The Goddess of Sound [INTRO]

Over the course of a single day, the fortunes of Illya Pegasus had changed. Where she once was the "cute, upbeat waitress girl" from Magnolia's taverns, now she was suddenly regarded as someone with the potential to be someone feared by all. It was all because of her eye, and the magic power granted by it. Of course, while she could have stayed working at the taverns and inns and restaurants, living paycheck to paycheck, a bigger fish was now present and available: Fairy Tail.

Living in Magnolia, Fairy Tail had become a sight for Illya to always look up to. While the guild was far different from what it once was and what she once expected, it still had always been a dream to work there, even if it was just as a menial worker. Now, she had her chance to be a wizard in the guild of her dreams. Without a doubt, at least one of the patrons to her taverns or one of the citizens who had seen her concerts at one of Magnolia's many festivals had told the guild of her impending arrival , but nonetheless, Illya was prepared for anything and everything.

Slowly exiting her small house, she slipped on her headphones, ready to finally make her entrance into the World of Magic. Her previous bosses were okay with her leaving even without a two-week notice, saying things along the lines of "You'll be more use at Fairy Tail!" or "You can still work here any time you want!" Her bosses' opinions of her were certainly great, and she was excited to be moving on to her work at Fairy Tail.

Her mind was racing with so many thoughts that the trip to Fairy Tail's guild hall went by in a flash, and suddenly she was standing just outside the entrance, looking up to it no different from how a little kid would. It was a much more simple building than the stories of old said about it, a tell to how serious they had become in recent times. While it once blended in with Magnolia's many festivals, now it was almost a chain dragging the city down to reality with its serious appearance. Her heart raced in her chest, the whimsy of a new life ready to begin pulsing in her entire body. She closed her eyes, humming a tune to herself quietly to calm her nerves before resolving herself to enter the admittedly bland guild hall.

"He-llo, Fairy Tail!" she announced, opening the door. She was unable to hide her enthusiasm. "I'm Illya Pegasus, and I'm here to join you guys!"

Arcadia was enjoying one of her favorites, a watermelon-strawberry juice slush. The juice cocktail had just the right proportions of strawberry to watermelon this time too. Plus she manged to not freeze it too fast, so the slush crystals were smaller and softer, just the way she liked. IT was good to relax down in the lobby again with no paperwork or jobs to worry about. Not even a conference fall or band to meet with later today.

She was just messing around in her iLac surfing the lacrima-net for random cat videos when her faerie green gaze caught glimpse of a new face. She took a long sip of her watermelon-strawberry slush, then pushed back from the table she was sitting at. The pale blonde barefoot slayer stuffed her iLac into the specially sewn pocket for it in her dress. Sadly, just as she leaned to stand, the slayer tipped her chair back just a little too far. She toppled most embarrassingly right along with it.

The barefoot slayer flushed briefly, but stood, smoothing down her dress and long hair. She laughed and smiled, "Let me try that again! Welcome! I'm Arcadia Fairchilde! Executive Manager. So you wanna join Fairy Tail? Why don't you take a seat then. Would you like anything to drink? Best juice in Fiore."

At seeing the other girl tip over in her chair, Illya rushed ahead to check on her. "Are you okay, Miss Fairechild?" Her eyes scanned the girl's body, making sure she was unharmed, which looked to be the case. Illya sighed in relief.

Finally realizing what Arcadia had said, she willingly took a seat beside the toppled chair that Arcadia had previously been on. "Yes, that's right! I'm here to join Fairy Tail! As for if I want something to drink..." Illya mulled it over in her head for a moment, thinking of what to get. "I suppose I'll have something pear-flavored, if you have something of that sort. As long as it isn't a problem for you to get, or anything!."

Illya scanned the hall of Fairy Tail. Sure enough, it was different than the pictures of the past that the Fairy Tap Tavern had of the inside. Much less festive, she thought, with a distinctly business-focused atmosphere.

