Not wanting anything bad like that to end up happening, especially when he knew very well that this was not what Lucy had wanted to do in her fated battle against Natsu, Sting knew that he had to try and get his girlfriend back to her normal self that just wanted to prove herself against her ex-boyfriend instead of killing him.
Sting exclaimed loudly as he saw Thorn chanting some words in the language of the shadows while charging up this move to a deadly level of power that could annihilate anything in its path, "No! Stop it, please! Don't do it!"
He ran towards her from behind, putting his arms around her waist while crying and looking terrified because of Thorn's dark power being so frightening, ""You're my best friend, my lover, my best training partner, and you mean everything to me! I don't want you to become a murderer! Taking Natsu's life won't allow you to prove anything to him, and it would just make you look like a cold-blooded killer! Lucy, I'm here for you. I know that I don't protect you as often as I should, but you're the best girlfriend that I've ever had. You don't want to be so bent on getting power, because love is more important. You're important to me, and you won this fight. There's no need to go any further, since the most important thing in a battle is knowing when to stop."
Thorn slowly turned around to face him, malice in her blood red eyes while locking them with his tearful blue ones, and she suddenly vanished in a puff of black smoke while leaving Lucy in Sting's arms. The smoke entered the book, which had now turned back to being pink because of Sting's wishes reaching Lucy's heart, and things grew quiet for a few more moments. The entire audience, the competitors, and the judges were completely silent. The only sounds that could be heard were from Natsu, who then collapsed because of the trauma being over. Lucy slowly opened her brown eyes to see Sting looking down at her with a smile, and she rubbed her head.
""That was… Chilling, frightening, moving, thrilling, exciting, wicked, malicious, amazing, cool, hot, insanely evil, devilish, wild, and more! Don't just stand there shuddering with your jaws dropped, people! Sabertooth wins the match, and they get ten more points! Let's have a big applause for the dragon slayer, and his demon girlfriend! That fight was awesome!" Hikari shouted from the judges' booth with a pleased smile on her face, speaking for the other two judges that still looked utterly shocked.
Lucy blushed a light shade of pink while her left hand touched Sting's cheek to make sure that this was not a dream, and she smiled happily while feeling his soft skin. He put Lucy down, now that she was able to stand up on her own two feet, and she looked somewhat scared while shuddering a bit from the coldness of the power that she had unleashed. When Thorn took control, Lucy had been lost in the darkness of her heart. All she kept seeing was her vicious thoughts, along with hearing the horrible screams from outside, and Sting had saved her when he called out to her.
"You saved me from that dark power, Sting. I'm still afraid of the book sometimes, and I understand if it freaks you out enough to leave me.." Lucy told him while looking disappointed in herself at what she had done mainly to Erza, as Chelia and Wendy both came down from their booths to heal the scarlet-haired woman's wounds and restore her blood.
Sting replied confidently while smiling a bit, trying to lighten up the atmosphere, "Are you kidding me, Lucy? I'd never leave you because of some spells that you have. They don't make you who you are are, but you make them based on what you are. I guess you just surprised me and Natsu with all of that power you've got. There's no reason to fear it because I'll help you control it. Trust in me as much as you trust in yourself, and your heart will allow you to command new magic. You're awesome, Lucy."
Lucy mouthed some words to Sting while her blush became in between pink and red, and she twiddled her thumbs while asking something. Instead of words, Sting responded by giving his girlfriend a soft and passionate kiss on the lips as he held her hands in his and looked into her beautiful cocoa brown eyes eyes. They really were the perfect team, always supporting each other and working together to accomplish a goal they both shared. As the confetti came down to end the fourth day, Sting and Lucy walked back to their team's booth while holding hands the whole way there. The crowd cheered excitedly after seeing the kiss, especially Mira and Lisanna.
However, Mavis and Makarov were both trembling from seeing that enormous power Lucy had been wielding. They could not believe their eyes, knowing what they had seen, and it truly frightened them. Makarov had heard the stories about it in many history books, seeing it as nothing more than a myth, but now he had reason to believe that what he had just seen was no myth. Mavis was breathing heavily, though, stunned that something like this had happened. She thought that this matter was over with, that it was gone for good.
"That book Lucy wields, and seeing that woman's appearance... Thorn, I thought that you had been dead all this time. Just like I see now in Team Sweet Melancholy, you and Karen are up to no good once again." She thought to herself while shuddering more in fear, having really recognized Karen now while seeing her, and knowing that Lucy was part of their plan to try and redo what they had tried to do back then.
How was Chapter 21? Pretty intense, huh? I apologize for Sting not showing off his moves that much, but he will show them off on the fifth day when he starts having suspicions about a certain guild as he remembers stuff about each day prior to this break day. The StiCy is continuing nicely, and the NaLi will continue as well. Will Erza finally find out what Lisanna has been up to? Will Natsu admit that he was in on it? What happens when Karen tells Lucy the story about the book and reveals who Thorn is, after they cross paths again? Standby for the update!