Fiery Night (A rank exam)

Shine down, Spark up

Today was the day! Summer was getting herself ready for what was known as the performers festival, the magic council have set it up just recently and they have invited Summer to be a performer as part of that festival. She was definitely excited for plenty of reasons. She hasn’t performed in a festival ever since the last one that was involved in her village. It was nice to be able to prepare for such an occasion, she could even call it an honour as part of the Guiyang family, not that she knew who her family were anymore since she doesn’t know where her father is, and her mother was a tad dead, okay, fully dead. That didn’t matter now however, Summer had to go and enjoy herself, that is what her family would have wanted, correct??

Leaving the hotel room which she resided in for the time being, she looked to the fancy gold writing on the lettering of the invitation and sighed softly, she wasn’t sure if she was ready to encounter another major performance. Simply because it has been so long since she done one before, sure, she could pull off a major firework show there and then. A major show involving being spotted by thousands upon thousands of people who would be judging how she was. She wasn’t even used to such a thing at all, all she could do was try her best and make the whole area proud of what she has.

“Summer!” A very familiar flower fairy whined out. “When will the preparation happen?? I just want to go home and just be like… bleeggh! I want to watch stuff and have fun!”

“You will be watching me, Laysha!” The zodiac child protested. “I just wanted some support.” Summer didn’t know what she thought of Laysha this time, she mentioned to Laysha in the hotel room that the flower fairy should be on her best behaviour and to not flirt with anyone that came their way. Clearly, the talk didn’t work out well as Laysha was most certainly not on her best behaviour. In fact, it was Summer that was acting the more mature one and Laysha was being hella immature. This was the fairy that took care of Summer when she was a childish D rank mage, just starting out.

“Finneee!” Laysha agreed, but gave up at the same time, clearly annoyed with Summer’s decision.

“Miss Guiyang??”

“Yes??” Summer answered the strange voice as she turned around, it was one of the people who worked on the backstage of the festival. It was going to be a strange night indeed. “Am I needed now??”

“Yes, please, come this way! We will get everything ready for you, as you know, your performance starts in three hours! We need to get you ready into your costume, get your hair done and dyed by the wardrobe mage and the hairstylist mage respectively.”

“R-right…” Summer sighed softly, yeaaah, she was so not ready for this.

--Night time--

The poppers popped, streamers were flooding the whole area and the lanterns were high up in the air, providing light to the ones that really needed it. It was well and truly a beautiful night to behold, and a perfect one for a festival at that! It has been two and a half hours passed the moment Summer was picked up by one of the people that were working backstage and Summer well and truly looked different. She couldn’t even tell that it was herself now. Even though she was familiar with blue eyes, she was not familiar with brunette hair that was tied up, she usually had her hair some up, some down, with fancy ribbons and flowers to accompany it. Wardrobe and Hairstyle mages are really the bomb, why has she never encountered them in Fiore before?? It would’ve been very nice to, to say the least… maybe she should pitch that to the magic council after the festival.

“Summer… is everything going to be okay??” Laysha asked nervously, she felt bad for the few events that happened earlier. She tipped over the makeup, she even looked up a girls skirt for her own enjoyment (although Summer told her off for performing such acts of ecchi)

“The overture has began, please get yourself ready, Miss Guiyang.” A mans voice could be heard in the speaker lacrima that was implemented in the dressing room.

“Yes, everything is going to be okay!” Summer spoke cheerfully before going into a frown. “While I am performing, you better not be looking up girls skirts, understood??” The brunette grunted as she shook her head. “Okay, okay, sorry!” Laysha squealed in fear, she didn’t like the fact that her master was being stern, Summer was almost never stern. It is proof of how much the fireworks expert has well and truly grown.

Standing up from the chair she has sat in for quite some time. Summer coughed lightly and then left Laysha to her own devices, making sure that she waved off the flower fairy. It was time for the show to begin! Summer was standing in the sidelines and waited for her cue to happen. Unfortunately, the signal did not come. Instead, the whole area was greeted by screams and magic bursting out from all over the place. Goddamnit, Summer knew she had a bad feeling about this! So it wasn’t her anxiety after all! She had to solve the issue as quick as possible. It was going to be difficult in such an outfit which wasn’t made for battle, but she was sure that she could do anything if she put her mind to it.

