Early in the morning...
Kenshin went to the guild to pick out a S-Class job for the team to go on.
He passed through the doors and looked up in the direction of the second floor.
'Hmm, what S-Class job sounds good today.' He thought out loud. He then came across one concerning the cursed island Galuna and looked over the rewards.
"Lucy will definitely like this." Kenshin took the job request and went down to the first floor to see Makarov talking to the rest of his teammates.
"Master, we'll be taking this S-Class mission." He handed the flyer to Makarov.
After looking it over, Makarov then said. "Are you sure Lucy should be going on this job with you? It might be dangerous."
"You and I both know everything we do is dangerous. It comes with being mages. We handle dangerous tasks so no one else has to." Kenshin reminded him.
"Good point." Makarov understood the logic behind his statement. "I approve your request."
Kenshin nodded and turned to his teammates. "We're going on the Galuna Island job. Any questions beforehand."
"Yeah. I have one that comes to mind. Isn't that the isle of demons were no wizard has ever returned?" Gray asked him.
"That's probably a made up story. I've passed through that area many times for the S-Class promotion exams. Besides, it's just a curse and those can be broken in no time. All and all this is a easy S-Class job." Kenshin said.
"I agree. This job doesn't sound hard. What's the reward?" Erza asked.
"I'm glad you asked. Lucy, you're gonna like this. It's seven million jewels and a gold Zodiac Key." Kenshin answered her question.
Milliseconds she was in front of him. Kenshin and everyone else was surprised she got there so fast.
"Did you say gold Zodiac key?!"
"The request doesn't mention a name, but it's a bonus reward." Kenshin said.
"We're going on this job. When do we leave?"
"Meet me in Hargeon shortly. We'll take a boat there and head to Galuna Island." He instructed the other three.
All were in agreement, so they left the guild and went back to their houses to get ready.
Mirajane turned to Makarov, concerned.
"Master, are you sure they should be doing that job? No one who has ever gone to do it has returned."
Makarov took a long gulp from his mug.
"Those four will be fine. Two of them are S-Class wizards, after all. Kenshin and the others will complete this job. Try and have some faith in them."
"I do. I'm just worried they might get hurt." Mirajane said.
Time skip...
They had gone back home and gotten all the needed supplies then met at the train station. They had gotten a train to Hargeon, where they were currently and now they were looking for a boat willing to take them to Galuna.
"I'm sure someone is willing to take us there. Let's split up and find them." Kenshin said.
The others nodded and then went off to find a captain willing to get them to their target.
But, alas, problems arose.
"No way am I going near Galuna Island!"
"Galuna island?! Are you crazy?! I am not risking my boat by going anywhere near that cursed place!"
"You couldn't pay me enough to go within twenty miles of that Island!"
"No way in hell!"
Everyone here seemed much too afraid to go anywhere near the island, making getting to the island a little bit of a hassle.
"Well this is going well. We aren't even on the Island and things are going wrong." Gray said sarcastically.
"I could part the waves with my Water Dragon Slayer magic and allow us to walk to Galuna."
"Man, who would have thought getting to Galuna Island would be this hard." Lucy said.
"Hey, you guys want to go to Galuna Island?" A voice said.
Turning around they saw a dark skinned sailor looking at them from his small boat.
"Yeah, you see we are wizards who want to get to the Island to break the curse and we are having a hard time finding someone to take us there." Lucy explained.
"You guys are wizards? Show me your magic." The sailor said.
The group did as he asked. Kenshin covered one of his fists with fire, Gary held a key of ice, Lucy's hands were glowing and Erza summoned one of her swords.
The sailor stared at their magic for a few seconds before he said, "Okay, get in."
"Huh?" The group intelligently said.
"I am going to take you to Galuna Island." The man said as he prepared to take off.
Not questioning their strange luck, the group got onto the boat one by one and once they were all on board, the man untied the ropes and started sailing the boat towards the Island of Demons.
Time skip, several hours later...
The group had been on the boat for several hours now and had not yet seen the island yet.
"So, Mister..." Lucy said, trying to get the boatman's name.
"My names Bobo." The man replied.
"So Mister Bobo, why are you so willing to take us to the Island?" Lucy asked.
"I used to live on the Island." Bobo revealed.
"So, what is the curse like?" Natsu asked, trying to get information on what they were about to face.
Bobo lifted his left arm and suddenly purple scales with black lines appeared over his entire forearm, while claws appeared where his finger nails used to be.
The Fairy Tail mages were stunned, they had never seen a curse like the one Bobo had just shown before and it was utterly mystifying.
