Bones Under The Sand [Archaeological Job | Frey]

Job Info:

“P-Pft, I haven’t missed this place at all…” the Onmyōji commented. The sand was just as annoying as always, and he was even wearing the nomad armor and all. However, here in this dry terrain, he could clearly remember the black dust that approached him that day… shaking off the thoughts, he began to focus on the job that he had up ahead. Someone had found what would appear to be a huge, archaeological found in the middle of the sand sea. Thinking of his present capabilities, he could be of good help for the gravers.

“The flat biome that stretches miles out in the distance… it reminds me of Midi, just replacing the grass with sandstone and… much sand,” the samurai ghost commented. Zirconis had his eyes locked into the end of the horizon, not saying a word. Mura, on the other hand, could already sense the presences far ahead, so he began speeding up by causing the stone particles to lift up his feet and send him off. Oh, how that magic was useful; bending elemental objects was a very versatile advantage…

270 words
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She knew that one other mage besides herself had been hired for this, However, the client had not given her many other details on her partner. Normally Frey did not mind working with other's, but she did often like to know who she was working with ahead of time in a bid to avoid an unsavory situation. This time though she was thrown in blind, leaning against Silver at the place she was supposed to meet her job partner, listening to his even breaths to keep herself calm. Rune just prayed that she was not meeting someone who would try to take her head for when she joined Savage Skull, nor would try to remove her head if they somehow sensed she was a daughter of death. Plus? If her mark became visible that was another reason for someone to try and kill her.

Silver suddenly stood up confusing the girl slightly when he started sprinting across the sand barking, causing her to run after him careful of her pale brown colored dress. "Silver what are you doi-" then she quickly noticed why he had run ahead when she spotted Mura, a 'shit' expression entering onto her face as she stopped running forward and froze in her tracks. So much for a calm peaceful day, there was no way Mura would not realize who she was, especially Silver was here and she had called out to the wolf by the name SHE had given him. Mura was not an idiot, just her companion would be more than enough for him.

She was screwed. And her best friend was wagging his tail looking up at the ghost hunter. Crap.

The client who waited for Mura looked friendly. He reached out his hand as soon as the shaman showed up and shook it even before Mura could even confirm that he was the one who accepted the request. “Hello, hello, boy,” the archaeologist greeted with a smile, “I’m Acennan, and you must be from Fairy Tail, am I right?” Mura simply nodded with a small smile to confirm that. Acennan shined and quickly put a helmet on Mura’s head to protect him from the sandstones that would often fall off the cliff where they found the new skeleton of… something. Quite interesting for the shaman.

Someone suddenly called after Silver… the name was very familiar with the name that Frey used to call her wolf. Curious, the young shaman moved up his head and took a quick glance, only to spot a green-haired lady in the background, accompanied by a grey wolf who was none other than Silver a few meters further away from her. “… F-Frey?” he asked quietly, slowly taking steps towards Silver and patting the wolf's head, “…” Quite honestly, he was surprised to the point where he barely knew what he was doing; instead, he simply patted the wagging dog who seemed happy to see Mura. Whilst doing that, he thought things through… this was certainly one of the weirdest encounters in his life. Yet, if he had to be even more honest… he missed her spirit, in which he quickly spoke up to her: “It’s been a while, Frey..!” Given by wisdom and knowledge, she was still a young lady, so he kept his voice calm and soft.

Kyuken, who suddenly appeared beside Mura’s head, had his eyes popping out of the spirit ball that was supposedly his skull; Frey had apparently grown quite a lot, which prompted the samurai ghost to do so many dirty things with her. “D-Damn..!” he proclaimed with that wide-opened mouth of his. Interrupted, Mura simply slammed his hand on Kyuken to make him behave; the auric presence would first then appear before Frey. “… You never change, you dirty senile,” Mura replied to Kyuken. Meanwhile, Zirconis had his eyes wide-opened too; not by the change in appearance, but the sudden strength that erupted from her. Her Dragon Slayer Magic… it intimidated him to the point where he even grinded his teeth together, but Mura was quick as ever to calm him down with the words: “L-Listen… uhm, Frey, do you want to help us? This guy behind me found a very large fossil under the sand; it could be fun to find out what it is.”

