Chapter Thirty-Six

The Stargazer

The only inn in the town of Loduhn that didn't have boarded windows and barred doors was full of the local townsfolk, all of them giving the Fairy Tail mages looks of disgust as they passed.

"So," Natsu said, taking a long drink from the mug in his hands, "What can you tell me about the Smiling Jackass that I just left in a heap out there?" He asked, throwing a handful of jewel on the counter in front of him.

"Smiling Jack?" The bartender frowned, "I haven't seen or heard of Smiling Jack for a while now. Most of us assumed that he'd gotten bored. A few of the folk around here say he didn't much like stalking the people here," he answered clearly, pulling out some glasses and proceeding to wipe them down.

Natsu couldn't help but notice that everyone else was drinking from pristinely clean glassware while he was given an almost rotting wooden mug.

"Well, he's out there, but at the moment he's tending to some broken spindly arms. I left him out there because I didn't really think the idiot was a problem, he just seems a bit special and very lost." Natsu said, letting his senses wander for a bit. While he was present in the conversation, he was actively seeing if he could feel where Smiling Jack was. All traces were gone.

'I told you that it is an Etherious, it will never be a 'harmless' creature. Incompetent, but still an Etherious.' E.N.D. told him flatly.

"Oh he was definitely a problem at one point, he's a serial killer. The stories of what Smiling Jack left behind have gone back a good fifty years or so. He left body parts strewn around like-"

"Like abstract art on a canvas of alleyways?" Gray asked darkly.

"Exactly," the barkeep nodded slowly, "But then, when the Stargazer arrived, the attacks on locals stopped, and it was only ever when outsiders came in that it seemed anyone even remembered about Smiling Jack." He added quietly.

"This Stargazer, he's the one in the tower?" Natsu asked, now feeling the eyes boring into him from all sides.

"Aye, he is. I didn't ask before, but what business has brought you three young'uns to Loduhn?" He asked, putting the glass and rag down.

Natsu silently finished his drink and stood up.

"They call me the Salamander, someone here requested a mage, and so I'm here. Now, shall we cut this awkward pretence? The Stargazer calls the shots, doesn't he?" Natsu asked, stretching his body as though he was about to get ready to brawl.

At once, every single other patron of the inn had stood, all standing and waiting for the Fairy Tail Mage's next move.

"The Wizard offers us protection, in return we agree to serve him. Now, I think it's best for everyone if you go to the tower." The barkeep's eyes had turned into a dangerous glare.

"Wow, the whole town really is a dark guild, I guess we shouldn't hold back then," Gray said as he stood up, raising a hand. The temperature in the inn dropped so fast that the beers turned ice cold.

"Nice," Natsu smiled, grabbing the full drink that Lucy hadn't touched.

"Who are you?" The barkeep stood back and grabbed a long bat from underneath the bar. It had nails sticking out of the end, all at ugly hurting angles.

"Mages from Fairy Tail. Now, be good and stay out of our way, otherwise, I'll have to show you the wrath of a Dragon." Natsu told them, his eyes flashing gold briefly. He decided against letting himself get worked up.

Not just yet.

"I need you two to do something very specific for me," Natsu said as the four of them left the inn quickly. As they got to the street, they could see eyes on them, all of the townfolk were watching from the shadows, behind curtains in their homes, and even just in the corners of the streets.

"I need you to stop this town from interfering with me and this Stargazer. Can you hold them off from entering the tower?" He asked, looking between them.

"They were the ones who told us to go in the tower, you think they'll be a problem?" Gray asked, looking around, uncaring for the eye contact he was making with the locals.

"If this Stargazer and I don't see eye to eye, the last thing I need is an entire town of cultists up my ass. Yes, I have a strong feeling that there is going to be a problem, but you'll probably be the first to know when the top of the tower explodes." Natsu shrugged honestly.

"I think we can manage," Lucy answered, sounding like she was struggling to put the courage in her voice, "Loke, I need you." She said.

Her words were contained by the flash of Celestial light as Leo stepped into existence beside them, adorned in a well-tailored suit.

"Since when could you-" Natsu tilted his head, amazed that Lucy hadn't needed to activate a chant with her keys.

"I'm the only one she can summon like that," Leo explained quickly, "What's the deal?"

