The Start of A Tail [Intro/Open]

"Is this the place?" Tiny feet pattered in front of the esteem headquarters of the guild Fairy Tail. The young body they were attached to would gaze up at the building in amazement, stunned by how modern everything look. From what the salesman on the road had gave, she would have assumed that this would be some kind of old mansion that was falling apart or something. Kumiko looked back down at her map, halfway folded in the clutches of her left hand. The right hand was clutching a burger she had managed to convince one of the local stands to give it to her. Of course, it was kind of shady since she had told him that she was a mage here at the guild and she didn't have any money. While technically a lie, she was on her way to try and join the guild while asking for help if they could find her father. So it really wasn't a lie as much as it was "just delaying the truth" in a sense. To her, at least. The food was amazing here, much better than the dry bowls that she had eaten back at the shrine with the others. The child's stomach growled at the possibilities that awaited behind the closed doors of the restaurants and cafes here in Fiore! The tail of bright orange swayed to the side while she scarfed down the remaining bits of her "snack" and then wiped the remnants of it on her hand. "All ready!~" she told herself, hyping herself up for the introduction. They were important, after all.

The map was folded back into her pockets while the foxling would gaze up the door leading towards her goal. She wondered what kind of people would be inside. Hardened, grizzly adventurers who could help a poor girl in need? Or would they be the snobbish types that were all high and mighty? Only one way to find out!

The front door was pushed open to the guild hall, Kumiko walking inside partially. Every was fairly clean and looked like it was some type of normal gathering place. Benches, a bar, stairs, and whatever else would. The door creaked on its way back behind her, her ears twitching a little at the sound while the child would walk further inside. It was fairly empty, more so than what she would have though, but some people would be mulling around the interior of the hall. Eager to get on with the greetings, making sure that she looked presentable for the people in the building here. The child smoothed out her outfit, the traditional work clothing of a miko which had been altered to make room her her tail, and would approach.

"Ohayou~" Kumiko began, offering the those present a cheerful and energetic wave. Her tail swished and swashed behind her to sigal her current mood while the youth would proudly beam up at all those in her way. "Is this the Fairy Tail Guild Hall? I need your help with stuff!"

Thankfully there was a guy sleeping close to the counter where some of the seats were located. He wore his hair short and had some rather colorful things floating around by his head! Kumiko's eyes were immediately drawn to them while they would erratically move about around him. They spoke of high while she would wander a little bit closer to the two. Now that the fox was closer up to the two, she could make out the two shapes much better. Each was a different color: one being a nice blue-ish color while the second one would be more of a nice green color. Her small tail's swaying speed only increased while the child's eyes would follow their path. "Whoa! Spirits! Are you-" she began to launch a platoon's worth of questions at the two but was cut off just as soon as the green colored spirit would chomp off the head of the former blue spirit. Kumiko jumbled around her words a bit while processing this information. "Why'd you eat your-" she was interrupted yet again as the sleeping man suddenly sat straight up with his eyes closed. The foxling jumped in surprise, her ears and tail standing up straight. The latter of which would floof up, increasing its size as it now looked akin to a throw rug that had been tossed inside of the washer.

"Gah!"

As quick as he shot up, the man's eyes would open to face them, Kumiko on high alert while her tail shook on the end before swishing to the opposite side. Wait, was he...floating in midair?! That was so cool! How was he doing that? Was it some kind of magic? Or like one of those cool invisible couches? Wait, the mission! Why she was here! The girl was worried that her greeting had been met with some kind, but his greeting helped calm Kumiko's worries somewhat. He even greeted her similar like all of the Midian folk back home. A toothy grin came upon the child's face, her bushy tail regaining its former shape. "Oh! Great! I was worried I got the wrong house. I kinda thought this would be super old or something." Kumiko would stand on her tippy toes to match the man's height, puffing out her cheeks as she did so. It was only common courtesy after all! After a good minute of trying, she sighed and got a chair from nearby and sat down on it in a traditional style.

