Colors of the Will'o'Wisp Chapter 1

Life’s so simple when you’re about to die.

Things are great then. Fight or flight engages, adrenaline spikes, your systems run high and pain shuts off; life’s so great when you’re about to die. If there’s nothing you can do, you close your eyes and just enjoy the natural drugs your body pumps out.

If there’s something you can do? Well, then it’s literally do-or-die and if you fail? Well, then.

You don’t have to live with the consequences!

Because you’ll be dead!

Fucking great.

That being said, I’m not dead, so I’m stuck having to dodge serpent spittle on a surfboard. I’ve never even surfed before today, so that’s fucking stressful. Nice part is that the serpent spittle is highly acidic, so if I get hit by it, I’ll only have seconds to cringe in how lame my death would be before I melt into blissful non-existence.

Holding my fedora down onto my head with one hand, I kept my other hand behind me, blasting flames behind me to rocket through the waves as I skidded on a Mist-Indigo board. Mist’s Construction was great for making tools on the go. Instantaneous in usage, ephemeral in existence, Mist-Indigo created whatever I needed as I willed it so.

I could end this with a simple burst of Storm-Red Flames to the serpent’s head, but since the gods hate me and Mister Zeref is way too fuckign good at making demons, this sea serpent had the intelligence to try and make the entirety of this part of the ocean fucking acid with its unique Curse magic.

Technically, it claimed the acid was poison, but e. Either way, if I didn’t use Storm-Red flames to carefully destroy the poison/acid, it was going to destroy Hargeon Town.

“IT ISSS USSSSELESSSS, MORTAL!” the sea serpent roared, thrashing around in his own filth. Ostensibly, it’s ocean water that it converted into acid, but I’m calling it his own filth. Makes me feel better, “EVEN IF I DIE! YOU’LL DIE TOO! THIS PITIFUL TOWN WILL BE ERASED FROM THE EARTH IN THE NAME OF LORD ZEREF!! I AM JORMUNGAND! THE SERPENT THAT WILL DEVOUR THE WORLD!”

Cursing softly, I flung myself into the air and sent out a wall of Rain-Blue flames backed by Storm-Red flames. The Tidal Wave crashed through the blue flames, and the Tranquil Nature of Rain took away all the energy, forcing the tidal wave to settle down to a much more manageable size. The Destructive Nature of Storm destroyed the poison in the water, purifying it back to regular water. I may have messed up a bit and purified it from ocean water to pure water, but I was doing my best, damn it.

You want to know what that thing was actually devouring? That thing was devouring my patience, that’s what it was doing. What is it with demons created by Mister Zeref having… I don’t know. Daddy issues? Genocidal tendencies? Superiority complexes? A mixture of all of the above!?

My mother fucking ditched me when I was three. You don’t see me going around killing every woman like some damn idiot.

Stupid-sea serpent, my amazing ass. It’s a fucking demon created by Mister Zeref. Why didn’t the Magic Council put that on the mission listings?

Oh, wait, I know. It’s because the stupid Magic Council can’t investigate for shit. This is a damn S-Class mission. Worst part is that if any collateral damage happened, Fairy Tail would get fined for it and we just spent all of our money buying back the old Guild Hall.

We could not leave any opening for the Magic Council to shut us down now. No fines. No collateral damage, and I will die before allowing any casualties happen.

Unfortunately, thinking about what shouldn’t happen left an opening for the sea serpent. Having hung too long in the air, Jormungandr had jumped out of the water, spinning around to flick his tail down like a whip and smacking me down the ocean hard enough to leave a crater.

Crackles of Lightning-Green Flames sparklign around me, I was so fucking thankful for the Reinforcing Nature of Lightning. That would have broken every bone in my body, and I’d just be a meatbag of bloody bone slurry.

I still coughed up blood though. My internal organs had gotten jostled, but aside from a minor case of internal bleeding, I was mostly fine.