"So, you're the 'Executive Manager?' Is that like a Guild Master?" she muttered quietly out loud. Unaware that she said that aloud, she continued on, directly speaking to Arcadia. "Oh, I should specify! I'm not here to work as a waitress or receptionist or anything like that. I'm here to work as a wizard!" She gave a sheepish grin. "I'm still not really sure what my magic is, or how good it is, but my bosses and patrons at my old workplace said that it was something really powerful." She put a finger up to her chin, thinking at what the words were. "I think they said something like 'Slayer' with my magic? I dunno exactly, but apparently I can 'eat sound' or something like that? I don't know what that means, to be perfectly honest, but my boss said I'd be more useful working at a guild than at a tavern so...here I am!" She shrugged, smiling. "To be honest, I've been looking up to Fairy Tail ever since I can remember, so I'm glad than I can join!"

ROAR!!! Was the loud noise Ghost made as he slammed his fist through the table he was sitting at. Being only three meters away from the two. As he looked on he would stand up as the table was in pieces slowly crumbling away. He would have not notice Arcadia when she nearly fell off of her chair. As his head was laying face down on the table. Which in fact was nearly dust as his right hand had glowed up with holy magic. Yet shadow magic was mixed within it. Looking towards the table they was at. A grin smile would come over his face. Within his left hand was his famous striped mask. To which he quickly put it on. As the mask covered his face. His right eye would let off a bright light. As did his left eye which let out shadow magic. Soon both fading away as his eye holes showed just that.

He would walk right to the table and looked at the slayer. He would start to speak in a moncho type of way. Which sounded very aggressive yet soft at the same time. Putting his right hand on the table he would dare to look the newbie in the eyes. "You have a magic that allows you to eat sound. The very sound we make. How interesting that is I wonder how it operates? More or less how one could come into gaining such magic. But not only that you claim to be a slayer but of what may I ask? But do not answer that,as if you need to. Around here you either know us or you don't." He would start to laugh in a grim yet frightening type of way. Only to turn that very laughter into a friendly sounded one.

"I really can't say what you should or shouldn't do to be a member. Nowadays it takes heart to stick around is all I know. Right plus you need to stay away from trouble and trouble makers like well- Anyway good luck and all that sound slayer. Such a fearsome magic to have Is it not?" Ghost would laugh yet again yet in a friendly yet grim kind of way. Walking off before they would utter a word to him. Making his leave by opening his portal to his realm. Not even looking back as wind picked up causing a small whirlwind to take off. "By the way welcome to the guild."
Waving his hands back at her as his portal closed.

Even in the night with cloudless sky, Mura couldn’t find head or tail in his search for the exact location of Tenrou Island. Yeah, his curiosity had gotten the better of him; just where was this island of mystery located? The stars themselves were all… unrecognizable. None of the famous constellations were to be found like… well, he held a book about star constellations and coordination in his hands, and he couldn’t find anything up there. The stars were all… lined up all too orderly. It was as if someone wanted to make a net of perfectly aligned stars making only one type of figures; squares. Maybe this was the island’s way of saying ‘Hey, don’t sweat it, you won’t find out’ and frankly, he would have to respect that decision. Softly patting the ground beneath his feet, he walked the other way and approached his little tent. Every step he took caused a faint, golden light to reveal itself on his right arm. He paid no attention to it as he was heavily exhausted after tonight’s work, and he just wanted to get some sleep for tomorrow.

The next morning, he exited the portal and approached the elevator. He was now in the discreet basement below Fairy Tail, and before he entered the elevator to get up again, he took a glance at the crystal statue. Today, Mura was the Guildmaster of Fairy Tail… but it wasn’t fully embraced by himself. He needed to wait for a certain person’s report out there, so the shaman could continue on his investigation.

“ACHOO!”

That was the first thing that came out of him when he reached the guild hall. Sniffing a little, he walked out and mumbled: “I-I need something hot…” He made it to the bar and got himself something rather unusual to be received from a bar like theirs; hot cocoa in a nice mug with Magnolia’s insignia on.