"My name is Kumiko." The foxling bowed her head to the man, a mannerism that had been drilled into her head since she could balance herself on her own two feet. She sat back up perfectly and would began to tale. "I guess I should start at the beginning. I'm a miko at a shrine in Midian with my Dad and other girls. He's not our Dad, but he's taken care of us for a super long time! We've been training for a long, long, long, long, long..." Kumiko counted each long on a separate finger, continuing until she exhausted all ten and would restarted again. On the 16th "long", she would mercifully end the torturous length of her description. "...long time. I wake up with him to do chores, but one day, he went missing. We thought that he was just away and didn't tell us, but it's been a few weeks now and we got worried." Kumiko placed a hand on her chest, her tail resting comfortably to her right side. "The others wanted to wait for him to come back on his own, but I volunteered to go out and try to find him. I've been walking around a lot now. I...kinda don't even know how I got here! But I came across this merchant guy in Era who told me that you could help! You're Fairy Tail, the super powerful mage guild!" A smile spread on the girl's face while the tip of her tail couldn't contain her elation. "So if anybody can find him, it's gotta be you!~"

Kumiko awaited the response she would gain before then continuing. "Even if you can't help, I wanna see if I can join. Dad taught me most of his magic after I kinda accidentally...swallowed his bright weird thing that people use to learn magic when I was a baby. But that just means I've got magic flowing through my body better. Do mages actually have that? Or is it like a pool of stuff inside of you that you can't see?" Kumiko pondered aloud for a bit before shaking her head and getting back on topic.

"But I wanna be a mage and help people and everything! I'm tired of just waiting in the wings for stuff to get better. I wanna be with everyone making the "better" happen!~" Kumiko looked energetic as ever, pumping her arms up. "I promise I'll be a good mage and follow the rules and everything. I'll fight and do the right stuff and clean around here and..." The girl rambled on and on, hoping that her pleas would be answered by the man and his spirits. "...and- Oh! Those spirits floating around you! Are you a Midian as well?~"

The tale of how she came to be in these lands far away from home must have stirred something within the man and his spirit companions. Kumiko's tale ended as she still wore her eager yet sympathetic smile on her young face. "I went to a ton of places. Of course, getting people to come with me after hearing about my Dad." The child's smile wavered, replaced with an expression of concern and weariness. For a single, brief moment, she appeared to have taken in the reality of what had happened to her so far. Both hands would be placed on her lap while Kumiko's ears drooped down. "To tell you the truth, I ran out of places to go. Nobody's seen him around anywhere, and I don't know where else to go. So that's why I came to you guys..." As quickly as the mood settled in, Kumiko would shake her head again and chew the inside of her cheek. "But I'll help as much as I can as well. I just wanna bring Dad home to everyone."

On a lighter topic, she was most interested in the explanation of magic that Mura had given. Of course her father had only really gone into the art briefly, explaining it once or twice to a child who barely paid attention to anything written on a page that wasn't the least bit interesting. But the man's words did, at least, strike up a curiosity within her. "A First Origin? I guess that kinda makes sense. So that thing I ate somehow just made me super powerful?" Kumiko asked, ears returning to their previous perky position. "That makes some sense. I guess I'll just have to get better at this and become the best mage the world's ever seen. Yeah!~ Maybe if I do, Dad will hear about me! Then he'll have to come out and find me." Hyped up on her own little course of action, her tail swayed back and forth while looking over towards her older friend for approval.

He introduced the two spirits which roamed around his body. The emerald colored one would be of a dragon no less, the foxling's eyes widening in surprise. She got to meet a dragon spirit no less! "Wow! A dragon! Were you super big? With wings and everything? It's such an honor to meet you, Mr. Zirconis!!!" Kumiko fawned over the spirit in question before Mura would introduce his companion, or at least the one who had just gotten eaten a few moments ago. Kyuken, on the other hand, would be much more relaxed interacting with, as Kumiko assumed that he was much more lax than the dragon spirit. Her tail spun a mile a minute, the girl impressed by the company he had found himself with. She offered a bow to both the spirits out of respect for Zirconis the dragon and...well, she wanted to make Kyuken feel the love as well.