Running out from the backstage area and onto the street, she looked around intensely as she gawked for any survivors or anyone that is still in the local area. Summer spotted a few people here and there, They looked scared and helpless… It was strange to say the least, to see this in a festival of all sorts again. The last time she was in a festival, the female was hit by a firework, it was a very tragic thing indeed, but she payed no heed to it. It might have changed her life, but because of that incident, she was able to control the power of fireworks. She was so ready to be who she was meant to be, a true fireworks expert.

“RUN! NOW!” The fireworks expert instructed in a demanding tone of voice, the people took a look to the performer before nodding. However, there was one that seemed to stand out from the rest… a little kid who was looking over a body that seemed to be lifeless, the body was on the floor and heavily bleeding. Oh gosh… this was not going to be cool. Running over to the little child, she gazed over to him and bit her lower lip while looking over the dead body.

“Momma is asleep… Isn’t she??” The little boy asked as he looked over along with her. This particular event triggered many things within the fireworks expert, she didn’t see her mother dying, but she was sure that if she did, then she would probably be even more scarred than she is currently, not that she let most of that monstrous event get the best of her.

“Yes… she is…” Summer gazed at the body as she shook her head. “May the chinese zodiac give her a peaceful rest.” She looked to the little kid. “We can give her a proper burial later. For now, we need to get you to safety. Do you know who had the ability to do such a dangerous thing??”

“It was two boys, ma’am! They looked terrible and they casted magic!”

“Magic users…” The femme fatale simply understood the situation, she should bring the two males to her attention and give them a good lesson on why they shouldn’t do such a thing in the first place. “It’s too dangerous now. Get in a building and I will go searching for you after!”

“The two boys… I think they are H rank mages around here… will you be okay??”

OH, bloody hell. H rank! The most disgusting rank for a mage. That wasn’t cool at all and Summer had to give them two a lesson?!

“I’ll be fine, I will just have to use tactics to take them down instead, the hunt is on.”

The little boy nodded as he kneeled up along with the older female and ran off into a nearby building for the time being. “Can you believe this, dragon of the Chinese Zodiac…?” The female grunted. Of course her zodiac couldn’t reply, but all 12 of them could hear her, she was sure of it. She was blessed by them after all.

“Oiiii, hello, cutie.”

Summer turned around, it was a male, he was dressed in white, and his hair was pure blonde. With them blue eyes of his, Summer could clearly tell that he was a man that loved getting attention of all the ladies around him. It wasn’t going to work on the fireworks expert however as she started to develop feelings for someone else, who was much more honourable than the blonde murderer.

“You do realise you killed someone right.” The fireworks expert mentioned as she pointed at the mother's dead body onto the floor. “Do you think what you have done is right?! Just entering a night of festivities and then completely annihilating it?! NO! THAT IS JUST WRONG, GOOD SIR!”

“Aahh, a feisty one… oh, wonderful twin! We are going to have fun with this one!”

Another male entered, this man was wearing much darker clothing, and even though he had the exact same facial features as his brother, his hair was black and his eyes were of a pale green. This made the two really look like each other, Summer was glad she could tell the difference because she wasn’t sure if she would be able to if they both looked like each other, just like a mirror.

“I see…” The ebony haired male replied. “She does look indeed pretty… you were right, destruction does bring out pretty mages. I mean, look at her inner thigh…”

Within Summer’s inner thigh, was the mark of a guild that the magic council have approved, the guild was known as Golden Phoenix, and Summer was known to be an ace of that prestigious treasure hunting guild. “Tell me, mage… what guild are you from…?” He walked towards the female as he clicked his fingers, Summer’s body suddenly felt paralyzed, she wasn’t able to move at all. She was going to make sure that they would pay for this… they aren’t Jian, nor will she ever compare them to Jian… the two boys are just scum, like she expected from them.

As the boy walked closer to the female, he placed his finger under the female's chin and tilted her head up slightly, signifying just how much taller the male was. “I must admit, that disguise on you is pretty weird, why don’t we settle it for what you actually look like…”

“Nah!”

“Oh come on…”

“Nope!”

“But, it’s a good idea to…”

“It is most certainly not!”

The black haired male quickly slapped her across the face before she spat on him. It may have been disrespectful move, but it was a reaction that caught him off guard for sure. It was only met with nothing but negativity when the male then threw Summer into the air with a pillar of pure darkness, throwing Summer onto the floor. Of course, this hurt the firework mage and quickly got up… that really hurt.

“What the hell man!” Summer shouted as she brought herself to her knees in order to get herself up. “That was rude!”