That was when he noticed Arcadia and a new face. The face of a lively, young girl with ginger-orange hair and slender figures. She possessed magic power, and Mura was quick to notice that… perhaps a potential, new member of their guild? She appeared to be eager for something. Mura would be more than happy to widen the member base, but Arcadia was the one to enroll her. Therefore, Mura just stood there at the bar and looked at them, his eyes closed in bliss and cheeks all red from the hot cocoa.

The sudden appearance of two others came as a huge shock to Illya. Just minutes prior, Arcadia and Illya were seemingly the only people in the lobby, and now a mysterious man sat at the end of the bar, drinking some sort of hot drink, and an even more mysterious man had vanished as quickly as he appeared.

"E-excuse me, sir? Are you part of Fairy Tail? My name's Illya Pegasus, and I'd like to join." She smiled. While they were not as festive as Mister Cayle remembered, they certainly were still just as strange and eccentric. In just a few minutes of being at Fairy Tail, Illya had already met someone who seemed to be a child, but mature for a child despite her outburst of tipping over, a man who said some weird words as he teleported into existence before vanishing just as quickly, and the most normal of the bunch, the person drinking at the end of the bar, a dagger at his hip. "I-I don't mean to sound arrogant or proud or anything like that, but if you've been around Magnolia a while, you've had to have been at one of my concerts for some of the festivals or at least visited one of the places I work at, right?"

She shrugged, getting her mind off of that and focusing on the words that the man who had been there for even a second said. "I still don't really understand it all that much, but I guess I'm a...Sound Slayer? I don't even know who that was and I'm asking the same questions as him! I don't know how this magic works or how I got this or-"

Her words were stopped dead in their tracks as her eye flashed a dark, nearly black color. The pain shot through her entire body, sending her off her chair in a heap. Her arm was rendered immobile from the pain, and it was a tough decision between attempting to quell the source of the pain in from her eye and staying the shaking her arm was undergoing. It was an unbearable pain, with Illya concentrating most of her efforts into not screaming from it. It felt as if a million swords were stabbing into each and every inch of the right side of her body, while her eye felt as if it would burst or shatter.

After what seemed like an eternity, the pain finally subsided. Just like the disappearing man, it came and went in a flash. She was breathing heavy, still collapsed on the ground, but conscious. "Sorry about that. Sometimes that just happens. Something with this eye." She pointed to her right eye, the one with the music note as a pupil. "My bosses and patrons kept saying that this eye is the source of my magic, but I don't really know. Someone mentioned something about a lacrima, but I'm not really sure. Aren't they just used for like lights or music storage or stuff like that? Doesn't seem like something you can see out of. My eyes work just fine!"

Arcadia smiled to Illya, taking her iLac back out of its pocket. She smiled, [color=#28b463]”It's... no not the Guild Master. It's one of the ace positions. We help the Guild Master run things. And pear juice. We've got that. I personally would recommend the pear fruit slush, but I might be biased in favor of frozen things.” The barefoot slayer laughed and ordered a glass of pair juice for Ilya., with one of the many blobs of light floating around the guild hall helping the glass float on over to their table.

She righted her chair, retaking her own seat. The barefoot slayer aimed her iLac's camera to Ilya and snapped a quick photo. [i]”Say cheeeese! And don't worry. This is just for our records.” Arcadia imported the photo into a new file in her iLac's office app. She added Ilya's name and a few notes and observations. Before she could truly settle into the main part of the interview however, things took an expected left turn. Not completely unusual around Fairy Tail, but Arcadia's faerie green gaze still showed surprise.

The barefoot slayer must have been surprised a little longer than she realized because before she realized it Ilya was calling over toward the bar. Arcadia shook her surprise away and smiled ”Actually, you already are joining our guild, so nothing to worry about.. Just a couple more questions. One of which you've pretty much answered already. The question being, 'Why do you want to join Fairy Tail?' You can add anything more to what you've already said if you want. And uh that first fellow was Ghost, you might see him around. He's right about that eating sound. That sounds hella awesome. If you want us to, we'll help you learn how to channel all that.”

