Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail. Hiro Mashima does. This story was made for fun, and not for cash. (How unfortunate.)
Chapter 31: To Pry Or Not To Pry?
The following day, Sting and Lucy had not gone to the request board to look for any jobs to do. They were taking a break from doing any requests, and this was the day where Sting would take Lucy to the beach for a romantic date. He would also be having another practice battle with her, seeing just how much she had improved ever since the Grand Magic Games had ended, and this would also be the perfect way to improve the chemistry in their relationship. Having a romantic picnic was a bit of a cliched romantic move, but it still worked.
Sting had been making a strategy for how to get Lucy to love his charms again like she had done in the past, and he also wanted to speak with her about the spell book that still had a few things shrouded in mystery. He had remembered her words from yesterday, hearing them resonate in his mind like the sound of an extremely large drum being struck, and the white dragon slayer knew that Lucy had a soul that was as pure as silver. She also did have a very kind heart that was bright like glistening gold, and that had been important for the book to be unsealed.
While Sting knew that he had to find out more about the book from Lucy, he also knew that he could not come on too strong with this sensitive subject. Talking about Lucy being a descendant of the infamous Thorn Heartfilia was something that Sting would definitely not be bringing up on their date, but he just had to wonder about that woman named Karen. If she was supposedly a traveling merchant who had given Lucy the spell book, then why was she participating in the Grand Magic Games with a former dark guild?
On top of that, when she had helped her team achieve first place for a moment in the survival tournament of the Grand Magic Games, why had Karen not made her team of females go after the people from Team Sabertooth? She could have used her shadowy powers to get rid of Sting and the others in the blink of an eye, yet why did she choose to leave them alone the entire time? Karen had certainly not been scared of the other competitors, and she could have easily sent everyone into the shadows to make Team Sweet Melancholy win the whole tournament.
Many assumptions had been going through Sting's mind, trying to figure out Karen's intentions, and he had looked very deep in thought while wondering why Karen had given Lucy a book that had Thorn's dark power within it. Having eavesdropped on Lucy and Karen when they had talked in the park, Sting could only guess that the book had intentionally been given to Lucy. After all, if Karen had not known about the darkness of Thorn, then she never would've told Lucy that Thorn was her ancestor. She gave the book to Lucy, but for what overall purpose?
As Sting still looked puzzled and continued to give more thought into this matter, Lucy happily told him while she had tiptoed quietly to give him a warm hug from behind, "I'm ready for us to go to the beach, Sting! It's a beautiful day for us to relax together, enjoy the romantic picnic, take in the warm heat of the sunshine, and I'm sure that Aquarius and my Water Magic will make some great waves for surfing! This all sounds so incredibly fun, Sting, and I'm glad that you suggested the idea yesterday!"
Sting wanted to respond, but the fact that Lucy had hugged him from behind was making him blush. It's not like she hadn't hugged him many times before, but at least Lucy was fully clothed back then. Right now, she was certainly dressed appropriately for the beach. She was wearing nothing but a lacy white bra and some white panties, looking very beautiful with her blonde hair down while her cheeks were blushing a light shade of pink, and her scent smelled so sweet like she had put on lots of cherry perfume.
Her large cleavage was pushing up against Sting's back, making him blush even more while Lucy wrapped her arms around his waist, and the white dragon slayer knew that he had to calm himself down. He was blushing right now from feeling Lucy's large orbs pressing up against his back, rubbing it softly for a few seconds, and he had to use most of his willpower to resist the urge of feeling them against his palms. Even Lucy's wonderful smell made it hard for Sting to resist her beauty, and he just fell backwards into her arms.
Lucy looked a bit surprised by this, catching her boyfriend before he could fall on to the floor, and she had a slight bit of worry in her cocoa brown eyes from seeing Sting look happily dazed. Lucy blushed while not even knowing that her sexy hug of love had caused Sting to be so dazed, and she saw him blushing even more when he opened his charming blue eyes to see that Lucy's breasts were mere inches from his face. This made the white dragon slayer blush even more, and Lucy giggled a bit before helping Sting stand up to give him a warm kiss on the lips.