"Stop anyone from this shit hole from getting inside that tower," Natsu hooked a thumb over his shoulder, "Happy, can you take me to the top, buddy?" He asked, his features automatically softening whenever he spoke to the flying blue feline.

"Up we gooo!" Happy confirmed, taking to the air and circling before grabbing hold of Natsu's shoulders and rising fast.

"Do you think they'll be ok, Natsu?" Happy's worried voice called out through the sounds of wind whipping around them.

"Yeah, they'll be fine as long as you go back down and keep them safe. Make sure that Leo knows about Smiling Jack and that magic won't work on it." Natsu ordered, the peak of the tower coming into sight.

'We should deal with that Etherious. It could become a problem if you let it roam free.' E.N.D. stated flatly, taking more and more interest in Smiling Jack.

Soon enough, Happy dropped off near a rocky alcove that had possibly once held a window inside. Now it was just an old, decrepit hole in the side of the tower.

"Thanks buddy, keep them safe down there," Natsu waved as he climbed through the hole in the wall, scrambling to his feet as he looked around.

It was total darkness. It wasn't that Natsu could completely see in the dark, but he could see far better than anyone bar the other Dragon Slayers, even so, he found himself squinting to try and focus that sight and navigate his way through what he thought was a long spiralling corridor that wormed its way towards the top.

'Stop ignoring me, Dragon. That Etherious could be tied to Tartaros.' E.N.D. complained, his efforts growing more than normal.

"Tartaros are too busy searching for you, they don't involve themselves with mortals, nor do they particularly cause them any harm. Until that changes, I have no reason to seek them out," he whispered, finally responding to the beast inside.

'Down in that town, there is an Etherious, rogue or not it will figure out who we are, sooner or later. If you do not deal with it, you will bring death to your guild.' E.N.D. explained, his tone strangely aggressive, though his stance had been changed.

"Oh?" Natsu asked coyly, "Could it be that you don't want anything bad to happen to Fairy Tail?"

'I'll burn them to ash myself if I must.' The Demon growled harshly.

"So, things go south, we're fighting Zeref, and all of a sudden, Titania, Silvertop, and even Lucy are in our way, trying to stop us from losing ourselves, and… What, you'll disregard their lives, as easily as that?" he asked, tilting his head as he waited for a response.

There was none.

"Yeah, that's what I thought. You aren't wrong when you say that we really are one being. Two sides of the same coin, perhaps, but that coin has one heart and I know who is in it. Don't try to bullshit me on this, I know you as much as you know me." Natsu scolded gravely.

"Man, those three have turned me into a total softy." he laughed quietly, musing as he reflected on exactly how much they'd come to mean to him, each separately, but at the same time, in unison.

He kept walking, fumbling in the dark until he fumbled too hard and came crashing through something that he couldn't make out until he ended up falling straight into a room with light.

Groaning, he realized that he'd just been outmuscled by a pile of wooden crates.

"What asshole thought it was a good idea to put those there?" He cursed, pushing off the floor and dusting his knees off.

"That would be me," an old and startlingly frail voice spoke, reaching him with ease.

Natsu immediately went on the defensive, he hadn't felt the presence of someone, especially this close to him.

On the other side of the room, in an old leatherback chair, was a man who fit the age-old description for a wizard. He was extremely old with a long grey beard that easily reached down to his waist. He wore what might have once been a long flowing robe of beautiful azure blue and emerald green, but now it was grey and tattered with only the odd flecks of colour to indicate that it was ever something else.

"Sir, I'm afraid to inform you that you will be failing this health and safety inspection," Natsu blurted out, straightening up. The Wizard simply raised a brow.

"Immediate remedial action will be required! I advise tearing down this shitty tower and moving somewhere nice and warm, a beach perhaps. I've heard good things about Akane Resort. Well, good and bad, depends who you ask." Natsu eventually gave up, instead taking a moment to notice how eerie everything in the room was.

Shelves with jars of various things in sickly green and yellow substances all lined the various walls, except for the far wall behind the wizard. There was nothing there except for an old rotting wooden staircase.

"I didn't expect that the first person to ever make their way to the peak of my tower would be clinically stupid." The old man sighed heavily.