“That guy at the bar is Mura. He is the Guild Master, and you can ask him or both of us any questions you have after this one last question for you. Would you ever harm a fellow guild mate or destroy guild property without permission?”

Then sometime before Ilya even got to the second question, Arcadia watched in horror as the poor girl fell into a heap from her chair. Arcadia tucked her iLac into her pocket quickly, and slipped off her own chair to slip across the floor and kneel at Ilya's side. Concern in her faerie green gaze, Acradia would offer the sound slayer magical aid. If accepted, Arcadia would cast a healing spell that would bring numbing chill to any further pain, her rainbow colored band of fused gemstones glowing in the in sapphire fused in for the blue. It enhanced the healing properties of the spell enacted its benefits over many minutes after casting.

Arcadia would also offer a hand to get back up, smiling with gentle concern, ”Don't worry about. And well... I believe lacrima are basically just objects for storing magic power. So it depends on how the lacrima was designed on what that stored magic power can be made to do. It also probably has something to do with the kind of magic power that is stored in the lacrima. In fact, I think it's safe to say there is no real limit on the kind of lacrima you can find out there.”

“Now if you're feeling up to it, we still need you to answer that last question, but we can wait if you need a little time after something like that. Developing your power might help control that kind of thing. At least I'm pretty sure that's what helped me. The lacrima I got from my mom, the dragon who trained me, greatly expanded the possibilities of what I had learned, but it was gave me my own problems at first. The more I developed my skill though, the easier it was to smooth out those hiccups that came after absorbing my lacrima.”

Still breathing heavy, Illya smiled and turned to Arcadia, doing her best to hide her still lingering pain. "You don't need to worry about my health. As painful as it sounds, I've kind of gotten used to it at this point. Well, as much as I can for this kind of pain." She let out a cheerful laugh, still hiding herself. She finally rose up to her feet, graciously accepting Arcadia's hand. "That said, I still don't really understand much about this. As far as I know, when I was asleep, there wasn't really any magic effects on me and the past three years have kinda been the same deal with no one around me being able to use magic." She shrugged, still smiling. If nothing else, she was optimistic. "But I can assure you that I have no intentions of harming anyone within Fairy Tail, nor do I intend to harm any of your guys's property." She sighed, placing a hand on her chest. "In fact, I feel like I'd be much happier staying in support as opposed to hurting anyone at all. I still don't really know much about my magic, but that just means I'm inexperienced, like you said, so maybe I can tune it to help others out more?" A twinge of pain shot across her right arm, causing her to wince in pain. Perhaps the presence of these incredibly strong Wizards was heightening her malfunction?

"Oh, sorry if I'm asking too many questions! It's just...when I was a kid and I would hear about Fairy Tail, I always pictured them as these "knights in shining armor" that would come to save me, and to think that now I have a chance to join, plus according to Ghost it seems like my magic is pretty good." Once more, she smiled, tilting her head along with it. "I really hope you don't mind that I'm asking so many questions. One that I definitely have a question with that whole "absorbing a lacrima" thing. Again, I don't really understand it, but I guess that means my eye is a lacrima? And somehow that's giving me this magic? But absorbing would mean it's completely gone and..." Realizing how much she was talking, she gasped before quickly bowing a few times in succession. "Again, very sorry to be asking so many questions! I'm just...I'm just so excited to be here!"

Arcadia made doubly sure that llya not need any healing after helping her up. The barefoot slayer returned to her seat, taking up her iLac again and began adding notes and other observations to the open file as she listened.

