Chapter 69: The Fire Within
Hours had passed since the celebration wound down. The guild hall had emptied, its members staggering home or passing out where they sat, leaving behind a battlefield of empty mugs and overturned chairs and the warm, lingering scent of camaraderie.
Natsu sat alone behind the guild hall, in a small clearing where the trees opened up to the night sky. The moon was high, casting silver light across the grass. Crickets sang their endless song. Somewhere in the distance, a night bird called.
He held his hands out in front of him, palms up, and watched the flames dance.
A small orb of fire appeared above his right palm. Orange. Steady. Controlled. He transferred it to his left, then back again, the motion fluid, effortless. Then he made it grow. Bigger. Hotter. The orange deepened to gold, then white, a miniature sun pulsing with contained power.
He closed his fist and the flame vanished.
Another appeared in his other hand. Then both hands. Then a dozen small flames orbiting his arms like a halo of fireflies. He moved them through the air, weaving patterns, tracing circles, pushing and pulling with nothing but will.
'Easy,' he thought. 'This is too easy.'
A month ago, this would have been impossible. His flames had always been powerful, but they had also been wild. Unpredictable. He had thrown them at problems like a hammer, hoping brute force would be enough.
Now they moved like water. Like breathing.
He let the flames die and sat cross-legged on the grass, closing his eyes.
The world fell away.
He was back in the void. The infinite darkness. The cold. The silence.
And there, in the distance, the golden cage.
The dragon's eyes opened first. Two points of crimson light, burning in the shadows, watching him with that ancient, patient hunger.
"You return," the dragon rumbled. Its voice vibrated through the void, through Natsu's bones, through the very fabric of his soul. "The victory tastes sweet, does it not? The hero returns home. The women fall into his arms. The world celebrates his triumph."
Natsu walked toward the cage, his footsteps echoing in the nothing. "I wanted to talk."
"You wanted to talk." The dragon's laugh was a grinding of tectonic plates. "The little hatchling who swallowed the sky and burned a god wants to talk. About what, little flame? About your women? About the ones who warm your bed and your heart?"
"About the Domain."
The dragon's eyes flickered. Interest. Amusement.
"Ah. The beast within. The hunger that drives you. The instinct that makes you more than the foolish boy who plays at being a Dragon Slayer."
Natsu stopped before the cage, close enough to see the shadow-form pressing against the bars, close enough to feel the heat radiating from within.
"It's been quiet since the tower. I haven't felt it. Not once."
The dragon's smile was audible in its voice. "You think this is a reprieve? You think because you fed it, it sleeps? No, little hatchling. You used the Dragon Force. You consumed the Etherion crystals. You drew deeper on my power than ever before. And with every draw, every taste of what I am, you come closer to becoming what I am."
"I'm not going to become you."
"You already are. The Dragon Force is not a spell, little flame. It is a transformation. A step on the path. Each time you use it, the scales grow closer to the skin. Each time you taste that power, the man recedes and the beast advances."
The dragon leaned closer, its massive head pressing against the bars, its eyes filling Natsu's vision.
"You felt it, did you not? The hunger. The rage. The need to claim, to possess, to dominate. That was not the Domain, little hatchling. That was you. The real you. The dragon you are becoming."
Natsu's jaw tightened. "Is there a point to this, or are you just trying to scare me?"
"I am trying to remind you." The dragon's voice softened, became almost gentle. "You have two women now. Two anchors. They hold you to humanity, to the world of flesh and feeling. But anchors can break. Love can fade. And when they do, the dragon will be waiting. It is always waiting."
Natsu stared into those burning eyes and felt something cold settle in his chest.
"I'm not going to let that happen."
"Let it happen? You think this is a choice? You think the Domain obeys your commands?" The dragon laughed again, softer this time. "You are a passenger, little hatchling. The same as me. The same as all who came before. The only question is how long the ride lasts."
Natsu closed his eyes. Breathed. Pushed the fear down.
When he opened them again, he was standing closer to the cage. Close enough to touch the bars if he wanted.
"How does it work? The Domain. Tell me everything."
The dragon's eyes narrowed. "Why?"
"Because if I understand it, I can control it. And if I can control it, I can use it without losing myself."
The dragon was silent for a long moment. Then it laughed, a low, rumbling sound that shook the void.
"You want to understand the hunger. You want to name it, cage it, make it yours." It paused. "Very well, little hatchling. Listen."
"The Domain is not a spell. It is not a curse. It is the purest expression of what a dragon is. A dragon does not fight for honor or justice or love. A dragon fights for what is his. Territory. Treasure. Mate."
The word hung in the air, heavy and possessive.