The white dragon slayer replied nicely with a kind smile, shaking his head to snap himself out of fantasizing over his girlfriend's breasts, "I'm glad that you love my idea of going to the beach, Lucy. We are going to have a really good time, and I will make sure that our romantic day at the beach is a pretty good day! Just don't think that I'll go easy on you in our battle, because I'm going to show you how powerful a real dragon slayer can be! We can definitely go surfing, but I should warn you that the great Sting Eucliffe is a master at surfboarding and many other sports."
His high amount of self-confidence made Lucy happily giggle at him, and the brown-eyed girl held Sting's hands in hers while admiring the beauty of his calm and charming blue eyes. She always loved to enjoy the positive energy that Sting would be radiating, and he certainly was bright like the White Dragon Slayer Magic that he wielded. Lucy could only hug Sting once again, letting him feel her loving warmth, and Lucy's feelings of love had made her book change from orange to yellow while it was on the counter of the bar next to a picnic basket that was filled with food. Since everything seemed fully prepared, Sting and Lucy respectively grabbed the picnic basket and the yellow spell book while they ran out of the Sabertooth guild to enjoy their day at the beach.
Meanwhile, at the Fairy Tail guild...
Lisanna's disappearance had made Mira become worried, very concerned that her younger brother and younger sister were now both missing, and the barmaid looked very concerned while she looked like the blame had to be put upon herself for not joining her little sister on that job yesterday. Mira had stamped the flyer for Lisanna to take that job in the Desert Resort, simply going to collect a bunch of sand for a client, and it didn't seem like a mission that had involved any criminals. What had happened to Lisanna?
The fact that Evergreen, Elfman, and Lisanna were now all missing was certainly a cause for alarm, and Mira had convinced Master Makarov to send a few people out on searches yesterday when Lisanna hadn't showed up after an hour. Everyone had conducted their searches in different parts of Fiore, wanting to see if their dear friend Lisanna had possibly been abducted by somebody, but no one had found anything. Since Mira's plan proved to utterly be a complete waste of time, everyone had decided to devise their own strategies. Well, almost everyone was on the hunt for Lisanna.
Gray had taken notice of the fact that while everyone else had been going off on searches, Natsu and Thorn had stayed behind in the guildhall to supposedly receive word about if Lisanna would be found. It was Thorn's idea to stay behind, since she looked kind and said that her magic would be useless in searches. Gray knew that every type of magic could be useful in some way, but he did not find the actions of Thorn to come from laziness or feelings of inferiority in her abilities. He actually saw her to be pretty suspicious.
Thorn's refusal to join the search was a small part of why Gray was suspicious of her, but he was interested in the fact that the girl who was new to Fairy Tail was conveniently manipulating and allied with the densest guy in the guild. Normally, new people wouldn't be so eager to talk with others on their first few days in a guild that they had recently joined. On top of that, Thorn had now seemed like the leader of the team. She sat down at a table with Natsu, and he looked lost in a daydream about her while grinning in a silly yet lovable manner.
It was pretty obvious to Gray that Thorn's charms had quite the effect on Natsu, making him be submissive to her every suggestion or command, and it was a little too convenient for the new girl to somehow know that Natsu was the densest guy in Fairy Tail. She hadn't even met him before she joined the guild, and Gray really found it odd for Thorn to manipulate him so easily like she had a plan of some kind. While the whole guild had freaked out over the fact that people were now missing, Thorn had been unusually calm like nothing important had happened.
Also, Gray had to wonder why Thorn would choose to partner up with someone who had such a bad rep with women. Natsu had been known to be a total jerk to girls, mainly to Lucy and Lisanna, and there had even been a few articles in the issues of Sorcerer Magazine that put the fire dragon slayer on the top ten list of men that women should not go out with. The paparazzi certainly had fun talking about him and dragging his name through the mud, so could Thorn be working for the paparazzi on some prank show that involved Natsu as the main victim?
