Chapter 3
Natsu woke up about 10 minutes before they were at the stop near the village. Though he woke up he tried to show that he wasn't awake yet because he felt really happy to be in Erza's lap. A few minutes after he wakes up he feels Erza lightly shaking him and says "Come on Natsu it's time to get up." "But I don't want to, you're too comfy." Natsu replied with out really paying attention to what he said. When Erza heard that saying that she was red in the face was a severe understatement. Next think Natsu new is that he was flying into the opposite side of the compartment with his head going through the wood and scaring the people in the next compartment shitless.
"You idiot." Erza mumbled still very red. "You don't say stuff like that to a girl, thankfully Gray and Lucy already got up to wait at the train doors." But Natsu didn't hear her considering he was stuck in the wall. When Erza noticed this she just yanked him out hard and told him to get ready.
"Oh by the way Erza when we get back to Magnolia, I want to fight you just like old times." Natsu said with a grin. "Alright Natsu, if you think you can handle yourself this time considering last time I had you down with a single hit." "Oh don't worry about me; I know I can handle myself just fine now." Natsu said while smirking.
When they arrived at the village Gray asked "Where are we supposed to meet the client at?" "We're supposed to meet the client at town hall, must be the mayor who put up the request at Fairy Tail." Erza replied. "Well come on guys lets get going. I'M ALL FIRED UP NOW." Natsu roared out while breathing a hefty stream of fire. 'Guess he uses fire magic.' Lucy thought to herself.
A few minutes later they arrived at the town hall and started to head in to find out more about the mission. The town hall wasn't a small building but not very large either. It was one story made from a dark colored wood and looked as if it was on its last legs from all the holes on the roof. Erza called out "Is the mayor here?" "Yes, I'll be right with you." The reply back came from a side room that looked to be a library.
"Ah yes you must be the mages from Fairy Tail that I was told were arriving."
"That we are sir." Erza said. "I am Erza Scarlet, this is Gray Fullbuster, Lucy Heartfillia, and Natsu Dragneel." She continued while pointing them out. After the introductions were made Natsu asked "So what do we need to know about the job?"
"Ah yes about that; we have currently upped the reward to 500,000 jewels because something bad has happened." "Wait what happened?" Lucy asked concerned. "The bandits have started taking hostages and now our women in the village can't even go out alone at this point. The bandits are starting to rape them even in broad day light." As he said that there was a loud crunching noise and everyone looked at Natsu to see the chair he was sitting on had its arm broken from him squeezing it; Gray's chair was no different. They were both furious at what they just heard.
Not waiting for another word to be said Natsu immediately left and said "I'm going to fucking slaughter them all." No one had ever seen Natsu so pissed and since he left Happy behind Erza asked him what was that about. "When we were out training for those two years Natsu found a little girl that had been raped and beat to death. The ones that were responsible were killed. Natsu had actually killed the two of them."
Erza, Gray, Lucy, and the mayor were all mortified by what Happy said. Erza was the first to react and said "We need to get to him now; I don't want him to go killing anyone…that's just not like him." She said it really softly she was actually scared as to how her friend was feeling. The other two agreed and they set out after Natsu.
Natsu had just arrived to the outside of the mine when he saw two bandits dragging a young boy into the mine to work for them. Natsu was furious; he immediately lashed out at the two bandits knocking them unconscious in a matter of seconds. He turned to the boy and said "Get back to your home where your safe." And walked into the mine and was consumed by the darkness. The boy just stared after him and then followed Natsu's order.
Erza, Gray, and Lucy arrived to the mine just 3 minutes after Natsu had saved the boy. They saw the unconscious bandits and went after Natsu fearing he was going to go berserk on them. They were mainly afraid that he would cause the mine to collapse on him if he did something to destructive. "Lets go guys we need to help Natsu." Erza said sternly.
When they saw the inside of the mine they were surprised to see everyone at the front all unconscious and were thankful nothing bad happened yet. Erza requiped her sword and started going after Natsu again while Lucy summoned out Taurus who started hitting on her right away. "Shut up you damn cow and just help us with any bandits you see that our teammate might have missed." "Alright miss Lucy." The spirit responded.
As they went around the corner they saw Natsu fighting a magic swordsman who had a very large broadsword. Erza rushed at him to tackle him down, and as she did that Gray froze him solid. "About damn time you guys showed up." Natsu said with a grin. "Shut up Natsu we were worried about what you might do to the bandits because of what Happy told us that happened when you were training." Erza said and also slapped him lightly. "Don't just run off like that next time." "Sorry about that guys, I just didn't want anything bad to happen. Also nothing to worry about I wasn't going to kill these guys…last time I had just lost control of my temper." Natsu shuddered at the memory. "I don't want to do that again, it wasn't a very good experience."