WC: 183 + 438 = 621

668 words total

The only thing she could do was stare straight ahead at the other mage, fighting the urge to bite her own tongue as that was not a very classy regal move. She could feel the wind filtering through her chest length green hair, but she felt separated from it as if she was experiencing things from the third point of view. Was it really going to end like this, murdered by someone she had once considered her ally, all because she wanted to be by her mother's side! The woman was frozen mostly her wings twitching as if they knew she had to flee or such, however, nothing happened and his words took a few moments to actually reach her bat wing-like ears causing the appendages to twitch sharply. From the way, things seemed right now? It appeared he wasn't actually going to attack her.

"Yeah" her voice was soft and hushed as she spoke, emerald gaze focused downwards as she did not currently really wish to look at him. Honestly? This seemed rather similar to when she had aged up, only she wasn't crying this time. Also "You perverted asshole! Don't dare stare at me like that you knave!" She was clearly shouting at the spirit of the perverted samurai, but she still had some adjusting to the form she currently appeared in, because she stomped one foot with fists balled at her side, which caused the part of her that had grown most to bounce drawing more attention than they already did. "yerf, yerf."  her wolf bounced and she blushed when she realized what she had just done, crossing her arms over her chest, though honestly in her current leotard outfit it did nothing but change the kind of appeal.

"Actually I was hired for it too." She kept her arms crossed in front of her body, one hand idly scratching the bandages around her guild mark keeping their client from realizing she was a dark mage. Of course unless fairy tail had launched an investigation, Mura also would not for sure know for sure if she was a dark mage or a guildless one. "So let's just go." she made the comment softly once more, turning her back the tips of her wings making lines in the sand as they dragged the girl unable to find the true energy required to hold them up.

… Well, she sure sounded more mature now. Her scolding of Kyuken indeed sounded like that; it kind of made him remember back at Tetsukazu where they accidently crossed paths with her in a towel. The difference was that she was more shy and scared back then than now where she made Kyuken back off with a sweat dropping off his head. Anyway, the samurai ghost deserved the rebuke, and Zirconis and Mura agreed on that with a nod. However, not only her voice and attitude had grown, but… was that on purpose? The bouncing? Quickly shaking that thought off, he pretended as if he didn’t notice anything and listened, while holding a finger across his nostrils.

Somehow, she was hired for the same job as him. Perhaps not many people knew about her actions back at Magnolia, so he didn’t dig further into that fact. Besides, if she truly wanted to help, which he felt that she sure did, then why keep her back? She was a child, after all; Mura could still not accept how fast that her body grew and kept reminding himself of his duty. “A-Alright, then,” he replied with a small pause of thinking, Wait, she must still possess her Earth Magic… if I’m not wrong… With that in mind, he did notice how her wings appeared so dry and exhausted… now that he looked at them, did she ever show signs of having wings before? In a moment, he’d walked up to her and would proceed to ask: “Ehm… those wings of yours, I didn’t know that you possessed them. To be honest, there’s a lot that I didn’t know about you before… do you mind if I ask to some of it?”

Back at the area where the skeleton of a huge, extinct mammal was found, Acennan had started the excavation. He already began sweating and asked himself: “Hmh… I forgot to give the boy a shovel. Also, guys!” He called out to the workers behind him, “Have any of you seen someone else, perhaps another mage or something… I did require two of them, if I’m not wrong..!”

WC: 621 + 356 = 977

887 words total

He asked about her wings and she momentarily managed to lift and fully expand the large bat like appearing appendages which since they were not active showed no signs they were actually partly caused by her earth dragon magic. "I've been able to materialize wings with my earth magic for some time, but your correct about the fact they were not actually part of my body until recently." not until Hemlock had that lacrima implanted into her thus strengthening her earth dragon magic thus causing it to induce more physical changes than her normal magic induced aging did. The female glanced down at herself once more, surprised at her own height and the globes caught in her vision preventing her from seeing her own stomach causing a slight grimace. "There are many parts of my body that are relatively new, it's weird." she often stayed silent about it, but growing up so fast had been weird even for her, even knowing she was not human, it was still weird to see how quickly she had grown to maturity.

