It was late in the afternoon by the time Arthur and Minerva had landed on Guiltina. Despite his surgery, maintaining Enif had not been an issue. In part because he didn’t miss the continent - twice - like on the first trip so it was a fraction of the time. More importantly he’d improved his pact with Enif. It took a fraction of the power to maintain his summon, even without dropping his speed parameter.
It was also a constant, stable drain as opposed to a sudden spike. He had been careful when summoning Enif, and made certain that he didn’t try to activate the wrong magical pathways. It was easy when he was given time to concentrate and work. The pathways were healing, though. He didn’t have a good way of gauging how long it would take, but each day magic was coming noticeably easier.
He didn’t go to Diabolos’s guild hall when he arrived in Guiltina. He needed what Selene had to offer, and Georg had made clear what his thoughts on that was. And if Arthur broke the deal… Well Selene taking Diabolos for her own was about the best case scenario. So instead of getting into a fight with Georg on the matter, Arthur simply landed by the coast, filled a bottle with sea water, and tossed it up into the air. He worked the spell Selene had taught him: aqua aera. It was a highly demanding spell, a top tier working of spatial magic, and he was trying to reach a specific location.
His chest flared with pain, as light magic bled into the water magic of the spell. Arthur thought the portal was a success, but instead of testing it, he cast the spell again. It took till the third try to have it go off without that surge, his Archive recording each attempt and what he had done differently in his flows of magic.
Minerva was looking around wide and wild eyed. It was her first real time in another world. Coco, the girl who had become the chief of staff for Selene, came running up. “It’s you. Thank goodness you came,” She said with heavy vitriol in her voice at first, only fading later to relief. “Her imperial majesty is impatient for your return, and…” She looked around as if the walls might be listening. “You shouldn’t keep her waiting.”
The castle seemed to have been, for a large part, repaired. But everyone he saw within it seemed to be furtive and scared, ready to jump out of their skin. They darted, moving in a hurry, heads lowered, and when they ran into each other burst into an exchange of apologies.
“If you want to retain the love of the common people, you will have to change something,” Jellal’s voice sounded out ahead of him. Or Mystogan’s Arthur realized. Prince Jellal of Edolas as opposed to Jellal of Earthland.
“Are you saying I need to constrain myself to rule?” Selene asked. She was seated in an opulent throne, a flock of servants around her tending to her every need.
“Yes,” Mystogan stated, his tone curt and upset.
“Then what’s the point of ruling? Why do I let you talk to me like this again?” Selene spoke in a voice like an unsheathed sword, words that almost dripped with killing intent.
“Because I do a good job of running the country so that you can focus on other things, and you know if you had me replaced you’d not be able to get nearly the same level of comforts you desire.”
Selene looked at him for a few moments. “Oh, yes, I guess that’s so.”
“She’s strong,” Minerva muttered, clinging behind Arthur. She had felt Selene’s magical power and pressure, and coupled with the killing intent it was devastating.
Arthur, though, couldn’t help but notice how weak it was. It felt like that if he hadn’t just had heart surgery he could kill her right here and now. Where before even as a human she had had more power than he did. She was now somewhere weaker than Draculos.
“I’m back,” Arthur said.
“I’m back? Is that how you treat your queen and master?” Selene said, looking at him with a face full of irritation. “I’ve been keeping my side of the bargain, supplying this ethernano dead world with magical power, gluttons that they are for it and they are ungrateful for the effort and pain it causes me.”
“The people are very grateful,” Mystogan said, “They see you as a goddess descended from heaven to save them, but the demands you make are somewhat unreasonable.”
“Once they stop sucking my life force dry with their demands I’ll stop sucking them dry with mine,” Selene said. “If I’m going to be in pain and misery for their sake they can give me what I need to mitigate that pain and misery.”
“Am I interrupting something?” Arthur asked.
“Yes!” Selene snapped. “But I’ve been waiting too long. How could you keep me waiting so long after all I’ve done for you?”
“I had business that needed to be done in Ishgar. It should be completed now. They were preparations that will…” Arthur was speaking when Selene angrily cut him off.
“Help see to Acnologia’s fall, by maximizing the chance of Igneel’s plan being successful. Yes yes yes. I remember. And did you maximize that chance?”
“I prevented Acnologia from killing 3 of the 5 early,” Arthur said.
“So you let him kill two?” She crushed the golden goblet in her hand in her sudden rage, splashing wine everywhere.
“No. Those two were never in danger.”
“Oh, that’s fine then,” she said, settling back into her cushion-covered throne. “I wish I could have watched what sort of distortions you wrought. But still… for now you must be exhausted from your travels from Ishgar. Let us dine and enjoy ourselves.”
It was the second royal feast Arthur had attended in as many days. Being whisked into an alternate reality and given unfair powers was a pretty sweet gig… if you didn’t mind the constant risk of death and nightmares about the blood on your hands. Or well… hand. It had its cons.
“Bring in the entertainment,” Selene said as the dinner progressed. Musicians and acrobats filed in, but Selene’s attention wasn’t on them. It was on Arthur… or more his prosthetic hand. “Now, I thought you were missing a hand, but here I see you have one.”
“Er, well, a king in Ishgar had gotten swept up in everything here, and to thank me for saving his capital city he had a prosthetic hand made for me. It’s not all that impressive and the sensory information from it sucks, but it’s better than…” Constantly using dragon slayer magic risking further dragonification. “... nothing.”
“I hope you won’t say the same about my hand,” She said, raising her hand and snapping her finger. “Bring it in,” She stated looking at a servant who had just entered carrying a plate of meat.
“Here it is, your majesty,” he said bowing deeply.
She smacked the plate into his face, forcing the food against his nose and eyes. “Not the food. The hand. The hand. Are you an imbecile?”
“I’m sorry, your majesty, but… what hand?” He said. “I’m more than happy to fetch it, but I don’t know what you’re-” He disappeared.