Gray could tell that Thorn had no real feelings for Natsu, based on how she was manipulating him like a puppet in their team, but the ice mage did not know why Thorn needed to have Natsu on her side. For one thing, a jerk like him could not really help her with the task of gaining popularity in Fairy Tail. He also wasn't the best team member to be on jobs with, since he had been caring about himself for the past few months, and Natsu also had a habit of being very reckless on missions. He had once destroyed an entire town, making Team Natsu be fined for the damages instead of being rewarded for their assistance.
The ice mage asked Erza in a calm tone, having a stern look in his dark blue eyes while they sat at a table together, "Hey, Erza. Don't you find it a bit odd how Thorn was so quick to form a team with Natsu, especially since she hardly knows him? On top of that, why is he getting so infatuated by her level of beauty and her abilities with persuasion? Isn't it like he's rushing into things with some girl that he barely even knows, and did you notice how he actually listened to Thorn when she wanted him to stay at the guild with her while we were all on searches for our friend?"
The scarlet-haired woman replied in a calm manner, sighing before closing her eyes and taking a sip of her cup of hot chocolate, "That really is odd, when looking at it from your viewpoint. I don't really know why she'd bother with the guy who used Lisanna and Lucy, unless she's just as disliked in whatever guild she came from and decided to befriend the idiot of our guild in an effort to get some sympathy. It's really sad to see that people can be so desperate for fame, like that Karen girl I heard about from Cana. If her own team wasn't good enough, making fake mages isn't going to give her any real power."
Gray looked a bit disappointed about asking Erza those questions, having gotten a few answers that would make the scarlet-haired mage not think of Thorn as suspicious in a dark way, and the black-haired male let out a sigh while turning around to see what would probably be the most shocking thing ever. Thorn was happily smiling while blushing at the sight of Natsu picking out a great job for them to go on, and she cupped his face in her hands before giving him a passionate kiss on the lips to supposedly show her appreciation for him.
As Thorn told Natsu that he was such a good guy to always be thinking of ways to greatly help her out, the demonic girl remained in her teenage form while looking left and right to make sure that no one was watching her. She had a sneaky look in her blood red eyes, satisfied that everything in her plan was going along nicely without any obvious flaws, and Thorn disappeared into the shadow of Cana as she walked by their table. She had thought that no one noticed that, but Gray had been watching her the entire time.
Now seeing this as his chance to really get some clues about who Thorn was, Gray used his Ice-Make Magic to make a tiny ice shard hit Cana's shadow right after Thorn had sunk down into it. As Thorn moved through the shadows, more small ice shards appeared above the ground in a moving line like a trail for Gray to track his shadowy suspect. He simply got up from his seat and ran fast while seeing more shards of ice being created while Thorn moved through the shadows, and Gray simply ran beside the growing line of shards while looking determined to find out what Thorn's motives were. His little trick was called Ice-Make: Chilly Track, by the way.
At the beach...
When Sting arrived at the beach with Lucy, he gently threw the picnic basket on to a small grassy hill that stood over the white sandy beach. He gave Lucy a smirk of confidence, ready to begin their practice battle, and the white dragon slayer quickly ran over to the other side of the beach to be Lucy's opponent. If they got to have a pretty good battle, it would both Sting and Lucy work up an appetite to eat the lunch for their romantic date. After all, fighting for fun and eating for romance were two ways to have a delightful day off from taking any jobs.
Lucy had also been forward to this friendly rematch with Sting, since their last match had really ended in a draw with no clear winner, and she smiled happily while wanting to do her best. She also hoped that her spells would not hurt Sting too much, since they had evolved while growing higher in their levels of power, and Lucy decided to really bring Sting a challenge. Even if he was her boyfriend, Lucy was certainly not going to let this fight be finished with a few easy attacks. She took in a deep breath, exhaling the air afterwards, and Lucy narrowed her cocoa brown eyes while trying to pretend that Sting was an enemy.
