Hey guys! At last, we've arrived at the Tower of Heaven arc. Enjoy!
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On a bright day with blue skies near a beach that was full of rides and a casino building inside. Team Chaotic was enjoying a relaxing day. While several flying creatures were in the air a huge wooden board was seen impacting the water and on it was Lucy who was sailing on the board while in her white and pink flowered bikini. Natsu who was in shorts was just hanging on and his cheeks were puffy as he felt like he would hurl at any moment.
"Can't hold on..." Natsu muttered.
Suddenly an surf board flew over the both of them and the person on it was Ariel and she was dressed in a light cyan bikini top and green short-shorts . "Jeez, can't you hold your stomach for even a few moments?" Ariel asked. "I bet the mere thought of transportation can make you sick, huh?."
"P-lease don't talk about it." The dragon slayer replied in a weak voice. The two girls decided to just laugh at him.
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Later on the beach sand, Happy was jumping up and down from one paw to another because the sand was hot. .
"Gray!" Erza yelled and she smacked a ball with her arm to Gray and it was speeding towards him.
"I got it!" Roxas said and he jumped high over Gray and backhanded it back towards Lucy and it was coming in too fast and it hit her in the head so hard that it left a burning mark. "Crap! Sorry Lu!" Roxas said as he landed back on his feet.
"It's fine..." Lucy said.
"You happy? You nearly knocked her out!" Ariel exclaimed.
"Who cares we won!" Natsu exclaimed and both he and Gray hi-fived.
Erza also in a bikini glared at them. "So you think you can defeat us so easily?" she asked and her eyes became four pointed stars. She jumped up and the ball was now surrounded by flames it sped to Natsu and it bounced off his head then off Roxas's stomach then somehow bounced on the sand and into Gray's groin area and he fell to his feet and he had endless tears falling from his face. "You were right Ariel, this day really is fun."
"In one shot...?" Ariel trailed off as her eyes were now just white circles as she was surprised at how Erza had hurt them. "That's not how the game is normally played but hey... they got what's coming to them."
"Hey you never got hit down there! So you can't talk!" Gray exclaimed.
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Roxas later walked towards the group with a few drinks in his hands, "Here you go, guys." He currently had swimming trunks on with sunglasses over his eyes.
Lucy smiled at her childhood friend, "Thanks Roxas," She accepted the drink that he handed her.
Roxas grinned. "Sure thing." He then handed a drink to Erza, Ariel, Gray and Natsu, "Here you go Happy. It's fish flavored."
"Aye!" Happy smiled at the slivernette and began to drink his fish drink. Fish was good.
Gray looked at the drink, "This isn't poisoned, is it?" He shrugged his shoulders and began to drink it.
Lucy sweat dropped, "Don't ask and then drink without getting an answer." She felt like she hung around idiots, which was technically true.
Roxas smiled and took a sip of his drink. There was nothing better than to have a day off with your best guild mates. Taking off his sunglasses he pointed towards the beach, "Who's up for a quick swim!?"
Natsu began to run to the water, "I'll race you!" He ran towards the water but tripped over a sea shell. He stood up and spit all the sand that had been in his mouth.
Everyone just laughed at Natsu. How could someone be so funny and not even try. Roxas then walked behind Erza and picked her up, "Let's go, Red!"
"Put me down!" She didn't need anyone carrying her. She had her own legs.
"If you say so!" Roxas made his way to the water and threw her in it. Roxas put his hand on his hips and began to laugh like a maniac. He then felt some weight on his back and fell face first into the water.
"Got you, Roxas!" Lucy had surprise attacked him and had jumped on his back when his guard was down. Lucy then smiled with satisfaction.
"That was not nice~" she cooed.
"And what you just did was the nicest thing in the world, right Ms. Heartfilia?" Roxas smiled devilishly, shaking some water off of his hair, and suddenly picked Lucy up.