Selene sighed. “Good help is hard to find,” She said, before extending a hand outwards and having a silver and white gold, clawed, gauntlet-hand appear in hers. It was a prosthetic, made with Edolas magic, but Arthur could feel…
“The lacrima were made from my magical power and I… flavored them a bit. I did promise to teach you my magic. It should be an excellent training tool.” She smiled, obvious pride on her face. And then her voice sharpened, and her tone darkened. “Show your gratitude properly.”
Arthur teleported his current prosthesis away. They had been seated on the floor in traditional Japanese style - Selene’s preference - and now Arthur bowed his head low, bringing it to the floor. “I am most thankful for your consideration, your gracious majesty,” He said, one eye looking up to see the not-exactly-pleased expression on Selene’s face. “I do not know how to properly show the thanks I have for the consideration you have made for me. Please, if there is a proper way, instruct me?”
Selene laughed a little. “I think this will be acceptable,” She said, placing the hand on Arthur’s fleshy and blood one.
Arthur looked at it. It was a silver hand, finely crafted with a skill that spoke of antiquity over the middle ages. He thought ruefully that despite wielding a rather complete manifestation of THE Black Sword he was not Elric, the Prime Progenitor of Edgelords in fantasy literature. He was Corum the Prince of Angst. It was not a pleasant thought; Corum was sort of lame.
Still he didn’t hesitate to put the hand on. It was not a mundane prosthesis, the magic in it allowed it to interface with the nerves. And the work was well beyond that of Crocus. Crocus’s work pretty much extended to kinesthetic sense and pressure. It didn’t feel hot or cold, it couldn’t tell you the difference at a touch between iron and iron wrapped in velvet. It told you ‘this is where this part of me is’ and ‘the thing in my grasp is resisting said grasp’. Arthur could immediately feel the warmth of his hand. It was still somewhat vague and alien, almost disorienting in its own way. But Arthur had to wonder if that had something to do with his altered sensorium as a dragon slayer. Still it was maddeningly half numb. It could tell that the goblet he had held was warmer than the stone floor, and feel that stone and wood were in someway different but it still wasn’t like flesh and blood.
“Now, hopefully you’ll someday outgrow it, but true to my word I am going to be teaching you. It has some of my magical arts loaded into it.” She snapped her fingers. “Water now.” When the servant arrived with a pitcher to refill her glass she seethed. “Bucket not… no the pitcher is large enough. Useless fools. Wave the hand over it and access the moon viewing spell.”
Arthur was scared to ask how. But he’d brought up a small interface with his Archive on the back of the hand, starting to run a sort of diagnostics program on it. It took him a minute to find what he thought was the right spell; one he could recognize as Aqua Aera, the others seemed to project energy in destructive forms, and to figure out the right way to work his will through the hand. The water rippled and it began to project an image. There’d been preset coordinates so he had followed them.
He saw two… no three men, well young men, teenagers, the youngest was probably the same age as Sting and the oldest was maybe 17, that he didn’t immediately recognize. Two were in cold weather gear, slowly stripping out of it. The third he realized he did recognize. And as the others removed their layered coats he realized who they were. The one dressed like it was summer and not a snowstorm was Orin. He looked to be 14 or 15, around early highschool age. He was brown haired and his muscles were toned more like a bodybuilder’s than an athletes, though short, with his guild mark hidden by his tanktop even now. The others were the two remaining members of Team Pax. He’d done a job with them when he’d first arrived and was only provisionally part of the guild. Well, to say he did a job was stretching it. He’d played tag along and servant. Orin was an ice dragon slayer.
The one with the guildmark displayed on his shoulder was Pax, the leader and the eldest, fully mature by Earthland standards, though he was still a kid by the standards of the 21st century. He was a big guy, though, already over 6 feet tall and still growing, and while he lacked Orin’s bodybuilder physique, he had the bulk of a strong, active man. Arthur remembered him levitating things, and carrying the heavy loads, but couldn’t say for certain what his magic had actually been. Levitation was a weird power to get from eating an element.
The third was Cullen. He was young. Younger than Kiria or Minerva, probably Sting’s age. He was already taller than the short Orin, but he was scrawny and relatively lithe. His guild mark was on his face, visible once he pulled down his hood. Arthr remembered him being relatively skilled as a mage, and having used sand make magic as much or more than any dragon slayer magic. Though he thought he was a sand dragon slayer. Desert? It was like trying to remember a trio you’d done a class project with months ago and never talked to again. It’d been several months and he barely talked to them after.
They were talking about how lucky it was that they found this cave, given the snowstorm outside. Arthur glanced at Selene. She had set it to view these three. There had to be a reason. “What’s going to happen to them?” Arthur asked.
“Well they went into the territory of a sleeping dragon. And not one of the young whelps your guild likes to murder. A survivor of the south from the days before the King was declared. Pyronoios.” There was malice in her voice, a grin twisting on her face. “She was one of the great fire dragons of the time. Second amongst those who came to Guiltina behind only Ignia himself.”
“Known as the Mother of Calamity. Her brood spread flames across the continent. She was supposed to have died after a brief reign as Ignia’s consort.” Diabolos did have a library for this sort of thing.
“Died? Why would you think that?”
“Because it’s said she angered one of the Dragon Gods and disappeared from history.”
Selene laughed. “She decided to step away from the prime territories that was all. She went to the far north. But you humans crawl everywhere and now that you’re waking her up…”
“And let me guess the preset place that the Aqua Aera opens to is the cave.”
“Oh, you are clever. Yes. I will take you directly to the trio.”
Arthur tossed the pitcher of water into the air, forming the portal and stepping through.
The trio of dragon eaters were surprised when they saw a man appear in front of them. Dressed in a silk shirt, and fine pants, he definitely hadn’t just come from the raging snowstorm outside. “Orin, Pax, Cullen, you need to get out of here,” He said.