Summoning Sun-Yellow flames, I Activated my body’s innate healing systems and pushed them to and past their limits. Sun power Activate! I spit out a wad of blood, and looked up to glare. I am going to--

Fucking drown. Surviving the crash was great and all, but when I was slapped down to the ocean floor, I had also left a vacuum of water that was now being filled by the ocean.

I survived because, of course, I did. I may have wanted to die, but fuck being killed. Nobody’s allowed to kill me, not even me. Spinning to and fro, tossed back and forth, I eventually fought/floated my way up to the surface. Laying back in the angriest starfish position I could make, I grit my teeth, one thought echoing in my mind.

I am so pissed.

Coating myself in purple flames, I made myself ourselves. Numerous clones of me floated in the waves, the Cloud-Purple power of Propagation empowering our existence. Multiplying, enlarging, if there was less, than just like Clouds, there would be more.

“Impossssible!” Jormungandr roared, “Thou isss but a flame mage! How many magics do you know!?”

“About eight,” we answered before letting out jets of rainbow flames to rocket forward in a flurry of hits. Each of my clones was maintained by Cloud-Purple flames. Using anything other than Cloud-Purple disrupted the cohesion and made the clone disappear, the violence of which was determined by the flame.

So I made every one of my clones Kamikaze with Storm-Red, the embodiment of destruction. Scorching, burning, scarring, the clone-bombs surely, but slowly wore the serpent down.

While they were doing that, I was surfing around once more on a Mist-Indigo board to clean up the surrounding area once more. I absolutely refuse to give the Magic Council a single excuse to pin this disaster on Fairy Tail.

I don’t know whose fault this is, but I rank the number one suspect of this mess the  Magic Council because they fucked up on clearly defining the mission parameter. This was an S-Rank mission. An S-Rank mission that should have had at least three different Guilds sending their top teams to work together.

Second is me for being a dumbass who didn’t call for backup.

Third is this fucker. Fuck you, Jormungandr. Please stop being such a fucker. Preferably by dying. I’ll settle for you just leaving.

“ENOUGH!” the serpent roared, releasing a powerful explosion of poisonous mist. Annoyingly enough, this killed all my clones and prevented me from using the suicide-bomer tactic.

Raising its head above the water, the serpent declared,  “Thou may hath burnt my poison, but behold a poison that could kill even Gods!”

I braced myself, but the serpent did the bastard thing and didn’t attack me. Instead, it coiled itself to leap out of the water towards Hargeon Town. From Jormungandr’s fangs, poisonous mist boiled from its mouth to coat the rest of it’s body, changing it’s already titanic body to one that needed to roll to kill to one that simply needed to exist to kill.

[BANE OF THOR] Jormungandr hissed.

The passive toxin effect the serpent had going on intensified into affecting even the air, thickening the air into a purple-black armor that enveloped the sea serpent. Each movement sent waves of toxic sludge through the ocean. A poor seagull flew too close, smelled the poison, and dropped. Its body dissolved before it could even touch the water.

With that destructive raiment, Jormungandr barreled down towards land.

This was supposed to be a simple monster extermination mission.

Just go to Hargeon Town! Kill the sea serpent attacking the ships! It’ll be nice! Get to eat seafood and shit! Nice, simple, sweet, easy A-Rank Mission.

But no! I’m fighting a fucking demon of a sea serpent. One that uses poison. One that has a passive ability of slowly poisoning the entire area, and now it’s aiming for an entire fucking town.

Fucking hellfire.

Burning Night-Black, I disappeared from that point of existence to reenter in front of it.

Omnipresent as the Night, Night-Black flames were simply there, just underneath the veil of the world and ready to burn into existence to turn everything into more of itself. They were both the easiest and hardest flame to use. Easiest because they were already there and took no effort to call forth. Hardest because while the flames had no will, that lack of will was infectious. If I didn’t fill it with intent and willpower and left it aimless, it would consume me.

