Chapter 2 – Lucy, the Half Fairy
Lucy woke up in extreme pain all over her body, but especially in her wound. She slowly opened her eyes and started to stand up. She was in some decorated room, lying in a bed. She was wearing some white clothes, but her keys or anything else she had on the mission were nowhere to be found. Suddenly she felt something strange on her back. She grabbed it and looked at it. They looked like wings. They were attached to her back.
"WAAAH!" - Lucy suddenly shouted as the memories started to come back. A mission, bandits, a fairy, a demon, a wound and she agreed to something.
"Oh." - someone suddenly said in the doorway - "I see you're awake."
Lucy looked at the girl with wings. It was the fairy she had saved from the demon, but now she was her size. She wore a simple pink dress, had golden eyes and hair, and had a pair of golden wings on her back.
"I'm sorry I didn't introduce myself earlier. I'm Elaine. I wanted to thank you for saving me from this demon."
Lucy was quiet for a moment, processing the situation, until she finally said - "You don't have to thank me. Anyone would do it if they were in my place."
"If that were true, we wouldn't have to create our own dimension." - said Elaine, looking at the ground for a moment. This must have been a touchy subject.
"Anyway, what happened to me?" - Lucy asked, trying to bring the conversation back - "The last thing I remember is a pain in my arm and you saying something."
"Yes... I was afraid that would happen." - Elaine said, and then she sat down on the bed next to me - "You see, it wasn't an ordinary wound. This demon had a sort of suicidal death curse. As long as you have had this wound open, if the demon dies, so will you."
Lucy began to realize what had just happened. Then she replied with relief - "But you cured me. Right." - Elaine's face was still sad - "Right?"
Elaine gathered herself and said - "It was a powerful curse and there was no time to heal you normally. That's why I had to take a drastic solution and turn you into a fairy."
The hammer fell on Lucy. Does this mean he will never see home again? Will he no longer be a Celestial Spirit Mage? Won't he see his Guild friends? What will Wendy, Happy, or Juvia think when they find out what happened? Will Natsu and the others care that she died?
Elaine wiped the tears that were starting to form in Lucy's eyes - "Don't worry, you'll still be able to go home."
"Really." - Lucy said with hope in her voice.
Elaine continued - "Some changes are irreversible, so you will have to adapt. You'll be half-fairy, half-human, which will be a challenge, but you should be able to handle it if you prepare properly. I have already asked the king to allow me to use the time warp chamber to teach you everything you will need to know while only a few hours have passed in your world."
"Seriously?" - Lucy asked, surprised - "You can bend time?"
"Yes." - replied Elaine smiling - "It's not that difficult. You're a celestial spirit mage, so they can tell you more. Although some things are banned for a reason."
"Speaking of which, where are my things?" - Lucy asked.
"Safe. The other fairies have taken care of them for now and will return them when you finish the training and adapt them a bit to your situation."
"I see. So when do we start?"
"Eat something first, and then we can start training. Oh, we are already in the chamber."
After a short meal, Lucy went outside to begin her training. In addition to the building she came from, there was a gate, most likely an exit, and a tree. Only now did Lucy realize that she was actually as small as a fairy, seeing the size of the tree. And the chamber itself was completely white, with no end in sight.
"Lucy." - a voice suddenly said from above and Lucy saw Elaine floating - "First lesson is flying. The most basic skill of a fairy and without it you won't survive in the big world for more than a few minutes. Come on, extend them fully. You just need to concentrate, and rest will come naturally."
Lucy quickly did as Elaine said and her wings appeared. They were white dragonfly wings with golden stars. They were all white with gold stars. After a bit of concentration, Lucy began to float but quickly lost her balance. Luckily, Elaine flew up to her and grabbed her hand.
"Let me guide you for a moment." - Elaine said. And so Lucy began flying with Elaine, quickly adapting to the situation. After about an hour, they took a break and Lucy began to tiredly drink a bottle of water.
"How come you don't get tired?" - Lucy asked.
"Just practice." - Elaine replied - "Even though you waste too much energy on unnecessary movements, you quickly learned the basics. By the end of the day, you will be able to fly as well as any fairy."
Lucy was happy with her teacher's praise, then looked at her wings and her new friend and asked - "Why do you have different wings than me, anyway? Every fairy is different, or am I special because I'm only half fairy."
"Both, actually. Each fairy has slightly different wings, but they generally resemble a butterfly in some way. People who weren't originally fairies start out with dragonfly wings. But this may change over time. Wings for fairies are like magical signatures for living beings. Each one is different and changes over time."