They were more surprised when he recognized them. “Who are you?” Orin asked.
“Wait, Arthur?” Cullen said after a moment.
“Arthur?” Orin asked.
“The library freak,” Cullen said.
“Oh, Kiria’s horsey!” Orin said. “He did use teleportation magic, didn’t he?”
“Spatial magic, not just teleportation,” Arthur said annoyed. He really hadn’t made much of an impact on his fellow dragon eaters had he? He’d have to try and do better in the future. If he had a future with them. Georg didn’t exactly approve of his whole working with Selene thing. That hadn’t come to a head before, but Arthur suspected it had to do with respect for the dead.
“So… why are you here?” Pax asked.
“Because you’re about to wake up one of the nastiest dragons Guiltina has ever…” The ground began to shake beneath them, rocks tumbling from the tunnel’s roof and a great roar drowned out Arthur’s words.
“Is it just me or did it just get real hot in here?” Orin asked. Perspiration was beginning to bead on the dragon eaters’ skin. Arthur’s new hand was telling him that the air was about the same temperature as his body and getting hotter.
He spun, raising his hands and extending his space in front of him, and behind him, letting it flow up in front like a wall, bending around and enveloping the group, and then extending in a plane back behind them. Light was shining from the deep of the cavern, growing brighter as a wave of flame rushed towards them.
“You need to get them out of there,” Minerva said as she and Selene watched in a barrel of water.
“Why?” Selene asked lightly.
“The dragon will kill them,” Minerva said.
“If Arthur dies here he’s weaker, much weaker than I thought. And child, I do not appreciate being spoken to in that tone.” Selene said with a little glare.
“He just had a lacrima implanted. He can’t fight at anything near his full strength.”
“What? Lacrima implanted?”
Minerva nodded, and placed a hand on her chest, over her heart. There wasn’t a scar, Wendy had made sure to heal that on her. Arthur had asked to be allowed to keep his as apparently he thought it made him look ‘cool’. “A dragon slayer lacrima. It should improve his magic, but it has to fully integrate first, until it does his magical power is in disarray and if he pulls heavily the flow from it and his origin can get mixed up.”
Selene looked at her and blinked twice. “Humans go to such lengths for power? Your kind never ceases to amaze me. Well if you want him saved go and save him.”
“I’m too weak,” Minerva said, hunching her back and pulling her arms in front of her, moving to make herself look small. “I can’t even use my magic right now after my own lacrima surgery. I passed out last time I tried.”
“Pathetic,” Selene said with a sigh.
“But you can do it, you’re a dragon god aren’t you?”
“First, if I kill that bitch myself to save some humans it’s the same as declaring war on Ignia. Second, I’ve been feeding the majority of my magical power into this world for more than a month now. She’s strong enough that even if I could bring my best she might wound me, and wounds from a dragon do not heal, not for other dragons at least. If I fought her while chronically exhausted: she would win.”
Minerva froze, going pale, and swallowing.
Arthur felt the telltale pain in his chest. Where his heart had been until it had been replaced with the lacrima. He was pouring too much energy, too fast into his barrier. The fire was melting the rock around them, leaving them in a tunnel of magma.
“Guys, help!” Arthur said in a strained voice, as part of the outer shell of his space failed, and fire shot through. Orin roared, a wave of white shooting from his mouth. It barely held back the crack as snow pummeled against the flame. Cullen’s sand came next, fusing into glass, but still providing something that had to be melted through.
Pax aimed higher and further, the roof of the lava tube falling into the flame in front of Arthur’s territory. And then they were breathing out into the snow storm. Arthur’s space had reached, and he had teleported them out. A plume of fire short from the mountain like a volcano, erupting into the air and filling the sky.
Pyronoios the Wildfire Dragon, Mother of Calamity. The books had said that while her flames did not burn particularly hot compared to the fire dragons which had been Ignia’s original compatriots, their scope and spread had been unequaled by any fire dragon Guiltina had known.
Arthur’s chest hurt, a pounding flaring pain. But he realized that they were still far too close. Not merely to the flame, an avalanche was coming down the mountainside, though the heat of the fire was turning it into a massive flash flood.
Arthur’s brought up his Archive to bear. He’d used Aqua Aera earlier, it’d taken him three tries, but he knew the pathways. Light magic crept in anyway. He was being too hasty. It was bleeding all through his magical energy.
“This is why Georg told us we weren’t ready to fight a dragon,” Orin whined, tears flowing down his face. Cullen lay in the snow, a bad burn visible across his body. Pax looked out at the tsunami-like mass of water rolling down towards them.
“We weren’t supposed to be fighting a dragon,” he said. It had been a simple job request. A group of explorers had gone missing. They were just supposed to find anything that would allow them to be tracked down.
Arthur tried again, turning the crashing wave of water into a portal. He didn’t know for certain if he’d gotten the magic right or not as it hit across them, but when Arthur and Team Pax spilled out into one of the courtyards of Edolas’s capital castle, along with a miniature landslide he could say he succeeded.
“Where are we?” Orin asked.
“And why can’t I feel my magic?” Pax added.
Arthur had barely begun to explain what and where Edolas was, when Selene appeared. “I can’t say you exactly passed the test, especially given you just destroyed my sand garden. But given the mitigating factors of your recent surgery, I won’t say you exactly failed.”
Arthur wanted to go hostile. He felt the rage rising up in him. Maybe it was the dragon in him. Maybe it was just the man. Still he managed to bite it back and say nothing.
“What’s the matter? Don’t give me the silent treatment,” Selene said, annoyed. Arthur still didn’t trust himself to say anything that wasn’t stupidly angry.
“She feels as strong as Georg,” Orin whispered to Pax.
Pax nodded. He wasn’t certain that they were equal, but they were both like trying to measure the size of a thunderstorm that blanketed the entire sky. If one merely reached past the horizon and the other covered an entire country it’d not be easy to tell just by looking at it.