"Kyah! What are you doing!?" when she saw him walking towards a deeper part of the water, she desperately tried to get off of him. She was laughing, though. "Oh, no, Roxas, please don't...!" she tried to hold onto him with hands and nails, but she didn't even get to finish talking before Roxas dropped her in the water. She emerged to the surface completely soaked, obviously, coughing and laughing at the same time.
"Roxas!" She yelled out.
"You can't beat the master. For I am king of the water." He then felt killing intent, "And this king must make his way to the snack bar once again." He then took off running with Erza on his tail.
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Later it was seen that Natsu and Happy were burying Gray in the sand while Roxas was looking out at the water.
"Hey guys..." Roxas called over to them. "Out of the blue question, but how come you guys don't have girlfriends yet?"
"I don't care much for that stuff." Gray simply said as if he didn't care.
"I just never thought about it." Natsu replied. "Though, if I were to think about stuff like that..." He then gazed over at Ariel who was drying the water out of her hair. His cheeks turned red for a bit.
"Natsu?" Happy called out, getting said dragon slayer's attention.
"Huh? What?" Natsu said, rubbing his head. "Sorry, just got lost in thought for a sec."
"What about you?" Gray asked Roxas.
"Huh?" Roxas asked.
"Do you have someone you're interested in?" Gray asked.
"Well..." Roxas looked behind him and he saw Lucy talking with Erza and her long blonde hair waved in the wind and he began to blush but his attention was suddenly caught by Gray.
"Hello!" Gray exclaimed.
"Uh, did you say something?" Roxas asked.
"I was trying to get your attention. Why did you look like you were in a trance just now?"
Happy was hovering above both of them. "I know why, because Roxas is in looove!" Happy sang.
"Really?" Gray said with a grin. "Alright, cat. Tell me who it is."
"Happy, don't you dare..." Roxas warned him.
"Roxas is in love with..." before Happy could reveal Roxas's crush he was blown by a powerful uppercut which sent him into the sky and this caused a white glint to be seen in the sky which showed Happy's location.
"Hey! What did you do that for?" Natsu asked with some anger.
"Sorry, Happy is too nosy for his own good sometimes."
"Okay, we'll let's go find him." Gray said and the trio went off to search for Happy.
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The sun was now setting as the day was coming to an end. Erza was lying on her back and was watching the sun set with her eyes closed.
'Today really was fun.' Erza thought. 'It isn't really a bad thing to kick back once in a while.' However in the middle of her thoughts in her mind a huge tower was seen in the middle of the ocean. There, people were being treated like slaves as they were doing work like lifting rubble and other huge rocks in order to build the huge tower.
The people watching over them were dressed in dark robes and had masks that showed no part of their real faces and had a peculiar symbol on their masks. One of the slaves was a little girl with short scarlet red hair with brown eyes she had shackles on her wrists which let out white electric streams that connected the shackles on each wrist, making them act like handcuffs. The girl had seen one of the slaves in front of her fall to his knees in fatigue and one of the guards with masks had let loose what could be described as a four legged creature with no eyes but had four legs and it had a huge jaw with jagged teeth. And it began to walk to the person who had fallen.
Soon it was seen that a person that was an old man was protecting someone from a blast of some kind and a white burst was seen.
Erza's eyes shot open and she was panting after she had that flashback. 'Why was I seeing all of that?' she thought as she began to shiver. She walked back into the room. She looked at herself in the mirror, after doing so she requipped into her Armor. 'It really is true, I do feel more at ease with my armor.'
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She heard a knock on her door, Erza turned to the direction. "Come in." the door was opened and standing in the doorway was Lucy and Ariel, both girls were wearing night dresses. Lucy's was maroon. Ariel's was a sky blue with some white wavy accents she was also wearing heels and it could be seen that she was struggling to stand on her two feet. "Lucy, Ariel?"
"Erza, you should join the rest of us, they have games here too." Lucy said.