Concern crossed back over her face, but she held back offering aid a third time as it seemed something Ilya had or wished to handle on her own. Instead, she returns a smile and nods. Adding a free more notes, Arcadia smile again, [color =#28b463]"Glad to hear it."[/color] To save time, Arcadia willed open a portal from the table to the reception desk. A couple of the floating blobs of light that drifted to and fro around the desk seemed to know what Arcadia needed. The light blobs floated through the portal and dropped off a block off unidentifiable material. Arcadia finished up her notes and traded her iLac to the light blobs. They carried her iLac back to reception desk to set it in a docking lacrima for uploading her notes to the guild.

When the portals closed, Arcadia smile back to Ilya, " We'll certainly do what can to help if you need it. I believe now it's your turn to ask any questions you have for us." Picking up the old block, the barefoot slayer laughed a little, "Other than that, you get to pick where you would like your guild mark and what color."

Arcadia's helpful attitude was certainly a breath of relief for Illya. In the past few days, she was dreading this moment, worried about whether or not she would fit in or whether or not she would be able to even be accepted into the guild. "Oh right, a guild tattoo. I don't think my managers would be all too excited for it to be super visible, so..." she placed a hand on her right ribs. "Probably right about here, in a pink color." She turned to Mura. "If it can't go through clothes, we might need to find somewhere else in the building to apply it." Thinking through other questions, she still had plenty in mind. "I'm really sorry if I end up asking too many questions. I definitely have a bunch about magic, since I really don't know much about how to use my magic or really anything about it. I didn't even know I could use magic until a few days ago!" She chuckled. "Anyways, I suppose you might be more looking for questions about Fairy Tail, right? One of my old bosses said that a while ago, Fairy Tail was still following the Magic Council, even though the council didn't really like them much. He said that now the guild doesn't really follow the council, but definitely not a dark guild still. I'm just a bit curious as to why that is exactly? As far as what my boss said, Fairy Tail also used to be a lot more...extravagant, more involved in the festivals. Why doesn't the guild get more involved in the festivals in town? Sorry if you're not allowed to answer these questions, I'm just real curious because I've been looking up to the guild for as long as I can remember and I'm just really excited to be here and learn more about the guild."

Arcadia gave a thoughtful frown. She hasn't personally ever seen a good mark applied through clothing, but that didn't mean it was impossible. The barefoot slayer took a closer look at the old block, slowly turning it over and over under her studious gaze. She knew each of the activation runes pretty well but now, so it did not take her long to study each one.

What she did find as she looked over the entire block was a faded rune covered by a little dust and grime. With the sleeve of her dress and some elbow grease it clean up enough to be more plainly visible. The Rune dos start to glow, so she tapped it until it faded again. Arcadia smile, mildly smug that she figured that out already.

She kept her ears peeled for Illya's further questions. Her faerie green eyes peeping up from the old block to help her keep track. She smiled over the old block, and when she finished her quick little hunt and look over , she lowered the block back to the table. ”Well, I'm afraid a couple of those questions will have to wait until another time. Ask Master Mura again sometime and he will be able to tell you more than I could. As for the festivals, well... since we're currently a more mecenary guild than perhaps we used to be, we don't always have enough people around town to pull off all te help we used to give with all of Magnolia's festivals we once did, because people are often off on important jobs. But that doesn't mean we don't help out with what festivals we can. And we still ut on our own once in a while. The Fairy Festival.”

The barefoot slayer held up the old block again, “Anyway, making it work through clothing shold not be a problem now so...” Arcadia carefully placed the block over Ilya's right ribs where the prospective mage had placed her hand. The slayer's fingers traced the newfound rune before all the usual other runes , activating one extra magical circle beneath the block than usual. The second circle rotated counter the the first, and the two burned twice as brightly as it placed a pink outline of the Fairy Tail guild mark without marring any bit of clothing that would go unseen until Ilya could look for herself later. It marked her as an official intern in Fairy Tail! The blobs of color that had brought over the old block would now clarify thanks tot he mark's magic into forms distinguishable as fairies. They flit here and there, keeping the guild hall in order.Welcome to Fairy Tail! Yer one of us now!”