“Thumper’s mom,” Arthur answered.
“What?” Selene said.
“If you can’t say anything nice don’t say anything at all.”
Selene laughed. “That’s not a very nice response either, but I guess it’s honest enough.”
“Arthur, who is she?” Pax asked.
“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here,” Selene said. “It’s impolite. But if you want to know, I am Selene the Moon Dragon God.”
The trio looked at Arthur. They might not know him well enough to recognize him easily, but everyone knew Georg had forbidden him from working with the Moon Dragon God.
“Why’d you set them up with Pyronoios?” Arthur finally said, having forced himself to stop and think.
“You wound me. I didn’t set them up. I just… Well ok, I set them up. I wanted to see if you were unique in your guild or if it had value. These three obviously do not.”
“Yes they do,” Arthur said.
Selene gave him a withering look, and flicked her hand, scything blades of moonlight flowed from her hand, slicing Orin and Pax’s clothes from their bodies before they could react. “No,they do not. At least not as dragon slayers.”
“Hey! We’re not even rated for fighting dragons!” Orin protested.
“I thought you were dragon eaters,” Selene said in an irritated tone.
“Well…” Orin began to explain how the guild worked. How the guild master was the real dragon slayer, and only a few teams were actually judged as ready to help fight dragons much less fight them alone. The rest just used dragon slayer magic; he carefully didn’t say from eating dragons. “The rest of us just do some general jobs. We were supposed to be looking for some lost prospectors not fighting a dragon.”
Selene groaned. “So you’re trying to tell me you call yourself dragon eaters, and most of you can’t even fathom slaying a dragon? Pathetic.”
“Georg made me slay a dragon myself,” Arthur complained. “Or at least help. I had to play dragon bait.”
“You weren’t a small child when you joined. Plus you rubbed him wrong when you showed up in his food.”
This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
Arthur sighed.
“So… what will happen with the dragon now?” Minerva asked, coming out into the courtyard.
“Knowing Pyronoios, she’ll probably rampage southward.” Selene’s hand moved over some of the water that had managed to flow in through the portal when Arthur had opened it. “The nearest town is still standing, so she’s not reached it yet. But she can probably follow their scent as she flies. And she will be going straight back to where it came from.”
“Didn’t she burn their scent away?” Arthur asked.
“Did they not mention her nose in the books?” Selene said. “Now that you’ve woken her up, especially since you’ve escaped, she’s going to be on a rampage.”
“I’ve woken her up?” Arthur said.
“The feeling of the dragon slayers definitely is what woke her.”
“Because you led them there.”
“I didn’t make them ignore the warning signs.”
“Is that what the writing at the entrance was?” Orin asked.
“See? If your little worthless guildmates had done their due diligence the dragon would still be asleep. All I did was point them in the direction. I didn’t make them careless oafs,” Selene said with an air of superiority.
“How do we stop the rampage?” Arthur asked.
“Either get Ignia to ask, or slay her,” Selene said. “I expected one of you four to manage it. I didn’t think four dragon slayers would have to run from a single dragon.”
Arthur seethed. Orin was freaking out, talking to himself, his words blurring together as he let his words run on one into the other to the point of incomprehensibility. He was hysterical, and pleading, falling on his knees before Selene and reaching towards her, as he blabbered about not meaning to and how Selene had to help and stop it.
“I can’t. Unlike your guild mate,” She looked pointedly at Arthur, “I have been keeping my end of our bargain. And I have been expending my magical power to revive this world’s own. It’s hard work, and has left me weak, irritated, and in a generally poor mood.”
Arthur felt a twinge of guilt then. Though he’d have argued he was keeping his end of the bargain. He was here wasn’t he? But he could feel that Selene had weakened herself, and it was entirely possible that she’d done so in a long term manner. And it was something that could be felt in Edolas. There was more ethernano in the air; as signified by the fact that… He looked at Cullen. He might be silent more because he’d been burned than just that he hadn’t immediately felt his lack of magic.
“Can you at least get some medical attention for my friend,” Pax was quicker on the uptake about Cullen’s condition. “He got burned badly.”
“That’s not burned badly,” Selene said. “Given what he was facing, that’s a light burn.” Arthur wasn’t sure what constituted a bad burn, but Cullen’s stretched across his shoulder and arm as well as half his torso. Still it wasn’t solid across that area, there were patches of unburnt skin.
“That I can do,” Selene said. “Coco, make yourself useful,” She commanded the quick running girl.
“So, you’re saying that if I don’t stop this dragon it’s on my conscience?” He said looking at Selene.
She looked at him then blinked a few times. “If that’s how your conscience works, I guess it is. I don’t think I am the adjudicator of your conscience. I don’t know why you’d feel guilt for it as you’re not the one who would be killing them. That’s the dragon. But if you do. Well then yes. If you don’t stop her I guess it will be. So stop her. If you’re going to kill the dragon king this should be easy for you.”
“I just had my heart replaced with a magic crystal. It’s-”
“A minor handicap. If you can’t figure this out despite that I have no doubt that you’ll be unable to figure out Ignia, much less Acnologia. Pyronoios’s rampage is a small price to pay to figure out if you’re actually worth continuing this investment.”
Arthur clenched his fists. He had a town to save. He just needed to figure out how fast.
Cullen was incapacitated. He was probably going to be fine. But he wasn’t fighting with the pain of those burns. Orin and Pax, however, could be recruited into helping evacuate the town. Opening the Aqua Aera and holding it open long enough to get people out was not quick, but… People could be relocated and even if they became refugees it was better than dying.
Not that everyone was willing to leave the town. Even though a mountain had exploded in a way that was visible from the village, through the blizzard. Arthur left it to Minerva, Pax, and the Edolas Royal Army to convince or force them from their homes. He had to prepare to meet the dragon a few miles away from the town. He knew a dragon’s roar could hit that far still. But it was less likely to be collateral.