"Oh, it makes sense that they would have those at a place like this." Erza was now surrounded in a gold light and she was now dressed in a purple dress with red roses on it. "I'm ready to go." Erza said as she was in an attractive pose.
"I'm never going to get used to that." Ariel muttered. "Anyway, how does one walk in these things!? I can barely walk and every time I do I fall to my feet!" she complained as she was walking in a pair of dark blue heels.
"Don't worry you'll get used to it."
"I don't see why I have to wear these in the first place. I prefer regular shoes."
"The attire fits the occasion; besides, you look great." Lucy smiled.
"Well, what about you? Trying to look good for Roxas, huh?" Ariel teased. "Though, he probably likes whatever you wear."
Lucy blushed and glared at the Dragon Slayer. "A-ARIEL!"
Ariel giggled. "I couldn't resist."
Erza now looked as if something was on her mind. "Lucy?" Erza began. "Are you Roxas' girlfriend?"
"N-no!" Lucy's blushing face hadn't faded. "Sheesh! Why do you guys always have to put us together?"
Ariel rolled her eyes. "Lucy, we can tell you have a thing for him. Sometimes, you can be so obvious."
"I told you it's not like that!"
"Uh huh."
"It's not!" Lucy said in defense.
"So, you can honestly tell me that you wouldn't date Roxas...at all?" Ariel asked as she looked Lucy in the eyes.
Lucy opened her mouth to say something, but no words came out causing a Cheshire cat smile to form on Ariel's lips.
"Lucy, if you do have romantic feelings for him. You must not wait to tell him how you feel. There is a lot going on in his mind and may not see the signs you are giving him." Erza said.
"H-hey! That's not... I wasn't sending him any signals or anything!"
"You liiiiike him." Ariel said.
"Great, last thing we need is another Happy. Can we please just go already!?"
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Meanwhile down at the casino, Roxas found himself in the resort's casino. A small crowd was starting to form around him. Everyone had decided to go their separate ways and explore, so Roxas had decided to play the slot machines, and he was doing good. But since he had already gotten money for this months rent, he didn't really have a need for it all.
"Who is this guy!?"
"He just keeps winning!"
Roxas sighed. 'Gambling is so boring... I wonder why people like it so much.'
Having played enough, he picked up his buckets of coins and walked off to cash in his winnings. He laughed internally at the looks on the crowd's faces.
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Natsu, with Happy on his shoulder, and Ariel were in front of a machine and Natsu was constantly pressing a button and many balls were flying around the machine.
"17!" Natsu yelled. "C'mon number 17!"
"You can do it number 17!" Happy yelled.
"Yay, number 17." Ariel sarcastically cheered.
The five floating balls in the machine were cycling through different numbers and two of them were already showing the number 17. One more of the balls were on seventeen before it suddenly switched to another number and Natsu and Happy had screamed in frustration.
"HEY! Make it go back to 17!" Natsu screamed as he began pounding on the machine.
"How? It's a machine you can't make it do what you want!" Ariel said with a sweatdrop.
"17!" Happy exclaimed.
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Meanwhile Gray, who was watching the spectacle from a far on a stool, he looked behind him and saw a girl in a royal blue dress with a gold coloured Fairy Tail necklace.
"Gray-sama." She said to the ice-make wizard. Gray turned his head and noticed that he was looking at Juvia. "Juvia has arrived."
Gray was surprised at her sudden appearance. "Uh... the Phantom woman!?"
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Natsu was still banging on the machine while endless tears flew from his eyes. "Go back to 17!" Natsu exclaimed.
"Hey cool it, the machine won't go back doofus!" Ariel exclaimed.
A man who looks like he worked at the casino walked up to the three with a slight nervous expression on his face. "Uh, I'm going to have to ask you to please vacate the area."
Ariel had felt someone walking up to them and she turned around and she prepared as if she was going to fight. "Heads up guys, someone's coming."
