Hundreds of feet below him, the battle raged on.
Moments like this Natsu understood why Acnologia chose to survey the damage from such heights. Beneath him, the soldiers seemed like nothing but ants. It was difficult to distinguish who fought for whom, but at this altitude it didn't matter. It all seemed so trivial from up here, a fruitless battle. Acnologia thought himself so far above mortals it was no wonder he enjoyed the god-like feeling witnessing the war from this viewpoint gave him.
But Natsu was not a god. He was a demon.
And so, like the devil, he plummeted to the earth.
The closer he got to the ground, the easier it was to make out who fought for his brother and who fought against him. The soldiers looked like chess pieces, his own army black where the enemies were white. It was rather accurate considering Zeref often thought of the war as nothing more than a game.
He opened his wings at the last moment, flying over the battle like a vulture waiting for the scraps. He let fire pour from his mouth as he went, helping his soldiers when he could. But helping them fight was not what he had come here to do.
He found her easily, a speck of gold in a monochrome sea. He flew a few feet higher, hovering in the air as he watched her fight, trying to deduce the best way to attack her. He knew his brother would be watching back at the base. He'd have no opportunity to spare her this time.
It was such a strange thing, to watch her fight. She fought beside a dark haired boy who seemed to be around her age; he wore no armour but was bare-chested, and battled using ice that sprang from the palms of his hands.
Stranger still was the Princesses own fighting methods. As he'd seen in the orb she wore gold armour, but now he realised that it wasn't a full suit of armour, only a golden breastplate. The metal fit her curvaceous figure perfectly, even extending up to cover the base of her neck. She also wore golden bracers, but the tops of her arms were left exposed, allowing her to move easily. She wore no armour on her legs, instead opting for simple black leather pants and boots that made her more agile. But her weapons? She wore none. Instead they just… appeared.
He watched in awe as she turned towards a new enemy. As a black-clad soldier rushed towards her, she raised her arms as though to fire a bow. When her arms reached the firing position, she held a gleaming bow in her left hand, and as she drew back her right, an arrow appeared too. She shot the man who ran at her, and as she turned once more to help the half-naked boy, the bow changed to a sword and she lashed out at a new enemy.
His eyes focussed on the man she had shot, and he watched as the arrow protruding from his chest faded away. The arrow made of pure light.
This was not good.
His stomach filled with an apprehension for battle that he hadn't felt in years. His gaze found her again. She seemed to have taken a moment, and he watched as she rubbed the armour on the side of her neck. The side of her neck where he'd…
Their eyes met.
He watched as her brown eyes filled with rage and she moved away from the boy she'd fought beside. He felt something that seemed oddly familiar to pride in his chest at the acknowledgement that this battle was between them, and them alone. He was not about to underestimate her after seeing how she wielded her strange disappearing weapons.
She wasted no time, a weapon materialising in her right hand. The weapon grew and grew, confusing Natsu enough for a moment that he missed a chance to attack. With a wave of her arm, the weapon- a whip, he now realised- came frying towards him. He beat his wings, attempting to fly out of its reach, but the glowing whip caught him around the ankle.