"I'll let that slide, seeing as you've likely been holed up in here all by yourself for five decades, so I'll get right to the point. Why did you send out the request for mages? What could someone like yourself possibly want with a Dragon Slayer?" Natsu asked, striding over through the middle of the room.

He didn't get more than halfway before several mechanical constructs shot out of the walls, latching on and restraining him where he stood. Even with his titanic raw strength, he couldn't move his limbs away from the buzzing cuffs around his hands. They pulsed with a dim blue light every few seconds, a rhythm and feeling that he couldn't place. This was new to him.

"Ah," he said, finally figuring it out, "I wondered why I couldn't sense you, but with these as well… You have no magic, you created these crazy little robot lacrima-type things because you aren't actually a wizard." He said, looking the old man dead in the eyes.

"The people down there, they send up food and water, and sometimes, even news they think I might be interested in. So, naturally, when I'd heard that the magical guild called Fairy Tail had managed to recruit not one but two Dragon Slayers, I knew that my lifelong plan was finally within reach." He explained, taking a long time to raise himself from the chair.

Without magic to sustain his body and slow the ageing, every single action must have felt like moving mountains.

He slowly came all the way over, having absolute faith that his creations would be able to keep Natsu contained.

"They call me the Stargazer. It has always been my goal to soar among the stars, untainted by the shackles of gravity. I built hundreds, thousands of designs to try and achieve this, but they all failed." He grumbled, stroking the beard like it was a comfort factor.

"Eventually I came to the conclusion that the only way to do it would be with magic, specifically something like yours, and so I built this." He waved his hand and nothing happened. He quickly noticed and waved again, catching a threadlike string hanging near the chair.

"This," he said again, pulling on it. The sound of stone grinding against stone filled Natsu's ears as parts of the floor and walls all creaked and groaned as they gave way, revealing a huge circular metal arch that held dozens more of those constructs that held him captive.

A much brighter blue light came to life and they all linked up, instantly pulling Natsu over and holding him in the centre of it.

"It took several generations of willing sacrifices to achieve this, but it finally held enough ether to come online. This is going to extract your magic and change its morphology, then once it's done, it will all be funnelled into me, and I will fly among the stars just like I've dreamed of doing every night of my life!" He croaked in what might have once sounded like a vindicated tone, but now it was just sad, broken by time.

"Hopefully that all sounds rather agreeable to you." He said with a dry laugh.

"If it was someone weaker, someone who wasn't attuned to their magic, you'd be able to extract it easily, but the thing about Dragon Slayers is that once they master their magic, it becomes them at their core and they stop ageing. Dragon Slayers beyond a normal age range aren't human, they literally are Dragons, they just choose to appear in their human forms." Natsu groaned, already feeling that the Stargazer was wholly not interested in what he had to say.

"And how old are you then, eh?" He croaked, pulling books and jars off of shelves to reveal a small panel with several levers and dozens upon dozens of buttons.

"Over four hundred," Natsu responded flatly.

"Oh. Shame." The Stargazer shrugged.

"If you try to extract my magic then it will certainly kill me, but you'll be left dealing with something far worse, I promise you that much." The Dragon Slayer said through gritted teeth.

'I'll be long gone by then, and your friends in the town will be dead and likely left as headless bodies burning at a stake. I'm not too concerned by whatever empty threats you make." The Stargazer chuckled to himself.

"You'd better hope to all of the Gods that these shackles hold," Natsu said each word almost painstakingly slowly, barely unable to keep his rage in check.

"Oh? It seems that the frequency of your magic fluctuates quite excessively with your change of emotion. I suppose that your friends mean quite a lot to you… Why don't we take a look inside that head of yours and figure out how we can maximize the magic that's extracted, let's see who you hold dear." The Wizard shuffled over to the other side of the room and picked up a dull metal sphere that sat between his two hands with ease. It couldn't have weighed more than a few pounds if the old man was holding it like that.

"Now, this might hurt a little… Lot, oh well, see you on the other side." He laughed hysterically before slamming the metal sphere into the side of Natsu's head, rendering him unconscious and sending him to the place he hated going.

A/N: Working on putting the fluff into the story in a way that's meaningful and actually makes sense. So far, I'm mostly just enjoying writing the original arc. Review?