Arthur knew he could spend points to trivialize the battle ahead. He had scored big with the Grimoire Heart raid; even though it hadn’t checked off robbing them blind or destroying them - the two it was intended to - it, and leaving Ishgar, had finally seen several others check off; he’d redeemed a villain, he’d put the Seis on the heroic path he’d almost knocked them from, he’d completed both the bounty for making 3 friends and apparently had made 7 friends as it popped up as a bounty already completed. The power to know who thought of him as a friend made him feel a bit bad, because apparently he’d not befriended Natsu, but Natsu thought of him as a friend. Laxus did not.
Still, while he had enough points to buy a big power, he didn’t want to rush it. He wasn’t sure how many more he would get, and he wasn’t getting another big power from this. If something like Seilah happened again he’d be in trouble. He needed to save the points for when he was. Besides, he didn’t even know what would help.
More magical power? He couldn’t use his full power at the moment already.
For my friends? He was saving a town of strangers, with a dumbass who he barely knew. It wasn’t like he was trying to save Minerva.
MBP Body? He wasn’t even sure that dragons were affected by Magical Barrier Particles like a human. And other than that it fell into the same set of problems as more magical power.
Curse Power? That’d only really prove useful if he failed.
Enchantment? The Books of Zeref?
Fairy Founder he was certain would fully restore his magic; the way it talked about magic flowing naturally through you and intuitively… it wasn’t that there was something fundamentally wrong with his magic. It was just that he had new pathways for it and lacked the muscle memory to use them properly. But it’d be 400 points. He had 500 now, it was a huge supply, but it would take a lot of it. And while the ability to make spells on the fly would be useful, he wasn’t certain it was worth it. And of the others that he could no longer discount on that tier; he thought it was probably the worst outside of this situation.
Fairy Strategist would do it. He’d be able to see the path to victory as clearly as if he had a shard guiding his brain. Well that might be an exaggeration. But he was fairly sure he’d know how to win this fight if he had it. And such an ability would only get better.
There were others he’d love. Edomagic would let him make a hand that would keep, and make his own dragon lacrima. It’d help him fulfill the bounty to become a “6th generation dragon slayer” by making weapons and armor from dragons. With his magical skill he had no doubt he could make a hand that was fully functional. With a bit of takeover magic tinkering one that looked human too.
Not So Lost Magic might prove the key to developing Dragon Takeover magic. Which given it was his best chance at the moment of not becoming a dragon - even if it was a selfish solution - he couldn’t ignore it.
Friends are Forever, Defeat Means Friendship, and Future Sight would all be wonderful. But they’d not help him in this situation, and while they might solve more things than avoiding becoming a draconic engine of destruction they’d not get that chance if he did become a draconic engine of destruction.
Of the others… Mage Sensor would be great, and might win the battle. It’d only be 200 points. But it overlapped with his Archive magic. Mystical Eye would give him something like Erik’s ability to hear the voice of the heart. Which would be great… just not useful right now. Friendly Fairies would help him not accidentally hurt those he cared about with even the most devastating AoE attacks; given that was increasingly a worry it’d be great, but it was the dragon he was afraid would hit them. Live to Magic Another Day might stop that. But only might. And it’d do nothing to help him win. If he couldn’t evacuate the town he might have bought it anyway. It was on the list of powers he needed to try and pick up before leaving here at least. Plenty of the 200 point options were great, and would need to be considered now that he was running out of discounts; On Two Legs might work to save Diabolos and probably would fix Erik’s snake… but he still had hope he could do it without that. Though it’d still be nice later on.
He had too many options, and too little information. Still he had a plan. Orin couldn’t make ice, only snow, but he could shape it somewhat, and it was filled with magical power; it wouldn’t melt as easily as normal snow. He was burying Arthur in as much as he could, with a narrow tunnel out.
Altair had found the enemy and was drawing her away. He couldn’t hurt her, but she recognized a scout and didn’t want to let it return to the point of origin. Arthur would have loved his Altair Star Dress for its vision enhancement right now. But he couldn’t afford it. He needed Caelum’s star dress for its gun and aim assist. He wasn’t a sniper but playing one was a lot easier when you had an Archive running your trajectories, a star dress assisting your aim, and were using beam weapons that weren’t affected by wind or bullet drop.
Altair’s strafing run had taught him something too. Pyronoios wasn’t alone. After the eagle had managed to weather a roar - with difficulty - she’d began to spit out balls of fire which had turned into smaller, draconic entities. Altair had taken one of these lesser dragons down with a full powered bolt. And then he’d been swarmed.
The Edo soldiers would be useless against them. His Archive told him they weren’t really dragons. Closer to a sort of Living Magic like Zeref had used to make his etherious, though really they were far from that level of sophistication. But they shared some of their maker’s magical resistance. Only a dragon slayer would have a chance against them.
Orin was running on fumes, though. And he didn’t even know how Pax’s magic worked. Still Altair had fallen. It was time to end the evacuation. The town wouldn’t be safe much longer.
The dragon’s fire summons were already flying for it. And Arthur winced. He could bring them down with Caelum, but only in a horribly energy inefficient manner. Or he could reveal he had dragon slayer magic and his position.
He couldn’t afford to stop them. He gave a warning to Pax and the Edo soldiers through his Archive link, and prepared to close the portal.
And then he waited. The town would be burned to the ground. He couldn’t stop that. He couldn’t think about the lives that would be ruined, and the number of refugees it’d make. Hopefully Edolas could swallow it. He was focused on stopping lives from being lost.
He could finally see the appeal of the Hero to Zero perk.