"I don't know how many questions you could have, but shoot." she still really didn't have a lot of energy, still caught up in her own head which caused her wings to drop down again being dragged along the sand

”Hmh… it’s really been a while, that’s clear,” the shaman commented as he stood right in front of the Dragon Slayer. Her height was reaching his collar, and for the love of God, he tried his best not to appear too shocked by the growth of her feminine side of her physique. He didn’t think about how much that she would’ve changed when looking closer, given by the fact that she looked so innocent and fragile back then. It was all a huge surprise for Mura, in which he was obviously vulnerable to awkward situations. “… W-Well, let’s go over to the excavation. I can ask you on the way,” he suggested before suddenly levitating and soaring back, turning around and slowly moving to the checkpoint.

He would start with the first questions when she followed; although, something had to come out first: “You told me back then, at Magnolia, that it was your mother… well, I haven’t really said this to anyone, but I guess that you won’t be harmed knowing.” He would turn his face towards Frey with a quite saddened look, an expression quite apparent, “I…” He began suddenly turning mute for some reason. If he told her, then what would she began to feel about her mother, Marceline? He wouldn’t forgive himself if a child was to hate her mother in any level as he couldn’t see that ever happening for him. Although, what he would say was a true event, but… something held him from telling as he quickly followed up: “U-Uhm, actually, what I was meaning is that… h-how are you and Silver now? I’ve kind of missed seeing you around the guildhall, so I just want to know if you’re fine and all…”

WC: 977 + 288 = 1265

1252 words total.

The wings that grew from her head seemed to come in closer to her skull as she walked a few steps forward, Silver's head right beneath her still relatively small hand. While she had grown up? The woman was still rather dainty in appearance, slender shoulder's, not much in terms of hips, but a good figure none the less, just a smaller figure than most. The female chuckled slightly about his comment concerning her growth, his attempt to be indirect about it. "Not as long as my growth would have some believe." honestly it had been only something like a handful of months, but she could easily see how someone would consider that a long time. It had only been subtly longer that she had been away from the place Marceline had left her to be raised initially and it felt like forever since she had seen those quaint buildings and the hoards of dragons which inhabited the town.

"You know what I hate? When people back out at the last second, what in the world do you want to tell me Mura." the young woman turned to face him slightly, her emerald optics narrowed slightly until the expression broke by them widening. He had mentioned Marceline although not by name, she flashed back to what Mashyuu told her and broke out into a chuckle, which dissolved into laughter. "Oh yes, my mother is a 'bad' person, she kills people." the woman seemed unable to keep a straight face, a bright smile which seemed slightly odd for the topic covering her mouth. "I am well aware, I just really don't care." her hair wavered slightly as the wind blew at her comment, her admission that she had now come to understand what death was. "Most of my family doesn't walk in the light, but they are my family." then her last statement implied she had found more family besides just Marceline, likely siblings.

"I'm Fine, though sometimes being away from the guild becomes dangerous, but I have what I was looking for, mostly." She still wished she could find Wivern and tell the people there that she had finally found her mother, her home.

“… Ehhh?” Mura was genuinely surprised that the young girl knew about her mother’s reputation. Well, she would’ve found out sooner or later, but that wasn’t the only thing. “So you already know that I’ve died… damn, I thought that I was good at keeping that a secret from the others.” He scratched his nose whilst internally rebuking himself for sucking at holding a secret for himself, despite that he didn’t have any memory of ever opening his mouth and talking about that event. It wasn’t a picnic trip at all; first off, of all places that were prophesized for a human’s soul to end in the life after death, he ended in Hell because of some insane, old being’s request. However, he didn’t suffer the extreme torment that most of the inhabitants there would; instead, he fought his entire way to the bridge between the nether and Heaven, he managed to find Hades himself, and the most mind-breaking event, he actually gained a second chance at life. During that one day’s amount of time, he broke all kinds of laws of nature and spirituality.