"Casinos are a place for grown-ups, wouldn't you agree? Boy." The person said looking at Natsu and Ariel. He was dressed in a blue suit with a tie and had a magenta and white top hat with a white scarf. He wore black sunglasses and had grey coloured stubble. His most interesting feature is that his entire body looked comprised of blocks and this spread to his fingertips. He was Wally.
"BLOCKHEAD!?" Natsu, Ariel and Happy exclaimed.
"There are only two paths a man can take..." Wally began as he held up two fingers, Ariel remained in a fighting position. "...one is to live in a dandy fashion..." suddenly his body was now being covered in yellow squares as he began transforming. Soon Natsu was thrown to the machine by many blocks that covered his arms and they slammed him into the glass of the machine.
"NATSU!" Happy exclaimed.
Ariel got in a stance and she shot forward with her fist engulfed in water and looked to have hit him while the upper part of his body was floating above the ground. "I dunno who you are, but you just made a big mistake pal!"
Wally was still floating in front of Ariel. "Oh have I, girly? 32 Frames Per second!" he exclaimed and his body had turned into blocks and they all had impacted Ariel and she flew to a machine which was now destroyed.
"Ariel no!" Happy exclaimed. When the dust cleared Ariel slowly got up.
"Oh, you're so gonna get it, Blockhead!" Ariel threatened and a red dot was seen on her torso.
"Hey! You leave Ariel alone!" Natsu yelled as he was still restrained. He then saw a red pointer on him, Wally had a laser pointer aimed at the Dragon Slayer as his arm had turned into a rifle. Some of the blocks flew off Natsu's arms and back to Wally and they formed a rifle to replace his other arm. He again aimed at Ariel, who glared at him.
"You didn't let me finish my sentence. Now the second path you can take... is to kneel over and die."
Natsu screamed in rage as the pointer was now aimed at him and Ariel made two water spheres and blasted them at Wally's vocal direction.
"You're going down Blockhead!"
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Meanwhile Juvia was talking with Gray at the nearby bar. "So Phantom Lord has been disbanded huh? So what are you doing now?" Gray asked.
"Nothing right now, Juvia is an independent wizard. This is why Juvia wants to join Fairy Tail." The water mage replied.
"You want to what!?" Gray exclaimed.
However they saw a figure behind them and the figure was a buff figure who was shirtless safe for his left arm which was covered in a dark green fabric and he had a sash over his torso with dark grey pants, he had a fabric wrapped around his head and had a black eye patch covering his left eye, and had what looked like a metallic jaw that covered his real jaw he was Simon. He had caused an explosion behind him as he walked to the two. "Where is Erza Scarlet?" Simon asked.
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While fights were going on around the building. Lucy and was watching Erza win a lot of the casino games.
"Oh Erza, you are really good at this!?" Lucy squealed.
"I wouldn't say that I am good. Luck is just on my side." Erza said modestly.
The dealer of the cards were changed and the new dealer had walked up to the table. He had a dark skin tone, very dark green eyes with blonde hair. He had a small black tattoo below his lower lip and was in the shape of a weird '5'.
"A new dealer? It won't matter. With the way my luck is going, I can't lose no matter what." Erza said with confidence.
"Is that so, then why don't we enjoy a special game?" He began throwing cards onto the table. "Except we won't bet with coins... let's bet with our lives." The two girls looked at the cards that were thrown on the table and they saw that they spelled 'DEATH' "It has been a while, sister." He said and Erza recognized the voice.
"S-Sho, is that you?"
"Erza, you know this guy?" Lucy asked.
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Elsewhere Simon was looking at Gray. "I will ask you again, where is Erza Scarlet?"
"And just who are you!?" Gray angrily asked getting ready to fight against Simon.
"I will not allow you to hurt Gray-sama!" Juvia exclaimed. "Juvia will be your opponent."