Caelum fired first. It was the moment that Pyronoios came within what he had decided was the effective range of engagement. The energy struck her and the dragon spawned more summons and flew onwards. Caelum fired again. She didn’t even try to dodge. These were full powered shots. Arthur could feel the drain of each one. They were enough to kill her summons. But they didn’t even cause the dragon to flinch.
He let Caelum focus on the summons for a bit. And he waited. Caelum was playing spotter, its targeting systems vastly superior to a human for the purposes of calculating target velocity and distance. Its shots had confirmed that Pyronoios didn’t feel the need to dodge when confronted with his magical power. Pyronoios crossed into his field of fire and he took his shot.
The index and ring fingers of his prosthetic hand were outstretched, the thumb raised. It looked almost like he was making a gun with his hand. And he was. He wasn’t using the preloaded spell, but his own magical energy.
His lacrima-heart roared in pain, and the darkness he had meant to fire erupted as a solid fountain of blinding light. Arthur couldn’t see. He’d blinded himself with the flash; hopefully only temporarily. Caelum’s sensory information was still being delivered via Archive link, however.
The powerful, red dragon had lost her left arm at the shoulder, a hole burned through her wing. He’d been aiming for the middle of her torso. He’d missed a bit. But he’d also taken a huge hunk out of the dragon. Pyronoios was bellowing out in pain and rage. He could hear it from here.
“Why do you protect the vermin!? Show yourself! We do not fight with trickery and stealth! We are the lords of the world! Fight me as we fight!” The dragon roared. Dragon slayer magic was essentially simply dragon magic. It had recognized the power and force of the spell as a dragon’s own. Arthur felt unwarranted pride in his own power and ability.
Still he was currently blind, and Caelum was having to beat a hasty retreat. It was time for the next phase of the plan. He summoned Enif and sent the pegasus into the air to duel the dragon in the skies, then he began to fire in quick succession, his chest hurting with each shot, but the dragon wove and dodged. They weren’t as powerful blasts as before, even Arthur couldn’t regularly output that sort of devastation.
Enif didn’t rely on pure magic to hurt, but he didn’t seem to be damaging the wounded dragon so much as simply inconveniencing her. Still he managed to get her to roar at him and not the town. Arthur winced as he realized even Enif wouldn’t be able to dodge it. The flames blanketed the sky, and the ground, covering the mountains to the north of man’s domain. There was going to be a rise in global sea levels from the attack, as ice sheets and permafrost melted.
Arthur wasn’t thinking about that, though. He was doing something somewhat difficult. It didn’t hurt; his last shot had shown him the pathways for the light energy and it didn’t try to flood into the energy to redirect it. He held Caelum’s key in his fleshy hand, and Caelum fired one last blast even if it meant letting the fire spirits catch it. The spirit would survive, though it’d be hurt. He’d have to repay Caelum, Enif, and Altair for their service here.
Arthur, still blinded by his own magic, reliant on his star dress and Caelum to aim his hand, shouted out: “Take it. My love, anger, and all of my sorrow. Double dragon’s roar!” He butchered the quote and he knew he butchered it. But it wasn’t like he was talking to anyone other than himself.
Caelum fired, but it wasn’t shooting its normal beam. His magical power fueled the servant. And he had let the magic from the shine dragon lacrima flow out into Caelum. The servant shot a highly concentrated dragon’s roar, a beam of light dragon slayer magic firing out to blaze across the sky. Arthur didn’t see the flash of light, which was a more literal way to translate the name of the dragon slayer magic than shine, but he was firing as well. It wasn’t his power. The hand was a Magic Tool from Edolas. And while it could be charged with draconic magic, it was made to be used by those wholly without magic. He was using its internal battery, firing off Selene’s moon dragon’s roar which was held within it.
Caelum confirmed that Pyronoios was falling from the sky, and then the link was severed. The gate of the chisel had closed. And Arthur felt heat. He reinforced his territory armor, pushing until pain began to overwhelm him. His vision was clearing but only slowly. Still, Horologium’s key - being one he had purchased with points - had repaired itself, and the spirit was on call to surround him should an emergency appear.
Arthur summoned his nikora spirit, and linked it into his Archive, uploading its visual data to his archive directly allowing him to view it in his mind’s eye. There was… nothing. It wasn’t even how. The spirit climbed from the snow-bunker and found it half melted. The dragon had died or blacked out, and its fire spawn had ceased to be in one last fireworks display.
“That is not how you properly carve dragon’s meat from bone.” Arthur was surprised to hear her voice when he finally arrived at the location the dragon had fallen.
She had a host of servants there as well, at work on carving up the wildfire dragon’s corpse. Arthur didn’t know what to say. “Why are you having them carve the meat from the bones?” He asked after a few moments.
“It’s easier to eat this way,” She said.
Arthur stared at her, mouth going agape. “But she’s a dragon.”
“Yes,” Selene answered in a tone like Arthur was stating the obvious.
“You’re a dragon.”
“Yes. Did you hit your head?”
“You’re going to eat her?”
“Of course. It’d be a waste not to.”
“So cannibalism is just a dragon thing?” Arthur asked.
Selene held a piece of the meat up to his nose. It was raw but it smelled delicious, his stomach growling with hunger. “Aren’t you from a guild of dragon eaters? Shouldn’t you know that?”
She pulled the meat away from his face as Arthur bit for it. “I need her arm.”
“Why?” Selene asked.
“An experiment. I want to try and see if a magic tool can be made from it.”
“There’s a lot of good meat on it.” Selene frowned.
“I may learn something more about dragon slayer magic that could prove useful against Acnologia.”
“You play that card a whole lot,” Selene complained.
“It guides my actions,” Arthur shot back.
“Fine,” Selene said.
“I want her heart too.”
“But that’s the best part,” Selene said in a huff.
“I can make a lacrima from it. It should give me the power to kill Ignia.”
“Well at least it’s not about Acnologia again,” Selene said. “Though do you really think you’ll be able to handle all this power? Won’t you potentially turn into a dragon just like Acnologia did?”