Just then, Gray saw something out of the corner of his right eye and turned around and said, "Hey look! Land!"
The group turned towards Gray's direction and indeed, they saw a island starting to come into view.
"Galuna Island." Bobo said, confirming the groups suspicion on the island before them.
Just then, they heard a strange noise and turned around, just in time to see a massive tsunami coming towards them fast.
"Ah! Where did Bobo go?!" Lucy yelled out.
The group looked and sure enough, Bobo was missing.
Kenshin then turned to the tsunami. "Wind Dragon Wind Blade!"
A blade of wind split the tsunami in half.
The two waves passed the boat by harmlessly.
Time skip...
The boat had just reached the shore and the mages were finally out of the boat, having reached the island at long last.
One by one, the group of mages got off of the boat and landed onto the soft sands of the beaches surrounding the island.
"Let's find the village that sent this request. It should be somewhere on the island." Kenshin said.
The rest of the team agreed and the started walking off in the direction that held the most recent smells of people.
After a little while they came to a massive wooden gate.
"Hello! Is anyone there!" Kenshin called out.
A second later two guards appeared at the top of the gate and one of them yelled down, "Who goes there?"
"We are wizards from Fairy Tail responding to the request you sent out." Erza answered.
"Oh, you're those wizards. We heard that you had taken the request, but you were taking so long to get here we thought you had gotten lost." The other guard said.
"It was nothing like that. May we enter so we can talk to the village chief?" Gray asked.
"Show us your Guild Marks to we are sure you are all Fairy Tail mages." The first guard said.
The group shrugged and showed of their guild marks.
Kenshin gestured to his right shoulder, Gray lifted his shirt to show his blue guild mark on his right pectoral, Lucy simply lifted and showed her mark on her left hand, while Erza's light blue mark on her left lower arm was shown.
"Those marks are real, they must be Fairy Tail mages. Let's let them inside." The second guard said.
"Okay, maybe they can finally break the curse. Open the gate!" He yelled down to someone on the ground.
Several seconds later the bottom part of the gate started rising until there was a 15 foot tall opening that they could get through.
"Let's get to the bottom of this curse." Kenshin told the other three.
The group of four entered into the village and saw people of all shapes and sizes watching them.
However, the strange thing is that everyone in the village were wearing full body cloaks that covered almost everything, leaving only a small slit in their faces so they could see and that was it.
There was a 4 foot tall man who had a large walking stick who said, "I am Moka, the village chief. I thank you for coming here to try and break our curse. But pleasantries aside, there is something you must see. Now my people!"
As one, the people of the village took off their cloaks and revealed their bodies.
Every single person in the village had a part of their body that was mutated or changed.
Some people had claws, others had their lower legs changed into something akin to a scaled birds foot.
"This is the same thing that happened to our guide." Gray said.
"Yeah, it is." Lucy said, looking at the people with pity.
"As you can see, everyone here has suffered horrible disfigurement due to the curse. Not even the animals are safe from it." Moka continued.
"Please excuse me for asking, but what makes you think it is a curse? It could be some form of infectious disease." Gray asked, with Erza nodding at his logic.
"We have consulted many doctors and they all agree that no such disease exists. You see, all of our symptoms appeared at the same time the moon fell under an evil spell." Moka said.
"What kind of spell?" Lucy asked.
"Since ancient times, the island has absorbed the light of the moon and has glowed almost as beautifully as the moon, but several years ago the moon began to glow an eerie purple glow." Moka explained.
'Purple moon. Is he talking about-' Kenshin thought. He was sure he knew what was transpiring.
Everyone looked up to the sky and saw that indeed, there was a purple moon now in the sky.
"That's creepy." Gray said as the purple light came over everyone.
"Stay back! The transformation is happening!" Moka said as all the villagers began to scream out as their bodies transformed.
After a few seconds, everyone in the village now looked like demons, with horns, claws and colored skins.
"I am sorry if our appearance frightens you." Moka said to the mages.
"As you can see, every night when the moon turns purple we undergo a transformation that turns us into horrific demons. If this isn't a curse then what is?" Moka asked.
"We will return back to normal once the morning comes, but there are some unfortunate souls that never do change back." Moka said.
"How sad." Lucy said.
"The fate for those that can't turn back is that we are forced to put them out of their misery." Moka said, unable to look the mages in the eyes.
Kenshin walked up and placed his right hand on Moka's shoulder and said. "I am sorry. That must have been unbearably hard for you to do."
"You have no idea. My own son, Bobo was one the unlucky ones." Moka said, startling the Fairy Tail mages.