Simon puts two fingers to his forehead before he began talking to himself. "Has anyone found Erza, yet?" a slight pause is made and he continues to talk. "That is good, is it alright if I finish up things here?" he soon takes his fingers away from his forehead and looks to the two wizards in front of him.
"Hey you! What's going on?" Gray demanded.
"It is the lineage of darkness magic: Dark Moment!" Simon said and dark purple seal appeared in front of him and suddenly the room went dark as all the lights in the building have somehow been shut off and it was now too dark for anyone to see anything.
"What's going on?!" Gray asked, after he said that the screams of Gray and Juvia were heard.
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Sitting down at a bar, Roxas waited for someone to come over and take his order. Suddenly all the lights went out. "What the hell, what happened to the lights?" Roxas asked aloud.
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The lights were also out by the machine Natsu, Ariel and Wally were fighting. "Hey! What's going on I can't see!" Natsu exclaimed.
"Hey! I'm not complaining!" Ariel exclaimed as she had shot a blast of water at Wally but it missed.
"Good night kids." Wally said and he aimed his laser pointers at Natsu's mouth and Ariel's chest and a loud bang was heard.
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Hearing the gunshot, Roxas tensed as he flared his magic and his right hand started glowing with blue fire, illuminating the immediate area before he started to look around for the source of the shot.
'What the heck was that?' Roxas thought looking around. "Alright, I need to find go the others."
"SOMEBODY, HELP!!!!"
Roxas's eyes widened when he recognized the voice, "That was Lucy's voice..." he muttered before his eyes narrowed and sprinted down to where he last saw Erza and Lucy. 'Hold on, guys! I'm on my way!' he shouted bolting down the hall.
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Within a few minutes, Roxas burst into the room he left Lucy and Erza in, only to see Lucy rolling on the ground tied up some orange whip and surrounded by cards.
"Lucy!" Roxas called as he ran over to the girl. Lucy stopped rolling and looked over to see who called her when a smile appeared on her face, "Roxas!" she cried happily.
Roxas knelt down beside her, "What happened? Where's Erza?" he asked as he tried to find some way to untie the whip that was wrap around the blond.
Lucy's smile vanished before it was replaced with a panicked look, "Some random people showed up and kidnapped Erza! They even took Happy too!"
"What?" Roxas asked in shock. Someone just showed up and took Erza? What for?
Lucy continued, "Yeah, after that they disappeared to some place called the 'Tower of Heaven' and left me here tied up! Also, they trapped all the people into the cards on the floor."
Roxas looked all over the floor to see people from the casino were indeed trapped inside the cards screaming. "What happened to them?" he asked.
"One of the guys who took Erza, I think his name was Sho, used magic to trap them-Oww!" Lucy said before the whip began to tighten it's hold on her.
"Don't worry, Lu. I got it" Roxas said before he gripped the whip and channeled blue flames to his hands to incinerate it to ashes. Once that was done, he helped Lucy to her feet.
"Thank you" Lucy said as she stretched her arms out from being tied up. Suddenly, Roxas pulled her into a hug, shocking the blonde. "R-Roxas?"
"Glad you're alright." Roxas told her as he pulled back."Now let's find out what's going on." Lucy nodded, trying to hide her blush from him.
Lucy then looked at all the people trapped in cards along the floor. "Don't worry. We'll find a way to save you all, I promise."
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The duo got to the area where Gray and Juvia were attacked. They both saw Gray unconscious and he was sitting with his back against a wall. "Gray! Oh no!" Lucy yelled.
"Gray!" Lucy cried when she saw the ice mage knocked out against a wall. She ran over to him with Roxas close behind him.
"Whoa! Is he okay?" Roxas said as looked over the state of his friend.
"I don't know...Gray! Can you me? Say something!" Lucy said shaking the ice mage, right before his body turned into ice and scattered into pieces.
"AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" Lucy cried as she behind Roxas, pointing at the pieces on the floor that was Gray, "Roxas, I broke Gray! I didn't mean to!" she cried out.