But what really made her all the more eager to please was the introduction that the man gave. Mura was not only Midian like her, but the guildmaster of Fairy Tail itself! To back up these claims, he showed her the palm of his hands, effortlessly creating the five basic elements that most of her older sisters could do without a second thought. "I didn't think I'd meet another Midian coming here. I kinda just like the uniform. Most clothes are kinda uncomfortable because of the..." The child motioned to her more primal features, her ears twitching and her floofy tail continuing to sway side to side. She was just so excited that its normal routine of resting next to her was all but abandoned.

The topic changed to her wish of joining the guild, with Mura giving a brief lesson on what it meant to bear the seal of the guild on one's person. Kumiko listened intently to his words and would take them to heart. The sparks of ambition were on the rise in the girl's spirit. The more he spoke of it being a family, to sacrifice and never be led astray from one another. It made her feel at home. It reminded her a lot about how her father would speak to the girls at the shrine. After he finished speaking, he snapped his fingers as a clone was born from him. The second copy of Mura would hand a strange, old wooden box and then hurry towards the elevator, vanishing from sight. The box was opened to reveal the Crest Ink that would be applied to the miko. Kumiko nodded confidently and would raise the back of her palm to Mura to stamp.

"I promise I'll take good care of everyone in my new family, Guildmaster~"

Her greeting to the emerald colored dragon spirit had gone fairly well based on reactions alone. The kind old dragon would say he was flattered by her sincerity and manners no doubt. Kumiko's tail swished in agreement with her current mood, unable to tell much of a difference of Kyuken, whom had taken up residence on her busy, orange colored kitsune feature. "My sisters back home will never believe them when I told them I met a dragon spirit! Oh, Tsuki is gunna be so excited! Junko might ask you a billion questions but she's always been super interested in them." She then recoiled her hand after the moist ink had left its impression on her palm. Kumiko turned it over to face her and glanced at it for a brief moment before raising it into the air, as if to put it on display for the entire world. It might have not been a big step at finding the whereabouts of her Dad, but this was a big step in terms of coming to trust others, after a decent amount of time being sheltered away from the world so far. "Thank you, Guildmaster!~ I promise I'll become the best mage Fairy Tail will ever know." He seemed just as happy as she was for whatever his own reasons maybe. Though the foxling didn't really assume that it was anything but eagerness to see a new member of the family that was his guild. What caught her interest next was when he asked about her father, to which she was happy to oblige.

"He was always super nice to everybody he came across. That's how he found most of my sisters. In fact..."

The child went on and on about her family, gushing about her "siblings". In total, there were roughly 13 other girls at the shrine where Kumiko had come from in Lower Midi. They all cared for one another and got along like one big happy family. Or at least one whose age range went from as young as 5 to as old was 19. It certainly made the days interesting, to say the very least. The child informed Mura, Zirconis, and Kyuken (should he be listening) of each and every single one. With some coaxing from Mura, Kumiko shifted the focus back onto her father after her five minute filibuster. "He wears his hair like super long. It's black and he usually ties it with some weird stuff he's had since he was a kid. When I was young, I used to pull on it when we went anywhere. He had it cut shorter but still long since then." While she went on and on about her father, a smile grew on Kumiko's face. Perhaps it was the fond memories or telling somebody else about the person who had made the most difference in her life thus far but it helped the girl feel slightly less anxious about her father's condition. Anything to really take her mind off of thoughts of him turning up in a state that was less looked forward to than being imprisoned far, far away.

The tale then swiftly became about what she knew of him. He was also a native to Midian, though having spent a good chunk of his life in Upper Midi. He had never fully said why he moved to a place so devoid of what he was accustomed to but Kumiko explained that she had thought that maybe it was due to the weather or something completely unrelated. In her mind, it made sense! "My older sisters know more about Dad than I do, I bet." Kumiko said as a matter of fact. She took a long sip of her orange juice box and would down the entire thing in only a few mouthfuls of pulpy goodness. "Oh! I forgot! He also wrote and read a lot of books about magic things. I used to play in his study and he would just read and read. I fell asleep in there a lot since there wasn't much to do. I tried reading what he was working on once, but didn't understand it. It was something about cures or something." She paused momentarily while pondering aloud.