"Magic signature?"
"One of the fairies' abilities. It allows us to easily detect who is who and it allowed us to hide from other beings. The best fortune tellers can accurately recognize every creature within a 10 km radius."
"Wow." - was all Lucy could say - "This is amazing."
"Not as much as you think." - Elaine replied - "Despite our wings and great magic, we may seem great, but our size limits us greatly."
"How much?"
"Humans and fairies have similar amounts of magical power. But due to our smaller size, we have to perform much stronger spells to match humans. Yes, we can cast them more times, but the incantation and learning takes a lot of time. And that doesn't even take into account physical problems. To defend ourselves, we had to invent more and more advanced spells and magical items. This allowed us to catch up with humans, but it also made them very jealous of us and wanted to steal our secrets. It didn't help that even the Dragons were starting to worry that we might be working something against them. Fortunately, their own stupidity caught up with them in the end."
"Hey." - Lucy interrupted - "The parents of 3 of my friends are dragons."
"Yes. There were dragons who opposed this, but they were in the minority. The magic of dragon slayers was created precisely because good dragons couldn't win and needed support. I admit, these are better starts than other Slayer magics, but that doesn't change the fact that it's better off being garbage without them. Coming back to where I left off. Well, at some point it became unbearable and our species actually became on the verge of extinction. It didn't help that some of our species decided to betray us and turn into humans. But eventually we managed to negotiate with the Celestial Spirit King and create our own dimension with his help. We fled here as soon as we could, even though we had to leave many artifacts on the other side. I'll tell you about them another time."
"Wow. I didn't know Stash Face was so powerful."
At this, Elain suddenly jumped up, grabbed her by the collar, and exclaimed - "Did you just call Celestial Spirit King Stash Face? Come back. Have you met him?!"
"Yes." - Lucy replied, a bit surprised.
"Can anyone confirm this?" - Elain asked.
"Yes."
"Who?!"
"Celestial Spirits I had a contract with at the time and Loke."
Elain let go of Lucy and said - "Unbelievable. I have to tell my brother. I'll be back soon. Practice flying until then. There is an obstacle course at the top. Don't worry about injuries. You cannot be harmed in this place. But it still hurts if you hit something. Bye."
And so Elaine flew out of the chamber while Lucy tried to understand what had just happened. But she quickly gave up on it and decided to just continue practicing flying. First, a simple flight up and onto one of the branches. Then for another one a little to the side. And the next one. It was quite funny. At least until she lost focus and fell into a twig. Nothing happened to her, but it still hurts. After a few more minutes, she decided to try the obstacle course.
It was a disaster. The first few times she tried, she didn't even cover a tenth of the entire track. After about half an hour she took a break and rested for a while. Her next attempts were better, but she still failed quite early. This time she made it about a third of the way before deciding to stop and rest again. She then tried again and this time, after over 2 hours, she made it halfway and took another break.
"Not bad." - A voice suddenly said from behind Lucy. After turning around, she saw Elaine and another fairy. This time it was a man with brown hair and eyes. He had blue wings on his back, bigger than himself. He was dressed in some exquisite suit and magical power practically radiated from him. He had to be stronger than the Master.
"You learn faster than most fairies. But you waste energy unnecessarily, which makes you tired quickly. If you work at it, you should last 4-5 times longer than you currently do."
"Thank you for your advice, Mr..."
"Harlequin, the king of the fairies and Elaine's older brother." - Harlequin said, pointing at Elaine.
Lucy was quickly shocked and bowed slightly.
"No need for pleasantries." - said Harlequin - "You finally saved my little sister's life. It's the least I could do for you. Although I didn't know you caught the Celestial Spirit King's attention. By the way, he has a really impressive mustache."
"I know." - Lucy said, relaxing a little - "So, your hig-"
"Harlequin is enough."
"So, Harlequin, why do I have your pleasure." - Lucy asked.
"To give you my blessing, of course. After Elaine stopped by and told me that you were able to convince the Celestial Spirit King himself to change the rules and save Leo the Lion, I thought you might want a little more than just help adjusting to your new body. That's why I've decided to let you study original fairy magic."
Lucy just stood there with her mouth dropped to the branch - "That's... really generous of you, Harlequin."
"Oh, don't worry." - Elaine said, flying up to me and grabbing my head - "You saved my life. I actually wanted to teach you this from the beginning, but the council wasn't too happy about it. After all, they would have to trust a human. But since Celestial Spirit King has vouched for you, there are no more problems."
"Good luck. I have to get back to my duties." - Harlequine said and flew away.