Roxas faced the girl and put his hands on her shoulders to calm her down, "Lu, calm down. It's okay, I'm pretty sure that wasn't the real Gray."
"He's right, there's no need to panic" a feminine voice said from behind the duo, who turned to see Juvia forming from water.
"J-Juvia? You're here!?" Lucy exclaimed.
"Uh, who now?" Roxas asked confused.
"She's with the Element Four!" Lucy shouted, reaching for her keys.
"But I thought Phantom Lord was disbanded." Roxas said, tensing for a fight.
"Hey, what's all the screaming for?" they heard and they saw Gray and he looked like to be coming out of Juvia's body.
Juvia twiddled her fingers. "Juvia wanted to protect Gray-sama, so I put him in Juvia's body."
"Uhhhhh...." Roxas said, a bit shock at how that sounded.
'Well, that didn't sound weird at all...' Lucy thought while blushing a bit.
"Yes, Gray-sama was inside Juvia the whole time." Juvia said, grinning at Lucy. "Not inside of you! Inside of Juvia!" she emphasized.
"When the lights went out we didn't know what was happening so I made an ice duplicate of myself to take any damage." Gray explained.
"After that, Juvia had hidden Gray-sama inside her Water Lock."
"And because of your antics they got away!" Gray said with accusation in his voice and Juvia screamed in unpleasant surprise.
Roxas cringed, that had to hurt her, "Relax Gray, She saved you. At least thank her." He didn't need to be so brash about it.
Gray looked towards a hurt Juvia, "Thanks." He at least owed her that for thinking of his safety.
"We have to find Natsu." Lucy said.
They all heard Natsu screaming and they saw huge flames flying to the roof. "That can only be one person." Roxas commented.
They all saw Natsu screaming in rage. "Natsu! Calm down!" Lucy exclaimed.
"CALM DOWN!? Who goes around shooting people in the mouth huh?! It really hurts!" Natsu said in frustration.
"Pipe down, Pyro!" they heard and they saw Ariel climbing out of a barrier.
"Easy for you to say! You're not even hurt!" Natsu shouted back.
"That's because I'm able to turn certain parts of my body into water at a time. So when he shot at me, it just passed through. But I still felt the force behind it though." She walked over to the others when she saw familiar face. "Juvia!?"
"Water Dragon Slayer..." Juvia nodded.
"You guys know each other?" Roxas asked.
"Long story." Ariel said. "Right now, I need to get payback on some blockhead who shot at me and Natsu. Did you guys seen him?"
"If you're talking about the the same one I saw, he already took of with some other guys."
"Oh that blockhead is going to get it, Natsu! Let's get even! It's time for revenge!" Ariel exclaimed.
"YEAH! We'll find that Blockhead! He's not getting away!"
Natsu began to sniff him and he ran in a direction. "That's it, boy! Find the Blocky!" Ariel exclaimed. Natsu ran trying to find Wally while Ariel followed him.
"Let's go kick some ass!" She shouted, as they left a trail of dust.
"Hey! You're not going to kick any ass without me!" Roxas shouted and flew after them.
Lucy then turned to the others. "Come on, let's follow them!"
They all ran after the three slayers.
"You sure we should just let them run around aimlessly?" Juvia asked.
"Don't worry. Where ever Natsu's and Ariel's noses lead us to, it will take us to our enemies." Gray said.
"And Erza." Lucy added.
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Meanwhile in another location a man with long, very dark blue hair with a white top, with white pants, along with dark maroon gloves had walked to a cloaked figure with blue hair.
"Jellal, why did you let the target live?" he asked.
"Why? The world would be a boring place without her, however now that the Tower is completed, she needs to die. She will become a necessary sacrifice."
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Next Time: Heaven's Bitter Path
Team Chaotic race to the Tower of Heaven to rescue Erza. Meanwhile, the Magical Council begins discussions on how to deal with Jellal and the Tower of Heaven.