As he finished talking someone had thrown a fireball at Natsu who just turned around and laughed. "Sorry pal that won't work on me." Then Natsu proceeded to kneeing the guy in the sternum with his knee on fire. Lucy was amazed at what she saw; she just watched Natsu take a fireball like it was nothing and attacked the wizard with his knee on fire.
The group continued deeper into the mine and heard more of the bandits up ahead. Gray took charge here and yelled out "ICE MAKE: LANCE!" sending a bunch of ice lances flying towards them and knocking them all out.
Then from the darkness ahead they heard "Hehe well isn't this a surprise." Natsu thought 'Wait I know that voice why do I recognize it?' "Well well well what do we have hear. Why isn't the mage who stopped us from our plan back last week, well all you did was delay it because now we have what we needed." Then Natsu new why he recognized the voice.
"I knew I recognized your voice, Erigor," "Wait Natsu you know who is behind these attacks?" Erza asked surprised. "Yeah he is the leader of the dark guild you were worried about. I don't know what they are after this time though."
Erigor just laughed and said "Well it's too late to stop us now boy we already have what we want; Lullaby. Lucy gasped recognizing the name and said "Guys we have to be careful now, Lullaby is death magic, just hearing a single not will have your soul taken away."
"Quite right you are missy, although only partly. But if you'll excuse me I have plans with this flute and you're in my way." With that said Erigor just flew on right past them before they had a chance to react. When Erigor went by them he yelled "I'll give the guild masters your regards before they all die." He was laughing like a man possessed.
"Don't tell me he is heading to the meeting hall for the masters." Gray said horrified. "We have to catch him immediately before any harm befalls the guild masters." Erza said. "Just what did he mean though that Lucy was only partly right about Lullaby, do you know Lucy?" "No sorry I just know that its death magic."
"I know what he was talking about." Gray said with a hard look. "Lullaby is a demon created by Zeref." "Oh no…" Lucy said with her hand over her mouth. "WE NEED TO GO NOW THEN." Erza yelled. "We can take a magic mobile to get to the masters faster that way…wait where is Natsu? And Happy for that matter?" They looked around only too see that they were both gone and no where in sight.
Erigor clutched on to Lullaby tightly and thought to himself 'I finally have it so I can now prove my power is absolute.' He failed to notice though a certain flying cat coming at him at high speed with Natsu hanging down below him. "HEY ERIGOR." Natsu yelled in anger. Erigor turned around in time to get tackled by Natsu, which ended with both of them falling down to train tracks they had been flying over.
"What? How did you catch up to me so fast?" Erigor didn't know what to think he was sure no one could catch up to him. "Doesn't matter though, I'll just kill you this time, I will not be taken by surprise again." He thought back to when they tried taking the train Natsu had been on and he took them all out with his fire magic. Well them and the train.
"Thanks for your help little buddy, you can go ahead and rest now I'll take care of Erigor." Natsu said to Happy who looked like he was on the verge of collapsing. "You doubled your max speed just to get us here in time. You did well so rest." Natsu then turned to Erigor and said "Well lets go off from where we left off last time."
"Don't get cocky boy. Last time you caught me by surprise and it won't happen again. "We'll see who the cocky one is Erigor. I'M FIRED UP NOW." Natsu yelled while igniting his fist and charging at Erigor. Erigor just put up a blast of wind to stop Natsu in his tracks and said "You won't be able to touch me little boy." There was a tick mark on Natsu's forehead and he yelled "WHO YOU CALLING LITTLE I'M FUCKING 19 YEARS OLD YOU PIECE OF SHIT.' Natsu raged at him. (A/N: I don't think I've seen Natsu's age before so I'm just going to have as the same age as Erza.)
Back along the train tracks Erza, Gray, and Lucy were driving in Erza's car at breakneck speeds so they can help Natsu. Gray yelled to Erza "Erza you need to slow down if you keep driving at this speed you could drain yourself dry of your magic energy. "I know but we need to get to Natsu fast to help him stop Erigor." Then she thought to herself 'I also don't want Natsu to die. I couldn't bear the thought of that happening.'
Back with Natsu and Erigor; the two were trading fierce blows back and forth. Natsu ducked Erigor's last kick and did an uppercut to Erigor's knee (that has to hurt). As Erigor was thrown off balance Natsu roundhouse kicked him across his upper back sending Erigor too the ground. "That's it boy you are getting on my nerves." Erigor started building a large amount of magic power and covered himself with his wind.
