Training Begins

East Forest, Magnolia

Kingdom of Fiore

X776

Despite becoming gods, our morning begins in the same way on most days, with training. Perhaps it's because it is a habit, or maybe because we have seen what a lack of training can do to even gods, but we have never stopped training in all forms of combat. Even Morgan who barely makes use of close quarter combat joins in on the training, and this morning is no different, at least not completely. I just never had a group of children knocking on my door early in the morning to ask me for training, which is exactly how Jason and his group of friends greet me this morning. Standing outside of my doorway asking Morgan and I to begin their magical training. They have even somehow roped Gray in along with Cana.

"Do you have any idea what time it is?" I question the group of children as I stand outside of the house with nothing but shorts on.

"It's almost five, which is exactly when you start training." answers Jason.

"You have never liked training early in the morning. You always prefer sometime in the evening or at night." I remark as I cross my arms in front of my chest.

"And you were never teaching me magic early in the morning." responds Jason with a shrug as if that statement alone answers my unasked questions.

"Because you were not ready to learn magic. At least not the kind we could teach you at the time." I answer him honestly.

Neither Morgan, Scáthach, Azula or I felt comfortable teaching Jason magic from either the Nasuverse or from DC. Jason is too reckless and too eager to experiment on his own. Heck, that's exactly why I have not given him magic circuits, nor has Morgan changed his physiology to allow him to easily learn DC's magic.

Earthland's magic however is a completely different story. While it is still dangerous, the form of magic that Jason has chosen, Ice Dragon Slayer Magic, is something that we are comfortable allowing him to experiment with on his own. The worst outcome is that he becomes a dragon, which is impossible since that's his default race now, or he freezes a body part off, which any of us can regrow. Besides, with the changes Morgan and Scáthach have made to his physiology, back in DC, Jason is essentially immune to elements that burn or freeze.

"So are you gonna teach us or not?" asks a shirtless Gray from the back of the group.

Gray is a boy around Jellal's age and height with black hair, dark blue hair, and a slim build that is beginning to tone. His guild mark is blue and is located on his right pectoral. He wears nothing but his short black pants, black boots, and a silver necklace, which resembles a sword with a stone in it.

"Gray, put your shirt back on." I tell the boy while thinking about how this habit of his will quickly get old.

Looking down at his chest, Gray quickly realises that his shirt is in fact missing and begins to look all over the floor for it. From what I can remember, the reason for that habit is because his magic teacher, Ur, used to have him remove his clothes in the snow so that he could get used to cold temperatures since the magic she was teaching was Ice Make Magic, a magic that involves the creation of objects with ice.

"I will agree to train you however, there are a few rules that you will ALL abide by, including Jason." I tell them once Gray finds his shirt somewhere on the floor and puts it back on.

"Alright." agrees Jason in a heartbeat.

"I have not even told you the rules yet." I reply with a raised eyebrow.

"I already know that you won't do anything to hurt us." says Jason with a shrug.

While I find it heartwarming that he trusts me so much, I cannot help but think of all the ways someone could take advantage of his trusting nature. I will have to teach him to learn to be careful. Trust but verify.

"Very well. The first rule is that all instructions are to be obeyed." I tell them. "The second rule is to take this seriously. If you fool around then you or someone else may get hurt or worse, die." I say seriously, sobering the mood of all but one member of the group whose eyes seem to become hollow at the painful reminder, Gray.

Gray's teacher, Ur, died because of his recklessness and because he disobeyed her. His parents had died at the hands of a demon of some kind and he had sought out Ur to teach him magic for revenge. Someday while training he had heard that the demon was targeting another town and he had gone to slay it despite his teacher's orders not to, she had even threatened to disown him as a student. In the end she saved him at the expense of her own life.

"Is that it." asks Jellal, bringing me out of my thoughts.

"So far, yes." I answer as I inspect the group of children.

Had I not been there to save them from the Tower of Heaven, I would never believe that until two day ago they were slaves. Not only are they completely clean and are wearing new clothes, but the effects of their malnourishment cannot be seen thanks to an elixir Morgan gave them the previous day.

"Alright, your first instruction is to run from here to the Fairy Tail Guild Hall and back three times." I instruct them as they stare at me. "Well? What are you waiting for, an invitation?" I ask them once I realise that they are not running.

Despite my comment the children remain standing in front of me while looking confused amongst themselves.

"Get moving." I order them as I conjure a kunai and fling it at the ground near their feet.

That seems to finally spur them into action as they all take off in a sprint with Gray, Jason, and Cassandra in the lead.