As the gentle sea breeze blew across the beach, Sting decided to begin this match with his White Dragon's Holy Ray. He fired a copious amount of white beams of light from the space in between his hands as he put them together, and they headed straight towards Lucy! Sting smirked in a cocky manner, thinking that he knew exactly what Lucy was going to do, and his prediction was right on target while he saw his girlfriend open up her yellow spell book. If Sting's guess was correct, what spell was Lucy going to use?
She had courage in her cocoa brown eyes, smiling a bit while the white beams of light came towards her, and Lucy began to spin around at a rapid pace while calling upon the first spell of her Lightning Magic. It was known as Thunder Jolt, and this was the spell that Lucy had used to cancel out Holy Ray last time. As she looked pretty confident about the result of these two spells clashing again, the Lightning Magic in the yellow spell book had other ideas. It made a spiraling tower of yellow lightning surround Lucy, and Sting's white beams of light were now hitting the tower from many different directions.
In an instant, Sting looked pretty shocked to see that the tower of lightning had reflected his attack back at him in the form of ten powerful beams of yellow electricity. They all headed straight for him in a curved trajectory, but the white dragon slayer was quick enough to dodge all of Lucy's attacks. When they hit the ground, large yellow blasts of lightning had transpired and they made huge craters appear in the ground. Lucy and Sting both looked puzzled by this, since Thunder Jolt did not work in that manner or make the Lightning Magic have so much power in its weakest attack spell.
Lucy told Sting in a concerned manner, looking a bit confused before she looked down at the spells of Lightning Magic in yellow text, "Don't try to attack me just yet, Sting! That spell was definitely not Thunder Jolt, and it would at least be similar to its previous form if the spell had actually evolved!"
The blonde girl looked in the yellow spell book, scanning all of the spells while reading their descriptions on the first few pages of the fourth section in the book where the Lightning Magic was located, and her brown eyes widened in pure amazement from seeing eight new lines in yellow text. These were obviously the fusion spells for the ability of electricity, and the first fusion spell had been activated when the book's will overruled Lucy's choice because it probably thought Thunder Jolt could not handle a much stronger version of Holy Ray. The recently used fusion spell was known as Lightning Counter, and it allowed Lucy to counter long-range attacks while sending them back at the foe with lightning added. The side effect of this spell also made the leftover electricity from the blasts surround Lucy, increasing her speed.
Now having the chance to attack, since he could see Lucy panting slightly like she needed to charge up her magical power after using that impressive first fusion spell, Sting unleashed his White Dragon's Roar. He unleashed a white laser beam from his mouth, now having trained hard enough to make the attack much larger with more power and speed, prompting Lucy to active her second fusion spell while she planned to also dodge the attack at the last moment if the spell was not able to work under certain conditions.
The second fusion spell was known as Electric Shock Trick, and it caused Lucy to unleash a yellow sphere of electricity from her mouth. The sphere quickly collided with Sting's White Dragon's Roar, and yellow electricity was surrounding his attack. This new fusion spell did not seem to have any side effects, and Lucy thought that she was going to get blasted away. Suddenly, she noticed that Sting's grew twice in size while also doubling in power before it split into two beams that went right by Lucy without touching her! Two large blasts of white light transpired, blinding Lucy for a few seconds, and she now knew how the new spell worked. It made electricity surround the attack, doubling its power to make the enemy think they were winning, but then the attack would split in half to really trick them.
Sting was pretty impressed to see that Lucy had made his attack miss its intended target, and he smirked confidently at his girlfriend while letting her make the first move this time. He wanted to really feel the powerful of whatever her next fusion spell would be, ready to try and counter it in any way possible, and Sting could see that Lucy's yellow spell book was beginning to glow once again. This signified that another new spell of Lightning Magic was being written into the book, and Lucy would be allowed to use it.