"When you activate the Domain, you are not casting magic. You are claiming. The nullification, the silence, the stripping away of everything but instinct... that is what it means to be a dragon. To strip away the lies of civilization and reveal the truth beneath. Hunger. Want. Need."
Natsu listened, his mind working, cataloguing, analyzing.
"And the women? The... the compulsion?"
The dragon's smile returned. "The Domain seeks what is yours. What should be yours. It removes the barriers between want and fulfillment. It is not a curse, little hatchling. It is clarity. Pure and absolute."
"You're saying it's not controlling me. It's showing me what I really want."
"I am saying there is no difference."
Natsu was quiet for a long time.
He thought of Lucy. Of the first night on Galuna, when the Domain had taken them both. He had told himself it was the magic. The curse. Something outside himself.
But the dragon was right. He had wanted her. From the moment he woke in Natsu's body, from the moment he saw her face, he had wanted her. The Domain had simply removed his hesitation.
And Erza. The challenge, the battle, the moments between. He had wanted her too. Had planned for her. Had positioned himself to be what she needed.
The Domain hadn't created those wants. It had just made them undeniable.
He looked up at the dragon.
"What happens when I use the Dragon Force again? When I push past this level?"
The dragon's eyes blazed.
"You draw closer. The scales grow harder. The hunger grows sharper. And one day, perhaps tomorrow, perhaps in a hundred years, you will open your eyes and realize you cannot close them again. The man will be gone. The dragon will remain."
"You make it sound inevitable."
"I make it sound like the truth." The dragon leaned back, retreating into the shadows of its cage. "But you knew the truth when you swallowed those crystals, little hatchling. You knew what you were becoming. And you chose it anyway."
"For her."
"For them." The dragon's voice was almost approving. "That is the paradox of your kind. You become monsters to protect the ones you love. And in becoming monsters, you lose them anyway."
Natsu stepped back from the cage.
"I'm not going to lose them."
The dragon said nothing. Its eyes followed him as he retreated into the darkness.
"Then perhaps, little hatchling, you should become something more than a dragon. Something the world has never seen."
The void faded. The dragon's eyes blinked out. And Natsu was back in the clearing, the moon still high, the crickets still singing.
He sat there for a long moment, breathing, feeling the massive mana reserves that now pulsed through his body. They were there, always there now, a second heart beating beneath his own. He could feel them waiting, ready to be called.
'I could smash through anything,' he thought. 'A mountain. A city. An army. With this power, nothing could stop me.'
He flexed his hand, and fire answered. Not the controlled flame of earlier, but something wilder. Hotter. The grass beneath his palm blackened and curled.
He closed his fist and the fire died.
Frustration bubbled up in his chest. The Tower of Heaven had been a victory, yes. But it had also been a lesson. He had let things happen. He had watched Jellal take Erza, watched Simon die, watched everything play out because he had been afraid of changing too much, afraid of losing his foreknowledge, afraid of stepping off the path he had seen.
'I need to do better,' he thought. 'I can't just let things happen and hope they work out. I need to understand. To plan. To manipulate events so that the people I care about don't have to suffer.'
He thought about what came next. The arcs he remembered, the events that were still fuzzy, the timeline he had been following since waking up in this world.
Laxus.
The next big event, if his memory served, was Laxus. Something about taking over the guild. A scheme that involved some reporter or council observer. The Thunder God Tribe. The whole guild turning against each other.
He closed his eyes, trying to pull the details from the haze of years-old memories.
'There was something about a battle. A tournament inside the guild. Laxus wanted to prove he was the strongest. He had some kind of device that would paralyze everyone if they didn't fight. And Erza... Erza fought one of the Thunder God Tribe. Freed everyone.'
He pressed his palms against his temples, frustrated.
'It's been years since I watched the show. The details are all scrambled. I need to remember more. I need to know exactly what happened so I can change it. Or use it. Or...'
He stopped. Breathed. Forced his mind to calm.
'Tomorrow,' he thought. 'I'll sleep on it. Let the memories surface. Talk to Lucy, maybe. She knows more about the guild's history than I do. She might remember details I've forgotten.'
He stood, brushing grass from his pants. The clearing was quiet, peaceful, a world away from the chaos of the celebration.
He looked at his hands again. At the fire that lived there, waiting.
'I have the power now. The strength to change things. But power without knowledge is just destruction. And I've destroyed enough for one lifetime.'
He turned and walked back toward the guild hall, toward the sounds of snoring drunks and scattered furniture, toward the two women who were waiting for him somewhere inside.
'Tomorrow,' he thought again. 'Tomorrow, I start figuring out how to be more than a dragon. How to be something the world has never seen.'
The guild hall loomed before him, warm and welcoming, the moonlight catching on its rebuilt walls.
He pushed open the door and stepped inside.
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Next Time: Life in Magnolia - The Looming Storm