"At this rate they will tire out before the warm up is even over." observes Azula as she Scáthach and Morgan emerge from the house in a tank top, sweats, and sneakers.

"Maybe not." observes Scáthach as she sees Cassandra, Sorano, Canna, a brown haired girl with brown eyes and tan skin, along with Erza slow down to a jog.

"Of course the girls would be the ones to notice." I comment while shaking my head. "Despite me never saying that it was a race, the boys simply had to make it a competition."

"What did you expect, with Jason leading them it was only a matter of time." says Morgan

"I expected better from Gray and Jason. They have both trained before." I answer.

"Gray has only trained in magic with his physical training simply being supplementary." observes Scáthach. "Jason is impulsive, hot-heated, and far too similar to Setanta for my liking." she says with a slight frown of worry, no doubt thinking back to Setanta's avoidable death.

"We can worry about the children later." comments Azula. "We have our own training to attend to." she says as she launches herself at me with a powerful roundhouse poised for the back of my head.

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"Common Gray, you can go faster than that." laughs Jason as he pumps his arms and legs as much as he can and easily blazes past Gray while also increasing the distance between him and the other children.

"Woohoo!" cheers Jason excitedly as he uses a massive tree root that sticks out of the soil as a springboard to jump and grab a tree branch. Using a maneuver that Dick taught him during his many times visiting the Wayne Manor, Jason swings from the branch into a front flip before landing on another branch, and with an agility that no child his age should possess, proceeds to jump to a higher branch. Without slowing down, Jason proceeds to leap from branch to branch until he reaches the end of the forest where he front flips back onto the ground and proceeds to sprint towards the Fairy Tail Guild Hall in Magnolia Town.

As he speeds into the still sleeping town, Jason further increases his speed into the supernatural territory and is forced to dig his heels into the ground to stop when the door to the guild hall appears in front of him sooner than he expected.

"Woah!" exclaims Jason in shock as he stops inches away from colliding with the doors.

Despite knowing that being a dragon enhances all of his physical stats, Jason underestimated how much faster he has become. His speed also isn't the only thing he's underestimated. During the past days he has been struggling with his strength and breaking things accidentally. It isn't that he has lost complete control of his strength, rather he has control up to a certain level of strength. He can carry simple things like a glass of water, or opening a door just fine. However, once he reaches tasks that a normal nine year old should not be able to do, he loses control of his strength since he has no idea where his upper limit is.

So deep in thought is Jason, that he fails to notice Gray approaching him from behind until he is next to him.

"Hey." says Gray as he taps Jason on the shoulder.

"You finally caught up." replies Jason with a grin once he notices Gray's presence.

"Yea, well I'm gonna beat you back." says Gray as he begins to sprint back to the Malphas house in East Forest.

"Hey!" complains Jason as he takes off after Gray and easily catches up to him. "That was cheating." he says as he easily passes Gray by, prompting Gray to try harder to catch up to him.

While Jason runs back towards the forest, he passes by Jellal and Erik on their way to the guild hall and sees Cassandra, Erza, Sorano, and Cana jogging their way out of the forest.

"You're all so slow." says Jason as they jog towards him.

"Pacing." answers Cassandra with a barely visible smug smile that makes Jason feel as if he is forgetting something.

Before Jason can further contemplate Cassandra's words, the sound of trees crashing down can be heard before Azula crashes through a tree on her way flying uncontrollably out of the forest. As her body exits the forest, Azula flips her body so that she lands on her feet and digs her fingers into the ground to slow her momentum.

"Fine, you want to play like that?" says Azula does a series of circular motions with her arms that generate lightning before she points her two fingers towards the forest and sends lightning flying in.

As the lightning bolt flies into the forest, the trees catch on fire that begins to quickly spread, and catches the attention of all the children.

"Oh." whispers Azula as she notices what she has caused.

"Azula!" roars Scáthach from within the forest as a torrential wave of ice spreads over the forest and quickly extinguishes the flames.

With Scáthach and the other adults walking out of the forest, the children can see that Scáthach is the cause of the wave of ice by the lingering frost on her arms.

"That was reckless." says Scáthach as she points to the forest. "You could have burned down the entire forest."

"My apologies, but I believe that you started it all." answers Azula as she nonchalantly inspects her nails, a habit that she has taken to doing whenever she feels embarrassed about her actions.

"I started it?" demands Scáthach with a raised eyebrow.