She called upon the third fusion spell, making the words in the book glow with yellow beams of light shining from the page, and this new move was known as Lightning Demon's Thundercloud. The instructions for this move simply told Lucy to look up into the sky, and she looked up to see a dark cloud floating down towards her. The cloud had electricity surrounding it, and the spell surprisingly wanted Lucy to eat the cloud. As weird as it sounded, Lucy felt her magical power being restored completely after eating the lightning within the dark cloud. It surprisingly tasted pretty good to her, too.
With her magical power now fully restored, Lucy decided that it was time to end this by unleashing the final fusion spell of Lightning Magic. She had quickly imagined this spell earlier, having wanted to create it sometime during this match, and it caused the eight clouds in the sky to turn from white to black with electricity surrounding all of them. The clouds began to spin around rapidly in a circle, and they created a large ring of electricity in the sky! The ring of lightning quickly propelled itself down towards Sting, landing on the ground with him in its center, and eight large yellow blasts of Lightning Magic began to transpire around him! The shock waves had paralyzed him as a side effect, and the rest of the electricity hit Sting simultaneously from all directions to create another massive blast of lightning!
The white dragon slayer comically told Lucy in a dazed manner, looking shocked while his body tingled from the electric shock, "As soon as the paralysis wears off, name that spell Lightning Demon's Surging Clouds."
As Sting fell to the ground and fainted from taking so much damage, Lucy looked very concerned and rushed to her boyfriend's aid. Sting was now unconscious, but he was still able to breathe. Lucy had really felt like cursing at herself for probably using too much electricity, and even Laxus or Orga would probably say that she was way too electrifying. Lightning Demon's Surging Clouds could also be used to power up other spells, sharing the ability of chain power with Electric Curve, and these new lightning spells were pretty lethal. Even though Lucy had won, she knelt down in front of Sting and gently kissed his lips to give him some warmth.
Meanwhile, in Magnolia Town...
Gray had followed the trail of ice shards to a back alley in the town of Magnolia, the part of the town where nobody was ever really hanging out, and he had quickly dispelled all of his ice shards to not let Thorn or anyone else possibly around here be aware of his presence. He did not want to be caught eavesdropping on Thorn, and Gray to see if his suspicions about her would be confirmed. If she really was a new girl who chose Natsu out of pure fate, then she was really lucky. If not, however, then there would be a problem.
The ice mage certainly did not rule out the possibility that Thorn was secretly working as a double agent for Raven Tail, the guild that was run by Ivan Dreyar because he wanted to find Lumen Histoire, and that guild did need a female member to replace Flare Corona after she had gone back to her home in the Sun Village. Either way, Thorn did seem really shady to Gray. After all, what girl would really want to be seen with a guy like Natsu? Also, why had Thorn been so calm while everyone else was worried about Lisanna's disappearance.
He hid behind a few trash cans, staying silent because he did not want to get caught, and Gray had to wonder why Thorn had come to a back alley with a dead end. She surely wasn't thinking of climbing the walls to jump from building to building, and there was no secret place in this back alley for anyone to have any speakeasies or cafes here. Besides, based on how trashy and dirty this back alley looked to anyone, customers might not want to come to a secret bar here. The crawling rats probably wouldn't even go in the cafe, since they enjoyed digging through garbage.
Upon hearing Thorn knock five times in a rhythm like she was trying to make beats on the brick wall in front of her, Gray took a peek over the trash cans to see that Karen came out of a rat's shadow to meet with her. Gray had to wonder what that woman from Team Sweet Melancholy was doing here, and why had she waited for Thorn to come here like this was their place for secret meetings? Well, it was one of their secret places to meet because nobody had rarely even come on the back streets of Magnolia.
Now seeing that Karen could move through the shadows like how Thorn was able to, Gray had to wonder what they would be talking about. Had Thorn been in league with Karen for strange purpose that involved Natsu? Gray immediately lowered his head back down, but the black aura suddenly rising into the air caught his interest. He looked between the small gap in between two trash cans to see what exactly was going on here, and he saw Thorn change into her adult form. Her hair was now black with red highlights, her skin was pale, and 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.