“Yours was also rude, my dear…”

Suddenly, fireworks were being shot everywhere, the man dodged them with ease and simply walked over to her and kneed her in the stomach. Of course, Summer wasn’t the most impressed person in the world when this happened and so she kneed him in return, causing a small explosion to his stomach. The man backed off while feeling his stomach, clearly shocked that Summer was able to pull off such a trick. “You… how…?”

“Firework mage, SUCKERRSSS!” Summer did an L sign in front of him and ran off as fast as she could. There was no way that Summer was going to be able to defeat them two with sheer force, unless she thought of tactics or something of the sort. She had to think of something… But what would that thing be… Summer knew the boys just wanted to wreck the place, they probably just said that to her as a distraction of sorts so they could have their fun. Yes, that must be it. They are just causing a distraction for themselves… SHE GOT IT! She just had to execute the idea somehow! There was no time to execute it right now, the boys were clearly chasing her, she looked up into the air to see that the blonde was floating rather quickly… well… two could play at that game! The winds drafted around Summer as she started to float herself into the air. She had to be pretty quick however, the boy was throwing light beams at her and that wasn’t the coolest thing in the world to experience.

“Stop following me!” The fireworks mage demanded as she floated as fast as she could. She just had to exhaust them of their magic… that was ALL she needed to do. They probably didn’t even know that was Summer’s plan in order to defeat them, it was her that they wanted and they both seemed pretty focused on that to worry about what the hell they were doing.

Suddenly, a male appeared right in front of her. It was the other twin, and he placed his hand right in front of her face as he was also floating, he began to drain her life source away from her. No… she wouldn’t have this at all. She doesn’t want to be drained of her life. She wanted to defeat them in vengeance of the little boy, in vengeance of the whole town, they just couldn’t go on the way they were.

“Boiii!” She shouted before kicking him in the groin, causing another explosion. It was clear that he was probably not going to have children in his life. Well, it was his fault for destroying a town.

The female had to float away at a quick speed, the boy was over and done with for the time being. Now it was just for the other male to deal with. She still had to exhaust the magic power from the both of them, but it seemed that they both used even more of their magic to catch up to Summer. Summer always knew that she preferred tactics in battles over brawn and this may be the best trick she has come up with yet. Finally, Summer looked around and found a box of sorts. She stopped herself from floating and hid herself in the box by contorting her body to the way she pleased. It was a pretty neat trick due to her gymnastic prowess. Sure enough, the two boys soon arrived and kept looking around.

“Oh girlie!” One shouted “We smell your gunpowder, come out, come out, wherever you are…”

Summer had to keep herself quiet now, there was no way that they would know she was in a box, could they?? Summer was clearly in a difficult position. She had to act now, especially in order to get them to lose all their magic power, no matter how long it’ll take since they are H rank mages, it was up to Summer to stop them from doing what they wanted. Summer jumped out of the box in a surprise and pounced at the blonde twin, pinning him and then quickly cartwheeling out of the way before she got poked with another one of their bizarre magics. That was when the boys then put their hands together and then released a force of magic, resulting in black and white meteorites falling down from the sky… what the hell was that magic that they were pulling off. Were they doing… a unison raid…?? She has heard of these long ago before she joined Golden Phoenix, her mother and father used to do Unison Raids a lot ‘apparently’

Okay, it was time to kick butt, it was time to exhaust them fully. She just couldn’t leave them to destroy the village more, and the meteorites were probably going to kill everyone within their wake. She was glad that the street was practically empty except for her and the twins. They suddenly started to engulf themselves in a white light and a dark light respectively. Just who the hell were these guys?? It was just wrong. Nothing was right about their intentions at all.

“No! Stop!” Summer screamed as she kicked one of the twins away from the other twin, does it really take that long to exhaust a H rank mage of their magic?! What would Elyx do?? She heard he was a pretty high ranking mage himself, although what rank?? she wasn’t exactly sure. Well, whatever, Summer had to do everything she possibly could now, it wasn’t the fact that she wouldn’t be able to focus or anything, but because the boys were a pair of douchebags.

“Oi! Why did you stop us?! Not like it's going to work now… we have already done out thing, and it’s so good to cause destruction once more, my girl…”

“Because you have murdered people! Therefore I will take you both to Fiore with me and to the magic council! You pair of scumbags!”

Meteorite after meteorite came crashing down towards the firework expert and caused more destruction for the town, this was getting more annoying by the minute. It was clearly going to cost the builders a lot of money to bring the city back to life, essentially. “STOP THEM, IMMEDIATELY!”