"Bobo, but he..." Lucy said, completely confused.
"I get how he disappeared now. He is actually a ghost because his soul can't find peace." Gray said.
"If you truly wish to help us, you must destroy the moon!" Moka said, completely startling the Fairy Tail mages.
Time skip...
Kenshin was looking through a book he brought with him from the guild.
"So guys, what are we going to do? We can't destroy the moon." Gray said.
"There must be another way to break the curse. Tomorrow we will look for it. We will search the island for any clues that might let us know the origins of the curse." Erza said.
"I know what the source of the purple moon is." The others came over to Kenshin and saw that the page he was on had a picture of a purple moon, exactly like the one currently in the sky.
"It's called Moon Drip. It's Dispel magic like what Kageyama used."
"So someone is trying to beak open a seal?" Gray asked.
"Moon Drip does more then just break seals. With enough time, it can break any spell regardless of power. I am more worried about what Moon Drip might be cracking open right now. There are some things that were never meant to be opened."
"I hope I'm wrong about this, but it might be the Shadow Wraiths." Kenshin said.
"Shadow Wraiths?" Erza, Lucy and Gray asked.
"I'm not surprised you don't know what they are. they are little more than myth and legend, the stories mothers tell their children at night. The Shadow Wraiths are five powerful wizards that Zeref, the creator of Lullaby, experimented on. He bent the rules of life and death, unleashing unholy black magic upon them. The power of the black magic was so great that it destroyed their corporeal bodies and they became shadows, neither living nor dead. They feed of the life energy of living people and they are the ancestors of today's Wraiths that live in the shadows, but Shadow Wraiths are much stronger, Wizard Saint level, if not Heavenly King of Ishgar level. They served as Zeref's assassins and deadliest warriors, because how can you kill a shadow? They only way to defeat them was to trap them in specially engineered coffins that were lined with holy light, the opposite of the shadows. These coffins were then placed in the deepest and darkest mountain with all the tunnels collapsed and the most powerful of seals placed on both coffins and the mountain itself to keep the Shadow Wraiths from ever emerging once again. If whoever is using Moon Drip really has gotten the coffins, then we are all in danger." Kenshin said.
The others were terrified now, these Shadow Wraiths sounded like something no one wants to face, ever.
"Are you sure that is what we face?" Erza asked.
"That's a good possibility."
"So we might just be facing Shadow Wraiths, unkillable shadows with strength almost immeasurable. And you said this job would be safe." Lucy said, completely terrified now.
"For all I know, it could be something else."
"Okay, so we still have time to stop them, whoever is crazy enough to do something like this." Lucy said, a little bit relieved.
Time skip, morning...
Lucy, Gray, Erza and Kenshin were currently walking through the foliage, eyes trained all over, searching for any clues to breaking the curse.
"So Kenshin, if it is Shadow Wraiths, is there anything we could do?" Lucy asked.
"That new magic I showed you might help."
The group fell into silence after that for a little while before a massive blue furred rat wearing a maid's outfit came charging at them
Quick as lightning Gray shouted out. "Ice Make: Floor!"
The rat slipped on the ice and fell onto it's back, knocking itself unconscious.
"Well, that was anti-climatic." Lucy said.
"Hey, there are ruins over there." Erza said.
The group went into the ruins and looked at a room filled with moon shapes and the group looked around a little.
"The island was once called the Island of the moon." Lucy said.
"So, moon drip, moon island? Things are just getting weirder." Gray said.
Erza walked over a section of floor, which then collapsed the entire floor, causing the group to fall.
After a few seconds of screaming and falling, the group landed at the bottom of a cavern.
"You guys okay?" Kenshin asked.
"I okay." Lucy said.
"Ditto." Gray said as he got up.
"I am fine and I am sorry for getting us down here." Erza said.
"It's okay. We will just fly right back up right?" Lucy asked.
"Yeah, just..." He trailed off, feeling a large source of magical power not to far from them.
He tuned towards the source of the magic and ran off towards it
"Kenshin, wait." Erza said as the others ran after him.
After a few minutes of running, they entered into a larger cavern and they all something that stopped them dead.
In the middle of the cavern was a massive fifty foot tall piece of light purple ice that had a massive black shape inside of it.
For Gray, he was seeing a familiar face.
"What is it doing here? What is Deliora doing on this island? What is going on here?" Gray shouted out, disbelief all over his face.
With his cry of disbelief echoing all over the chamber, our heroes stared in shock at the massive demon, unable to believe what they are seeing.
What shall come next after finding out Deliora is on this island? Only time shall tell.