"Do you think that's where he went? To go find a cure? I don't know what it would be for though..."

Even if but brief, the recollection of her family brought the foxling immense joy that would last for quite some time. She gooshed about each and every one of her sisters, giving enough details that by the end of each description, Mura and his spiritual companions could have written an book on the entire family structure. After some amount of thought egging her into the topic of her father, Kumiko would tell the guildmaster all about the man. Her description was a bit brief, but the details were enough to get a good picture on where to start with the whole ordeal. "Yep! If anybody was hurt or anything, he would be the first to help. Dad's why I wanted to join too. I wanted to help people just like him." The base reason was childish, though a noble cause. Her tail swayed faster from side to side, giving the perverted samurai a good ride (which she still couldn't really tell was on) from touch alone. She had practically binge read most books about all the great heroes of old, at least for her age group, who would risk life and limb just to save the world from anybody who would threaten the balance of things. So who was to say some weird fox girl kid couldn't do just that? Stranger things had happened in the world, after all. Like that time all those weird things were attacking people in the summer. Come to think of it, that was every summer!

Mura talked briefly on him, commenting on his magic to his younger guild intern. The girl's fingers would continue to trace over her guild tattoo, still excited to be a part of such a wonderful family. It was just another group of people it would fall under her to protect. His train of thought was something that only seemed plausible to Kumiko when somebody else told it to her in front of her face. She furrowed her brows in thought, thinking about the proposed reason. It definitely made sense now that she took a minute to actually think it through. "Yeah, maybe. But nobody was really sick or anything. At least not that I knew. My sister's weren't sick...No, Katsumi was sick!...but that was just a flu. But that's a super good point, Guildmaster, sir! He definitely left because something happened." Kumiko would continue diving around in her memories for clues that could help the investigation, but there really wasn't much in terms of useful or relevant information so far. The farthest back she could remember was a memory of him carrying her to bed after getting frightened one night from a terrible nightmare. While her ears flattered against her head in frustration, Mura would reach over and instruct her on not to move. Kumiko was happy to oblige by doing just that. When he took his hands away, a small multicolored knot hung from her shoulder, being secured by a knot there. Her eyes traced across the strange item as she smiled. "Thank you! I don't think I'm sick, but just in case." The kitsune continued to dive in her memory bank but nothing came of it.

"My magic?" Kumiko repeated the question asked of her. She cupped a hand and would focus on a little show for Mura and Zirconis (and Kyuken, wherever he was). A sphere of light would grow in her hands, a bright, white color surrounding the shape just as the child would practice on controlling it around her. Mura also might notice that the magic aura that should have been around her by now would be much more present. In fact, it was pretty dense when the orb of magic was out, probably a state meant for somebody twice her age. Yet it was being held back by something. A seal that was placed on her, as if to limit the amount of magic she could produce or gather. The child would end the sphere by closing it between two hands...and then reopening it to show several flickers of light, dancing across her palm. The display was certainly eye catching, as she had a pretty good control of her magic all things considered. Consider it a perk of swallowing a magical item from a young age. Maybe the boy might also notice the kind of light magic it was. While still of the light element, Kumiko's magic was much more than just that.

"Light Magic~ It's pretty cool, huh? I always used to be good at it since eating that lacrima thing. Oh, I can also do this." Kumiko looked over at the lights overhead and opened her mouth, inhaling through it. The lights above would begin to flicker, as the light coming from the source would glow a bright, sparkling color and flow into the child's maw. The more of the energy she ate, the denser her magical energy became. After a few seconds or so, she ended her meal and the lights returned to their steady flickering status quo."Pretty cool, huh?~" she said, hoping it would answer any questions that Mura might have. "I'm not good at healing, but I wanted to learn that eventually too. Dad said you could never have too many healing spells." She thought back to all the advice he had given to her, especially how his roomed used to smell. He burned incense normally so it reeked of peculiar scents. Kumiko even missed that annoying wind chime that sat above his door. How it used to go off when it was windy, especially that one night when...