“Naaahh, too much effort!” The blonde shouted as he shot a light beam at her, Summer shown no worry as her garter suddenly absorbed the light beam that was coming straight for the femme fatale.

“Stop it!”

“My turn.”

The man teleported straight to the female and grabbed her face once more, this time however, Summer retaliated by placing a hand on his forehead and shooting out a firework. The boys seemed to have gotten themselves tired over time. That was good, but there was still some work to do in order for them to finally stop. They might be too strong for her, but knowledge IS power.

“You’re tiring us out, little girl!”

“I am not little, I am tall, especially for someone who has had the short gene run in her family.” Now they’ve done it, they were panting heavily, you can tell by the change in their breathing schedule, Summer was glad she was able to pull something off, it wasn’t anything short of a miracle.

“You will pay!” the black haired male’s hands started to glow a deep black, this only caused the black meteorites to fall down faster and faster, this reminded Summer of what nightmares should really be… this was a horrible thing to consider. He tried to punch the female, but he missed because he was being much slower with his attacks. That was when the man fell onto the floor, one down… one to go.

“M-my brother!” The man shouted. “You knew this would happen didn’t you?!”

“Why else would I have done it??” Summer asked as she tilted her head, eventually crossing her arms across her pillows. She was clearly in the mood to play now that her work was going to be much more easier for her. Starting to cartwheel, she cartwheeled around the male as she then somersaulted away and onto a roof. The blonde got aggravated by this and followed her in a quick manner. Of course he would be able to, he didn’t do as much work as his twin brother did. “You’re good at following me, boy.” The female grunted. “Maybe now I can truly take you out, especially with all of your main source of energy gone… sounds fun, right??” Summer just realised how calculating she could well and truly be, but it was the only way to deal with the whole situation… maybe she could make him step down and try her best to take it slowly. Especially since the twin brother was now down and out, which she expected. It had to be one or the other, it just happened to be him that got taken down first. “Now, we can do this the easy way… I take you both to the magic council, or we can do it the hard way and we can battle until all your energy is a goner. Which one is it?? Decide now because I do not mind attempting to drain your energy right now.”

“S-stop!” The blonde cried out. “Okay, okay! Take us! Just don’t hurt us anymore!”

“Good.” The female replied as she looked the opposite way.

“THE PLACE IS SAFE NOW, EVERYONE CAN COME OUT, THE METEORS ARE GONE AND THE CULPRITS ARE DEFEATED!”

It didn’t take long for some doors to open. Some of the festival-goers came out to see the fireworks expert’s blue eyes gazing down on the few of them that actually left the homes to see what the girl was making a racket about. It was clear that Summer did indeed do her job, it was very difficult though.

“Oh my, thank you, mage!” One of them shouted with happiness as they then watched the female push the blonde down onto the floor, even though the man squealed and fell onto the floor face first, he seemed to be rather light-hearted about it. “Don’t worry. I done everything I could, the boys should bother you no more… I'll take them to the magic council in Fiore in a few. Does anyone know of a little boy?? There was a little boy in a festival and his mother ot ki-”

“I’m right here…” The little boy replied as he walked towards Summer with a bouquet of flowers. This caused Summer to jump from the roof and onto the floor to greet the little boy and to take the flowers from him. She didn’t know what to do with the little boy now, except she knew that she spoke about burying his mother. Summer didn’t really want to do such a thing,but it seemed she had literally no choice, the mother had to be in peace now.

“Let’s go bury your mother and let her rest in peace… okay?” Summer had to make sure that he was ready, no little kid should have to face this, it was why she was going to help him incase it got too emotional for him. She could already tell that the little boy was struggling to keep his cool. Tears were about to fill his eyes and she felt so sorry for the wee bairn. All the boy could do was nod slowly. Understanding his current task. He grabbed Summer’s hand tightly and walked with her back to his mother.

Summer sighed softly as she looked to the females lifeless corpse on the floor once more, that was surely not something to die over. She was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time. Picking up the dead, she carried them over her shoulder, making sure that she was still holding the child's hand tightly in hers. “Are you ready then??”

Yeah… I’m ready… are you?”

“He doesn’t seem to be ready…”

That voice…! Did she just hear a voice?! But that was impossible, the manly voice was much deeper than the little boys and there was simply no way for the female to comprehend that tone of voice… Finally, they were at the hill of the town. They were going to dig a hole and then bury her, it was simply as that. It wasn’t going to be easy, especially with the sadness that they had to endure.