“That’s why I need you to teach me the magic you use to become human. Maybe there’s something in it that could help prevent dragonification.”
“Interesting. But fine you can have the heart.”
“I’d like some of the meat.”
“The arm has meat on it.”
“I killed the dragon, I’m not sure why I’m giving you any of the meat.”
“You killed it with my power in that hand.”
“That doesn’t justify the lion’s share.”
“Someone’s greedy. Wanting to eat her flesh that badly?”
“Some but more I want to send some back to Diabolos with the three stooges.”
Selene arched an eyebrow. “Why?”
“Pay my dues. Get Georg off my back a bit. Show that I’m a team player.”
“Denied.”
Arthur clenched his hand. He felt the dragon rage, and he let his takeover magic flow through him. It burned, his chest screaming with pain. He fell to his knees. And then he was forcing the dragon back.
Selene stopped and looked at him, watching as his scales faded from his whole arm, though the black pattern remained and even was replicated on his other arm, and feline ears and tail sprouted. “I killed it. It’s mine.” Arthur said.
“Are you talking back to me, servant?” Selene asked.
“Are you using one of your commands, queen?”
Selene stepped back a bit. “You’re taking advantage of my weakness.”
“No, I’m just a hunter claiming my kill.”
Selene smiled a bit. “Fine, I will merely take the arm.”
“You can have the right. I need the left.” He raised his prosthesis, making Selene arch and eyebrow once more. “And tell them not to dispose of the scales.”
“Got a plan for them?”
“It’s a dragon. Every part of a dragon has a use.”
Selene considered. She was curious what his plan was. But she’d let him follow through with it. “So be it. Though if I can’t have the left arm I get an arm and a leg.”
“Where did you learn to haggle?”
“Spying on humans. Why? Am I doing it wrong?” Her tone changed at the end from the smug superiority to actually sounding interested. He was never going to get her was he?
“Don’t worry about it,” He said. He had to make a decision though. Did he buy Edomagic and try and make his gear personally, ensuring it’d work in future worlds, and that he was making it with his insane magic skill. Or did he keep his stash for a true emergency?
Dragon flesh kept. Months, or even years. The scales wouldn’t rot. The heart would stay fresh. He decided to table that decision. To put off working on the arm till that time came. Similarly, he’d get his share of the delicious smelling meat, which made him want to lean down and start eating it straight from the bones, for later. He wanted, at least, to recover from his surgery. After all, eating was no simple matter.
Selene had bounced back massively by feasting, her magical power rising as she ate. She still wasn’t at the level of power when Arthur had first met her, but she had been restored a fair bit; and she confirmed for Arthur that she hadn’t done anything that had truly weakened her long term. After her meal she sent the worthless trio, as she called them, back to Diabolos with the meat and a message. Arthur thought better of going back. He had a responsibility to Edolas. He needed to get Alta Face. And he was better situated to study things with Selene than there.
Cana, or well the Edolas version, from Fairy Tail, again the Edolas version, brought him the prosthesis she’d promised to construct for him. It was less ostentatious than the white gold hand which Selene had provided him; a simple - again in the gamut of silver alloys - gauntlet with a shield insignia on the back of the hand. Its ability to relay sensory information was similar to that of the one King Toma had provided him. And its magical power was starkly more limited than the one Selene had given him. If he used it in a full powered fight, even being conservative, it’d empty out quickly, and unlike Selene’s which was designed to be easily recharged by a dragon slayer it lacked such a design feature. It could be recharged but it’d take effort. Still it was anti-magic, or more counter magic. Dispel, magic disrupting shields. It hopefully would prove useful.
But it wouldn’t be enough to deal with the real threat of Altaface. If he consumed too much ethernano at once the dragon force could activate. There was no way to be certain he could fight Altaface without undergoing dragonification. Well, almost no way.
He hated spending his emergency reserve. He hated buying something that could have been discounted but was not. But if he was going to fight Altaface he would need to fix his dragonification, and with takeover magic his best option for that was now to develop dragon takeover magic. He didn’t make the decision quickly. It took him days, debating whether he needed the boost now or if it was better to save it for an emergency purchase. He couldn’t be certain how many more points he would get. This was probably not his last big purchase, but it was feasible that it would be. Still he made his choice. He bought Not So Lost Magic; it discussed creating new magic, and helping with learning of lost magic, and here he needed to do both at once. He’d originally intended to eat Pyronoios’s flesh at the end of the week. Now, though, he would wait and see what he could develop first. He had wanted to rest. To simply vegetate and let the numerous, and all female and at least not unattractive, servants that provided for the every want or need of the Moon Temple wait on him while he enjoyed the luxurious decadence.
His dreams of hedonistic relaxation weren’t going to happen. Selene couldn’t maintain Edolas’s magic indefinitely. She was already complaining that he needed to start finding Altaface. He needed to learn how to control his dragon seed before then. And he couldn’t continue to rely on smothering it into submission by filling himself with demonic nature instead.
Just because Arthur was trying to create Dragon Takeover Magic didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy his time at the Moon Temple. There was good food, good sake, beautiful women, and it was despite being called a Temple a palace. And in a place where hierarchy was almost entirely dependent upon Selene’s favor and one’s personal power, he was at the top. Oh he was not her only servant; Selene had a few dozen spirit arts practitioners who were being groomed for her service. Arthur wasn’t sure which of the muscle idiots would grow into the one who served her in the manga, or which of the yokai summoners, though given only one specialized in ice he guessed she was the yuki-onna woman.
But Arthur was clearly special. He was, officially, her apprentice, and while she was recalcitrant to actually teach him anything she had shown him, multiple times, slowly and explaining how it worked, the magic which allowed her to assume human form. The hand she had given him also provided a fair bit of information on her moon magic; it wasn’t the same as working through them with him, but it was a very good tool for instruction at least when combined with his Archive.