All of a sudden, something connected. A click!

"I just remembered!" Kumi exclaimed, her ears perking back up on top of their head and she was pleased to even recall something that normally would have just seemed so innocuous. "The night before he disappeared! I was there with him in the middle of the night. I woke up because I heard him shouting and wanted to see what was happening. There wasn't much of anything but I do remember..." she winced. "Th-There was a knife. And it had this strange stuff on it. Like leather or some kind of moldy, red stuff on it." Kumiko paused, biting her lip at the next part. Her tail visibly shuddered at the memory. "I...We hugged and I could smell blood. He tried to hide it, but I could tell. That's all I can remember though. Just that awful smell..."

The Agemaki hung off of the girl's left shoulder, Kumiko toying with it a little by pushing it it with her right hand every now and again. She had heard of them before, notably with her sisters when they weren't feeling right or were ill, but never actually wearing on herself. Maybe she was just lucky that way? Her excitable tail waved around with the samurai inside of it though she was still none the wiser to whatever antics he may be while inside of it. No, the midian was much too proud of the little spectacle she had given to her awaiting audience, beaming widely at the guildmaster. "Yep! I'm super powerful, I bet~" she said in a playful tone, snickering to herself. For some reason the three seemed fairly surprised by it, though Kumiko really had very little clue of what they actually were thinking. To her, it was just a lacrima or something, as she likely figured that she was just a really exceptional mage for her kind. Humble brags!

When they shifted back over to her father, Mura would ponder to what he figured would be the most crucial evidence. Poor Kumiko would still be affected by the memory that had popped up after a sudden resurgence had brought it to light. Her tail shivered at the memory of what the scent was like. A strong, metallic one but that wasn't just everything yet. She chewed the inside of her cheek (while Kyuken would hopefully not be getting too comfortable) and awaited the guildmaster's response. When he thought more, she swallowed hard. "There was another smell kinda..." she said, her ears falling flat against her head. "It was blood, but, something else was there. It was...like, uhh..." she stammered, trying to think of a good way to explain what kind of scent had been coming off of her father back during they last time she felt his arms around her. In a way, she sort of felt sad that it was like it it would be the last time for a while, and it definitely had been. But if anybody could get to the bottom of things, it was Fairy Tail! "I...don't know how to describe it. It was like something bad. Not like blood or anything. Just like rotting. Like death. Like when you leave food out for too long. Do...you think he knew I could smell it?" Kumiko asked, looking up at the floating guildmaster who would touch the ground with some words of encouragement. They were strange, asking her to try and remember the putrid smell that was with her father that one day. She wanted to throw up even just recalling them but reluctantly nodded her head after a moment or so of hesitation. But then came another request from him.

"A nap?!"

Kumiko looked up at Mura in surprise while he more or less ordered her to refrain from picking jobs on the board for the day, and instead to use it to rest up. She responded by pouting at the guildmaster. Her tail flicked in a pattern that was a bit more aggressiveness now. It remained stationary for a moment with the body creating a U-shape before being tossed to the opposie side which created the same kind of shape. "B-But I'm not even tired! I can do like 30 missions and still be ready to do more. That's no fair!" Mura gave her another head pat, the girl unable to help but lift her ears at the feeling and watch as he made his way back on the couch and quickly fall asleep. Like most her age, the girl puffed out her cheeks and would stomp over towards the couch opposite of Mura near the fireplace. She mumbled some words underneath her breath while focusing on his words before. "Gotta focus on the scent. Remember what it smelled like." She closed her eyes and did her best to remember the smell and the little intricacies of the room that were her father's study. A few minutes went by, and Kumiko would be out like a light. The child was leaning on her side in a deep asleep after her long and trecherous journey to Fairy Tail.