“Hehe… it’s difficult to follow up with you. You simply grow too fast for me, if I have to be honest,” he continued, whilst suddenly forcing Kyuken’s spirit ball head down with a forceful, yet funny movement. The bastard looked too much at her and it even annoyed the shaman as well. Earlier-mentioned was all true; it was like watching a lizard grow up in the span of a day which he compared her growth. Although, she’d grown up both physically and psychically, being able to take care of herself like he never saw coming. “… Look, Frey-chan, I never said that I had anything against your family. Yes, I was killed by your mother, but I can't cry over spilled milk... or so they say." He made it sound a bit too trivial to die, "Your blood is tied to them just as my blood is tied to Midi… they come first, right?” When it came to ties of blood, Mura was a true nationalist; Midi was, and would always be, his home and soul. Yet to this day, Fairy Tail was a partner, but not surpassing his loyalty for the Kensho family. It was all a part of his upraising. His foot would then stumble upon the bones of that large excavation discovery that Acennan had been staying at. It turned into a fog of sand around the fallen samurai, who comically faceplanted onto the calcium. “H-Hey, be careful with the skeleton..!” Acennan spoke up loud, “And it sure took a while, lads! Come on, let’s get this thing off the boulder..!”

WC: 1265 + 449 = 1714

1536 words total.
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Frey had actually been unaware of the fact that her mother had actually brought an end to Mura once before and she briefly wondered how he had revived if her dearest mother had killed him. Surviving death? Was not something easily done. "Well I didn't know she had killed you, but what else is the embodiment of death, the queen of the underworld, supposed to do." then she thought about his comment on secrets, her hand instinctually covering her bandages. Would he accidentally slip to people that she was part of Savage Skull, people did not tend to look kindly on dark mages existing period. "You assume more of people then you should, that's why you are not good with secrets, be more suspicious of people." by this time her wings had pretty much lifted back to a normal position. "I knew of my mother's murderous habits due to being in her guild and the fact she taught me to not play around with using my sword if I'm fighting I should swing to end the fight each time." they had scared the crap out of Tristian when they did that, and Frey had picked up the lesson quickly enough, several chairs in the guild hall suffering for this.

"but I'm actually still a support mage." she offered the information with a smile, motioning to the fact she apparently had no weapon on her expect for her wolf, which was not very intimidating, to be honest, especially since he was not armed today. "let's go do this." the female walked over to the leader of the dig, waiting for instructions on what she could do to help get the skeleton out of the ground.

… Damn it, he sucked more at keeping a secret hidden than anyone else in this world! She had no idea about his death! Realizing that, his face turned dark and a black cloud surrounded it as he rebuked himself in silence. Her next words rebuked him even more, causing the cloud to turn even darker. “… I-I didn’t know that I was that bad at hiding a secret,” he mumbled back to her. If anything had to be improved in his arsenal, then it would definitely be his mouth; he had to master the way of shutting his mouth at the proper times and not tell what he assumed. Look at what it caused now, just as he thought that everyone knew of it because that she did…

The large skeleton resembled that of a whale-like creature, but out here in the desert? That didn’t make any sense… except if you’ve fought creatures like those who were made of sand, not bones. To think that a real life whale had been swimming around these lands impressed both Mura and the archaeologists. Frey mentioned that her magic hadn’t changed much since the old days and that she still leaned on the supportive role more than any other role, which appeared to suit the situation. “I see,” he responded with a smile, “Then let’s get this large guy out, safe and sound.” The skeleton wasn’t to be underestimated; its size reached the far end of the horizon, yes, the horizon! At least, from his point of view, it did, but that alone demonstrated its size. Lifting up both his hands, the rock element within the sandstones began to react to his magic. “Onmyōdō,” he mentioned, before the large bones began moving off the side of the hill.

He had to be careful; if he pulled it off too fast, then it would definitely crack. Acennan didn’t wish that, in which he asked: “Perhaps if we should smoothen the rocks around the bones first… that would make your job easier.” Thinking about it, Mura nodded and looked back at Frey. “I guess that you’re capable of doing that, no?”

WC: 1714 + 357 = 2071

In terms of getting rid of earth? The dragon slayer was actually very adept at that considering she ate that element pretty much all the time! Thus the female shrugged when they mentioned for her to do it and walked forward "This will take a bit, but I can do it." she spoke up. At the very least she didn't have to look for her dinner tonight because it had just been handed to her on a silver platter. Frey was not one to refuse any bit of earth she could eat, so this would be enjoyable if they had the patience to wait for her to eat what was keeping the skeleton locked in the ground.