It was a week before Minerva’s magic was recovered enough to really train. Minerva still hadn’t fully recovered, but she was starting to be able to tap into both the lacrima and her own magic. She couldn’t eat… whatever it was a white tiger dragon slayer ate yet, but she could use its magic a bit. Arthur’s archive confirmed she wasn’t transforming into light or lightning like Serena and Laxus had for their speed. It wasn’t time magic like Sawyer’s slow magic, not precisely at least. And it wasn’t teleportation. It was a true high speed magic. But Arthur found it hard to believe that was the beginning and the end of the magic. A dragon slayer ate something. What did she eat?
Training Minerva gave Arthur an additional chance to delay actually starting to hunt down Altaface. He was proud that this time it wasn’t true procrastination; he was trying to prepare himself. He did not know how long Selene would allow him for that preparation, though. But every excuse to delay bought him a bit more time. And it wasn’t like teaching Minerva wasn’t already his responsibility.
Arthur taught her to roar. They were using a rock on top of a hill as a target, and when it was hit by her roar it didn’t shatter, or crumble, it wasn’t burned through. It flew, shooting out from where it had been at high speed until it was out of sight.
Minerva practiced her roar, one which seemed to launch things in its path at high speeds directly away from her, until she had nearly exhausted her magical energy. It didn’t seem to impact the objects particularly, merely launch them with a fairly high acceleration. Aries, hit by it, described it as something like a fun ride, as the acceleration seemed to be applied across her body simultaneously, as opposed to from the point of impact.
It was a start. Minerva had a lot more to learn, however, but Arthur and his Archive would help and watching Minerva grow might well help his attempt to learn dragon takeover magic.
“Arthur, her lady has declared it is time for dinner to be served,” Fumiko said. One of Selene’s many servants, she was cuter, and lonelier, than most. Arthur didn’t particularly mind the way her hand lingered on his shoulder though.
He had been ‘meditating’. It wasn’t really mindfulness meditation derived from Buddhist practices as might come to mind, but it was still an attempt at turning his mind’s focus inward. He was trying to find and master the dragon seed. He would cycle through his various takeover forms: Seilah, Jackal, the Black Sword. With each one he would sit and simply feel the power flowing through him until he grew bored to the point of annoyance and instead shifted to using its powers somewhat. Then he’d switch. And once he had finished he cycled through the three types of dragon magic he had some proficiency in. And all the while he tried to get a feel for his own magic, and have his Archive record it all.
It was apparently strenuous enough that it went against the bounty he had received recently to relax for a week. He’d have grumbled at that, but in truth he found it an onerous requirement of training. It wasn’t as bad as working for eight hours, or even a four hour shift, but between it and Minerva, he was putting in at least 4 or 5 hours of training every day. He could see the dividends though. He was learning. Just wasn’t as relaxing as he had hoped he’d have the chance to do once he no longer had the ticking clock of Tenrou Island hanging over him.
He was holding his shine dragon slayer magic just lightly invoked when Fumiko had interrupted him. He was sitting in a basic lotus position, his whole body glowing with a nimbus of light. It was an armor of light, applying the principles behind his territory armor to his shine dragon slayer magic. Arthur let his light begin to falter and fade, and walked to the dinner.
It was partway through the meal, that Selene shot him a glaring look. If she didn’t have naked malice on her face so often she would be a truly breathtaking beauty. “So how is finding Altaface going?” She said.
“I’m still preparing for…” Arthur began.
“So it’s not,” She said with a glare. “I am getting tired of waiting. If you do not start producing results soon you will regret it.” She crushed her sake cup, shattering it in one hand. “Understood?”
Arthur wasn’t really certain what she was threatening. But still he accepted that it was time to start at least making a show of pursuing it.
“I can start my Archive working on identifying the flows of magical energy to pinpoint its location tomorrow,” he said.
“And you haven’t yet because?”
“Because I don’t want to become the next Acnologia, and I don’t know what happens if I dive into a pure source of ethernano as I am right now.”
She looked at him for a few moments. “I can’t keep supporting Edolas’s magical power. You do not have time to squander if you don’t want it to fall into a total civil war.”
Arthur held back any comment about how its precarious position was in no small part because of her choices. That she was actively cultivating those who might become warlords to create her distortions. “Understood,” he said. He still wasn’t sure if she was a monster or not.
As long as Acnologia was alive she was a useful monster. And once Acnologia died… it’d be time to decide whether she was or not. Though he wondered who had elected him judge or jury.
“What is all this?” Selene asked as she walked into her grand hall, and found Arthur’s Archive dominating the massive chamber.
“I’m looking for Altaface,” Arthur answered. “My Archive can sense ethernano. If Altaface is the source of ethernano in this world there should be a flow of ethernano from it, by following the currents back to their source I should be able to find…”
“Do it somewhere other than my feast hall!”
“But this is the only room large enough to hold my Archive in the temple.”
“Do it outside.”
“Lower altitude, the mountains could get in the way.”
Selene looked at him for a few moments. “I could squash you like a bug.”
He looked back at her. “I thought you wanted this done fast.”
She glared for a few moments and then turned her head to one of the servants. “I will take my meal in my personal chambers,” She said with a sigh.
Arthur’s Archive had failed him. Well it wasn’t a complete failure. It wasn’t going to pinpoint it alone. He was going to have to triangulate the location, have to get more data points and cover more area. It was going to be time for a road trip. He hated road trips.
He considered whether he could return to the Moon Temple effectively. There was no Acnologia here. He could extend his territory outwards. Go to a site, set up his Archive, let it work while he extended his territory outwards, return to the Temple, and then go further the next time. It’d be tiring, but it’d be a lot easier on Elentear than Earthland.
Of course he could take his time better if he did not return to the temple. It’d be less comfortable and enjoyable, but he suspected he would need the additional time to develop his magic.