"Is the plan commencing nicely, Thorn, my grand mistress of darkness? How soon shall you end up admitting it all to that foolish boy?" Karen asked in a calm tone while smiling a bit, having witnessed Thorn's manipulation of Natsu from the shadows.
Thorn responded in an evil tone, giggling sadistically with a devilish look in her blood red eyes, "My plan has no flaws in it. Even you must be one to admit that, Karen. I think that I'll be able to admit all the truth to Natsu while I take my time killing him for what he did to my descendant. It's only natural that a lesser antagonist gets his karma delivered to him by the greater antagonist, and I am really dominating over him in this game of chess. I even convinced him to not fret over Lisanna possibly being dead, since we already killed Suna after she took care of that little girl for me."
Karen told Thorn while grinning evilly, letting out a sultry laugh of pleasure from hearing Thorn's scheme, "You are definitely the demonic goddess in this age of fools, Thorn. Mavis is no longer physically alive, and no one has as much Fairy Magic as she did for you to be stopped like last time. Fairy Tail is going to end up falling to ruin, and then the world will be ours while you replace Zeref as The Killing Mage in this world. After all, Thorn, we both know that you created the legendary item that has the curse of immortality on it."
Thorn answered back in a scheming manner while putting on some black lipstick, before having a wicked smile on her face, "My book is indeed immortal to serve the one who can open it, and the spells in my book possess the power to create delightful disasters. I'm so glad to be helping my young blonde descendant complete the book, and I even sensed her using the ultimate spells of my Lightning Magic earlier. She and I are related, but we couldn't be more different because of her goddamn niceness. She refuses to give in to the darkness, but I think she'll like the evil side of magic after I take over her body. Lucy Heartfilia is the most important piece on my chessboard, after all. Maybe I can make her boyfriend of light cater to my every whim as well, and he's the promoted pawn beside the queen. I play a dark and devilish game, Karen."
From hearing and seeing all of that, Gray could only drop his jaw in utter shock while he began to tremble slightly. Thorn, the one who was disguised as a new mage in Fairy Tail, was the same woman who nearly killed Natsu and Erza in the tag-team battle on the fourth day of the Grand Magic Games? She was not only planning to destroy the guild, but she had killed the person who presumably got rid of Lisanna? Had she killed Evergreen and Elfman, too? On top of that, Thorn was related to Lucy in an ancestral way?
Gray now knew that he had every right to be suspicious of Thorn from the start, and he was right about the fact that she was only using Natsu. The ice mage felt a slight chill in the air when he had heard that Thorn would kill Natsu, but why tell that to the fire dragon slayer when he might be too infatuated with the demonic woman to believe Gray's words? Right now, the black-haired male looked stern while narrowing his dark blue eyes about this situation. He had to let Lucy and Sting know that they were in pretty deep danger, and he had to tell them before it would be too late.
As Thorn sunk down into the shadow of a bird flying overhead, she whispered softly to Karen in a vicious tone while sensing something and maintaining her wicked smile to give a false sense of security to a certain eavesdropper, "By the way, the shadows have told me that a silent little fly was buzzing around our plans. No need to get alarmed, though. I'll crush that little fly, and you can assist me with taking care of any other pests that try to get in our way."
20 minutes later, back at the beach...
Sting had awoken to the taste of chocolate cookies, and he looked amazed while beginning to chew the delicious treats that were in his mouth. He sat up straight and blushed at the sight of Lucy still looking beautiful in her lacy white bra and lacy white panties, and she was currently taking the cans of Coca-Cola out of the wooden picnic basket. She had set everything down on the pink tablecloth that Sting had put in the basket for their romantic picnic, and Lucy had joy in her cocoa brown eyes while enjoying the delicious taste of a cheeseburger in her hands. There was a box of salty french fries in front of her, too.