“You know… I know how you feel…”

“You do??” The little boy asked as he bit his lower lip. “Is that why you’re helping??”

“No, not really… although I will admit, I am very sorry for your loss.” The little boy began to cry the moment Summer spoke them very words. “I want to help you because I want to help everyone that needs it. Everyone should be happy and everyone just needs to overcome their problems. However, they can only sometimes do that with a little assistance. Hehehe.”

“You’re so nice…” the little boy complimented as he finally picked up a nearby shovel “Okay! For mothers sake, I won’t cry! I will be strong for her and I will bury her, that is what she wants.” The little boy then looked to Summer for some sort of approval, to which Summer nodded. That was just enough for the boy to go on. He began to dig, and Summer sighed softly as she looked behind herself to look for another shovel of some sort to help the burial, she placed the mother's body onto the grass ever so softly.

“No wonder you are blessed by us.” The same male voice chuckled ever so faintly “Summer Guiyang, you may not see us, but you can now communicate to us. I am the dragon, but feel free to call me whatever you want. I will be here to aid you whenever you please, your majesty…”

Your majesty…?? What did the dragon mean by that?? She didn’t understand at all what that meant for the fireworks expert, but it was certainly something to take a mental note of. Your majesty, though… that was a very weird statement to blabber out in the most inconvenient of times.

“Is… everything okay, miss nice girl??” The little boy asked, it made Summer bring her thought process back to reality and she looked over to the little boy. My my, he dug that quickly! “Yeah, everything is fine. You dug that quickly, I am proud of you.”

“Will you… take me anywhere?? I don’t want to go anywhere. I want to stay with my mother.”

“You will, don’t worry, make sure friends take you in though, okay??”

“Okay…”

After burying the mother in the hole that was made specifically for her, and covering it up for her sake, Summer sat on the edge of the hill with the little boy. She wanted to have a small rest before she officially leaves the place with the two boys to go to the magic council, she was sure they would kick their arses good and proper. “So, why were you here…??”

“I was the one that was going to be performing for you and all the others. But it seems I cannot do that now.” She looked downwards in defeat, kicking her legs like a little child would, just like the little boy was! “I am sorry that this trouble was caused for you, hopefully everything will be okay soon.”

“Oh, it will be, I assure you!” The little boy was trying his hardest to keep keep his spirit up. “I will be wanting to overcome as much as possible, sure I am upset now. But I won’t forget this tragedy, but I won’t let myself get beaten down either.”

“You know, I like you, kid.” Summer complimented him, but mainly only because she has gone through similar grief. “When you need me, or anyone else… please, run to Fiore… and look for the guild known as Golden Phoenix, that is the guild I am in, and I want to help you so much if you are ever in trouble ever again.” Summer really did want to help him, there was so much going through her right now, she didn’t want the little boy to suffer the same fate as her, it wasn’t healthy at all if he had to. “Then, if you are ever there. Don’t hesitate to greet the others, they are lovely.”

“You really mean that??” The little boy smiled softly as he showed off a big grin to the older woman. She was sure that he has grown quite attached to her right now, not that she minded. She was sure that little children were typically like this. “Yes, I really do mean that.” Summer smiled to herself as she stood up. “Will you be okay?? I need to leave to take the boys to the magic council now.” She admitted.

“I’ll be fine…”

“Good…”

Summer finally walked away from the hill and waved her goodbyes to the little boy before speaking to herself, trying to find out what the hell was the dragon speaking about.

“Okay, who the hell are you and how the hell can you communicate with me?”

“Your majesty, are you really that curious about me?? You clearly have just become a stronger mage within yourself, please let yourself know that…”

“I do not believe I am the type of mage to have become stronger, I am merely just trying to be myself.” Summer replied.

“You, that makes you much stronger than you think, Summer Guiyang…”

“Lies, man… lies.”

The weird voice that was talking to her simply chuckled before appearing in front of her in his spirit form. “Do you not worry, only you can see me. Do you believe me?? Do you believe you have become stronger?? Embrace who you are Summer, you are blessed by the chinese zodiac, and you are the next heir of the throne.”

“Thats… impossible…”

Summer shook her head as she walked away from the dragon spirit. Next heir to the throne? All she could care about right now is the fact that she was going to send the males to the council.

Made by Salrynn from FTRP