I’ve got Will to burn in spades though. Coating my hands in Night-Black, I burnt together the front of Jormungandr’s attack to his back, creating a burning night-black portal that connected head and tail. The effect was the serpent’s head devoured the tail. Before Jormungandr could react, I closed the Night-Black portals, beheading the serpent dimensionally.

Then I dropped, the backlash of using all my Flames in with such intensity finally catching up to me.

Landing into the sea, I found myself struggling to keep my head above water as I turned into my chibi-form. I hate being a toddler. Floundering a bit, I eventually conjured a small floatie with Mist-Indigo Flames, praise be their infinite utility. I then checked the crystal-shaped pacifier around my neck, sighing with relief that it wasn’t damaged. Previously clear, it now swirled with and cycled through all the colors of my flames, an excellent sign that it had captured the overflow of my Flames.

Before I would have to struggle to not burn myself alive in an eight-flavored myriad of esoteric effects as my own Will fought to free itself from my mortal body. Now I just shrunk in what I like to call the Chibi-Failsafe. My magic’s much less powerful in this form, but much more controlled in this state.

Kudos to the Exceeds for designing such an effective limiter. I’d have to buy some sashimi for them.

And kudos to them for getting the shrinking enchantments on the clothes working properly. So glad I’m not naked this time. Fucking hellfire, it used to be that whenever the Chibi-Failsafe activated, I’d be a naked-ass toddler running around.

This is amazing.

“Aahhh,” a sigh reverberated through the ocean water. Judging by the literally toxic stench and the size of the sigh, it was fucking Jormungandr, somehow still alive sans a body.

That wasn’t as near as amazing. That was just fucking fucked up. Why in the fucking 9 Hells is the damn sea serpent still alive? I wish I could say I’m surprised, but Mister Zeref knew how to make demons durable. Every time. EVERYT TIME I think they’re dead, they’re still alive.

Taking a deep breath, I let out all my frustration. Then, blasting out of the water, I landed on the forehead of the serpent. While its main body floated lifelessly in the water, Jormungandr’s head was still alive, its eyes staring dourfully at me. Carefully cycling my Will through my much-smaller body, I built up the firepower to deal the finishing blow, prepared for any sign of attack.

To my surprise, the serpent spoke instead.

“Peaccce…. Mortal…” Jormungandr breathed, its breath still exuding enough toxicity that I had to keep up a shield of controlled Storm-Red flames to purify the air, “You have… won.”

“Forgive me for not relaxing then,” I smiled blandly. Demons were as tricky as they were powerful.

“Who am I to…” defy your… will?” the serpent wheezed.

…Huh, I forgot about this bit of demons. For all their daddy issues, all their power, all their arrogance, they stayed true to their tenet of might makes right. In defeating the serpent, I was now the superior being in this scenario.

…It’s rare I get a chance to question a demon. Deciding to stave off finishing off the demon, I kept cycling power. Just to be safe.

“Why’d you come here?”

“Does… a disaster… need reason?”

That’s a shitty explanation for being an asshole. Disasters are disasters. They don’t really have the higher thinking to choose not to do something. Demons have no such excuse. They’re arseholes because they choose to be.

…No use lecturing a dying one.

“What were you created for?”

“The sesame… reassson…. Asss all demonsss… To kill Lord Zeref… Asss… per hisss… firssst command…. and greatessst desssire…”

“Shitty way to do it,” I grumbled.

For a man who wanted to kill himself the rid the world of his presence, Mister Zeref sure left a lot of things that went around wrecking problems in his quest for suicide. Fit in line with my experience with the Black Wizard though. Even if it was half a decade ago, I still remembered those long chats.

Kind, but distant. Caring, yet callous. Wielded only the weakest of magics and having the deadliest of presences, Mister Zeref was and still is a contradiction. I couldn’t even blame him, only that shitty god who cursed him.