As Sting finished chewing the chocolate cookies and swallowing them, he stretched his arms high above his head and yawned loudly to get the attention of his girlfriend. Sting smiled confidently at the fact that Lucy had not only beaten him in a fight, but she had set up everything in a pretty organized way. There were cheeseburgers, hot dogs, rice balls, boxes of salty french fries, steaks on plates, fish sticks, nachos covered in hot cheese, potato chips, a box of cheese pizza, chicken tenders, chocolate cookies, chocolate brownies, vanilla cupcakes, ten slices of red velvet cake, sugar cookies with green icing, jelly beans, and six cans of Coca-Cola. Every single food item was on its respective plate, and there had been many plates and tons of space in the large wooden picnic basket. Really, did Sting love Lucy that much to get such a large basket for a romantic date?
The white dragon slayer noticed that Lucy had also set her yellow spell book down on top of the picnic basket that was now closed up, and he remembered that this date was not only for romance. He had to find out more about the book, and Sting also needed to find out more information about Karen. He knew that just openly starting things off with questions about Karen or Thorn might make Lucy feel pretty uncomfortable, and he was trying to increase the love that he had with the blonde mage.
While Sting took three chicken tenders off of their plate and ate them, he looked over at Lucy to see her happily blushing while eating another cheeseburger. She giggled with joy while enjoying the delicious taste of it, and Sting was very glad to have bought the highest quality of every single food item for his appreciative girlfriend. He even tasted the chicken tenders that he had bought, finding them to be very crispy and delicious, prompting him to grin in satisfaction at how the food was at gourmet level.
With happiness in her beautiful cocoa brown eyes, Lucy exclaimed to Sting in a joyful tone while looking pleased about how the food tasted, "Sting, you really went to great lengths to make this a very romantic date for us! You've really showed me the depths of your devotion for our relationship, and I should do the same for you someday. You're such a great boyfriend, and I can tell you anything. You're always so confident, calm, smart, patient, and you make me feel so incredibly happy with feelings of love."
Sting responded kindly with calmness in his blue eyes that looked a bit relaxed like the sea, smiling proudly at the fact that his girlfriend had thought so highly of him, "I'm glad to be devoted to helping a great girl like you, Lucy. I want to make you feel happy in every way possible, and this date is just as romantic as the time when we had our first kiss at the cafe. It was my first time getting kissed by a girl, and I'm glad that the girl was you. You make me feel happy, too, and I can't thank you for all the times that you've been there for me. You're so awesome, cool, hot, smart, and I love you enough to where cupcake frosting would look cute on your face."
He was about to grab a red velvet cupcake to put some white icing on Lucy's mouth, but Sting curiously looked at Lucy when he saw her left hand romantically touch his right hand. Lucy grabbed the cupcake with her other hand, and she simply ate all the icing off of it while smiling at Sting. She then proceeded to give him a warm kiss on the lips, her arms wrapping around his waist while she pulled him closer to her, and Lucy blushed cherry red while she felt the sun's rays heat up her body as her breasts were now pressing against Sting's chest. They were still in their constraints, however, so neither Lucy or Sting really had anything to worry about.
As the white dragon slayer returned the kiss to his blonde girlfriend, Sting knew that he couldn't ruin a warm summer day like this by making Lucy feel uncomfortable. She was having fun on this romantic date with him, enjoying the relaxation time that they were spending together, and Sting also could guess that Lucy probably did not even know Karen's ulterior motives for giving her the strange spell book. However, if the two main protagonists could not figure it out, the bright light would eventually reveal the dark shadows to them. Right now, they were simply enjoying the warmth of the sun and the rekindled flames of love that they cutely showed for each other.
How was the 31st chapter? Did you like it? Sting and Lucy have rekindled their flames of love, and the romance of the StiCy is now back to being focused on! I apologize if Sting did not seem strong in the battle, but his new skills will be shown later in the story. I know it's getting kind of long, but at least development will occur. I also hope you're enjoying the Fairy Tail side of this arc as well, since it has its importance. Anyway, standby for the next update!