"HAHAHA you have no chance at getting to me now young fire wizard. My storm mail is impenetrable. None of your attacks will reach me." Erigor took off into the air and started sending slices of wind so fast that started cutting into the rocks whenever Natsu dodged them. Natsu leapt into the air yelling "FIRE DRAGON'S IRON FIST." But before the attack could connect; Erigor's storm mail blew him away and Natsu went tumbling over the edge of the train tracks into the canyon below.
"NATSU!" Happy cried out as he saw him go over the edge and tried to go after him but didn't have enough magic power to form his wings.
"Damnit! What do I do now?" Natsu thought desperately for a way out of this situation before he becomes a stain on the ground far below then remembered that Macao said he could change the properties of his fire to make it do almost anything he wanted and in the end it could over come any attack he was up against. 'Well here goes nothing.' Natsu started channeling his fire into his feet and had it propel him upwards so he became a human rocket so to speak.
Atop the train tracks Erigor was laughing like crazy at Natsu's fate from falling off the edge, but didn't notice said wizard was rocketing towards him and couldn't react in time when he heard "FIRE DRAGON'S SWORD HORN" and felt Natsu slam into his stomach and coughed out some blood. "Ugh damnit boy how did you get up here again?" Erigor coughed out. "Doesn't matter how I did it. All that matters is that I take you down. "Don't think you won just yet boy. You hit me when I had storm mail down so let's see you try that again." With that said Erigor put up his storm mail once again.
Natsu leapt at Erigor again trying to punch him with another Fire Dragon's Iron fist, but was just blown away. This kept happening over and over. Nothing Natsu did could get through to Erigor. He couldn't even get within 3 feet of Erigor. Natsu was getting mad and grabbed the railings for the train tracks and started pulling on them with his entire body engulfed in fire.
"DAMNIT WHY CAN'T I HIT HIM. NOTHING I DO WORKS AT ALL, WHAT THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO DO?" What Natsu didn't notice was Erigor's storm mail being blown upwards from the extreme vertical updraft Natsu's fire was causing.
'What is going on? His fire is blowing away my storm mail and it seems to be getting stronger as he gets angrier.' Happy had caught on to what was happening and yelled to Natsu "Hey Natsu you should just give up you're not good enough to beat him. You should just let Gray handle him.
Just like that Natsu's fire died out as he stared at Happy in shock. Then it returned even stronger before as he yelled "WHAT DID YOU FUCKING SAY?" Erigor was starting to panic now because almost all of his storm mail was being blown away. 'How is this happening? These are flames of emotion, its ancient magic. Where did this boy learn how to use it?'
Before Erigor could think anymore he felt his chest get flattened inwards as Natsu once again used Fire Dragon's Swordhorn. 'It isn't possible' Erigor thought with wide eyes. 'Dragon slayers truly exist.' And with that last thought he collapsed to the ground unconscious while Natsu turned towards Happy. "So what was that you said Happy?" Natsu asked in a vicious tone. "Cat's have short term memory so I don't remember."
"Yeah right you said something like I couldn't beat him so I should leave it to Erza or something." "You have even worse memory then I do I said Gray not Erza. Though none of that matters now you still beat him." "Yeah I guess your right though I'm not sure how I managed to hit him in the end." "You're just that awesome Natsu." Happy cheered. "Yeah I guess you're right Happy." "Aye sir!"
Natsu walked over to Erigor's unconscious body and grabbed Lullaby's flute from him and said "We should wait for Erza and the others to get here before we decide what to do with this flute." "Well we won't have to wait too long, I can see them driving towards us right now." "Hey look at that your right." Natsu said as he turned in the direction Happy was looking and started to wave towards them.
When Erza, Gray, and Lucy arrived they saw Erigor's body on the ground and Erza said "So you managed to beat him after all Natsu?" "What did you ever doubt me Erza? I'm hurt." He said mocking being hurt. Erza just laughed and gave Natsu a hug. Well it's not much of a hug it's more of him getting his head slammed into really hard armor.
"H-hard." Natsu groaned in pain. As Erza let go he stood up and asked "I have Lullaby here with me what should we do with it?" Erza thought for a moment and said "We should take it to the masters and see what they think is best. Also great job Natsu I'm proud of you." Natsu just blushed and rubbed the back of his head.
"Yeah I guess he did alright for someone who has a melted brain." Gray said with a smirk." Natsu was about to make a remark but the glare from Erza the two got was enough to shut them both up instantly.
"Alright guys lets head to the masters then." Erza said. As they all got into the car they failed to notice Lullaby's three eyes glow with a purple glint as the demon inside waited.