Time for reminiscence later though. I had finally gathered enough firepower to finish off the serpent once and for all. I could ask more questions, but that would be pointless risk and

“You’re going to die now,” I explained, “Any requests?”

Was it dangerous to ask that question? Absolutely. It left room for one last attack, a final curse, and sometimes, if you’re stupidly honorable, a really annoying task to do, but in my experience, those near death became quite honest in the strangest of ways. A last request, a final question, at the end of things, people confessed deep secrets unknown even to themselves for the living to ponder. If I could understand a demon’s mind, maybe I could understand Mister Zeref’s mind and then…

…Well, I’ll figure it out when I get to that point.

After a moment of silence, Jormungandr whispered, its whisper still enough to cause ripples of toxicity in the ocean waves, “What isss…. your name? I wisssh… to know the name of my conqueror.”

…Huh,  guess it took death to cause some things to learn humility. Made sense though. Those immortal never understood the struggles of the mortal until they were facing death. Straightening my tie, I cleaned myself up as best as I could.

No reason to be crass about this. Better to be classy.

“Romeo,” I answered, “Romeo Conbolt.”

“Ah… Fiamma Dell’Arcobaleno,” the serpent sighed, sounding satisfied by my answer, “There isss no ssshame in thisss death then. To die to one of the few that our Lord Zeref ssstill mournsss. ”

And my theory on death bringing out strange honesty remained true. Interesting to know that Mister Zeref still remembers that old idiot of a kid that I was. Not sure what to do with that information. Not sure how to feel about that actually. He killed me, but… he also started me in my life as a mage and taught me the basics of fire magic that I still use to this day.

He also made demons that still plague the world to this day, have cults that perform atrocities in his name, and… Well, I guess he did kill me that one time, but I got better.

Heh. I guess he wasn’t the only one who was a contradiction to himself. I guess that’s just part and parcel of being alive though.

Bowing my head, I tipped my hat to the serpent, “Die well then.”

Coating my index finger in Sky-Orange flames, I shot a burst of fire through the serpent’s head. Spreading across the head and jumping the gap to the tail of the beheaded body, I began to burn the entirety of Jormungandr, a feat difficult with my limited power.

But I had Will to pull, so I pushed through anyways. I refused to leave anything that could be a danger. Poisonous miasma, poisonous water, poisonous bodies, I was going to cleanse it all.

Sky-Orange Flames were as encompassing as the sky, embracing and Harmonizing all the things within it together into a beautiful tapestry. Neutral yet adaptive, it made all my other flames work together in ways unknown.

Just as all the flames together became the Flames of Sky, the Orange Flames could become the other ones. Carefully splitting the Sky-Orange flames into a mixture Storm-Red’s pure Destruction and Rain-Blue’s peaceful Tranquility, I thoroughly destroyed Jormungandr as painlessly as possible.

Some may have wanted the serpent to suffer. Jormungandr had killed relentlessly and maliciously, as unthinking and uncaring as a human. It had tried eestroying Hargeon Town over and over. An execution would have only been proper most would argue.I’m not some. I’m not most. I’m Romeo Conbolt and I know what death is like on both sides of the equation.

Let the dying have dignity, what dignity left could be salvaged.

“What… a… gentle… flame…” the serpent whispered its last, the sound drifting away into silence. Storm-Red flames burnt pure enough to leave not even ash.

When all was said and done, all that was left was the skull of Jormungandr, the part of the body with the most toxins. While I’d like to have left nothing behind, burning away the poison had taken what little I had left and this would just have to be good enough.

All in all, this was a successful mission. Collateral damage was set to a minimum, Jormungandr was neutralized, and I got a few more answers to the enigma that was Mister Zeref, an unexpected bonus. Today went from manageable to stress-inducing to bone-melting relief, and that last feeling almost made getting out of bed today worth it.

Almost because I still have to figure out how to get back to shore now.