"Both of you are at fault." interrupts Morgan before Azula can answer. "This was meant to be a spar with absolutely no magic." she says. "Scáthach should not have conjured that spear of ice and used it to send you flying, and Azula shouldn't have lost herself in the moment to resort to using lightning."

"I say that our spar is over." says Ambrosius as he goes about melting the ice into water before evaporating it, leaving behind a damaged forest that Morgan easily fixes with a magical spell that comes from an emerald magic circle.

"Since our training ended prematurely, we may as well train the children." suggests Ambrosius as he turns towards the bystanding children.

"Very well." agrees Scáthach while Morgan and Azula simply nod in agreement.

"Come along children, it's training time." says Azula with a smile that sends a chill down their spine.

Without a word, the group of children follow behind the adults as they walk back towards the clearing where the house is located. Once there, the children cannot help but notice the massive amount of damage that was caused to the forest during the adult's spar, causing them to wonder how strong can the adults really be.

"Take a seat on the ground." orders Ambrosius as Morgan fixes the damage and Ambrosius creates seats for the adults out of the earth. "Scáthach, Morgan, Azula and I discussed how to train you and we have come to a decision." informs Ambrosius as they take a seat on their makeshift chairs. "Each one of us is going to teach you something as a group while also breaking the group down based on your specialties to mentor you." he says before pausing to make sure that his words sink in. "Azula will teach you unarmed combat, Morgan will teach magical theory, Scáthach will teach weaponry, and I will teach you how to implement everything you learn in the most effective ways for combat." he says before pausing once again. "When it comes to specialties, Azula will be teaching mind and elemental magic, for example illusions or mind reading or fire, Morgan will teach enchantment along with advanced forms for any type of magic you use, therefore her second class is mandatory, Scáthach will also teach elemental magic and how to apply letter magic as a main form of combat, and I will teach how to use Letter Magic as a secondary form of combat. Any questions?" he asks.

"What's the difference between elemental magic from Azula and the one from Scáthach?" asks Gray.

"Scáthach will teach elemental magic in close quarter combat and molding magic while Azula will teach mid-range and long-range combat using elemental magic." answers Ambrosius as Scáthach creates a spear along with the Fairy Tail mark out of ice and fire while Azula shoots a fireball into the sky along with ice spikes.

Satisfied with the answer, Gray simply nods his head before falling silent.

"What if we don't use any of those magic?" asks Cana worriedly as she shows Ambrosius a pack of cards.

"Morgan knows every form of magic, so you will be going to her for that. And if you don't know what magic is best for you, we will figure it out." answers Ambrosius with a gentle smile that puts her at ease.

Before anyone else can ask anymore questions, a scream can be heard as an arrow impales itself an inch away from Ambrosius' foot.

"Azula!" calls out Mordred's voice from the sky, prompting everyone to look at the direction it came from.

There, flying towards the group at an extremely fast pace with a bow and arrow in her hands is none other than a fully armored Mordred. Releasing another arrow that grazes Ambrosius by the cheek, Mordred requips her bow and arrow for the sword Morgan and Ambrosius forged for her, Veterum, meaning chivalry in latin. As she reaches close enough to Azula, Mordred swings her sword towards her head with a scowl on her face.

"Mordred, what is the meaning of this?" questions Azula as she easily dodges the sword swing.

"You!" exclaims Mordred as she points at Azula. "Just minutes ago the Rune Knights received a report of a group of people destroying the East Forest so naturally I was sent to investigate. So imagine my lack of surprise when I see you sending a lightning bolt into the forest." explains Mordred as she lunges once again at Azula. "Do you have ANY IDEA the amount of paperwork you created for me just by getting reported?" questions Mordred as she and Azula exchange a few blows that don't even worry Ambrosius, Morgan, or Scáthach while the children watch them in awe, and a particular redhead even begins to idolise Mordred.

"I'm already swamped with paperwork because of that stupid Cult of Zeref, and now I have to file a report that explains what I found destroying the East Forest. Heck, I might even have to arrest you, and that's another set of paperwork that I'll have to file." rants Mordred. "I didn't join the Rune Knights to be filing paperwork because you four can't stop destroying things!" she exclaims as she kicks Azula through a tree, a blow that Azula allowed to connect as an apology.

"Now, I'm going back to headquarters and I'm going to say that you four were just building a damn house." says Mordred as she returns her sword back to her requip space. "In exchange, you four will make sure that I'm never called because of you." she says as she glares at her mother and father.

"Or else what?" teasingly asks Azula as she dusts herself off.

Rather than answer her verbally, Mordred summons countless weapons from her requip space in a manner far too reminiscent of a certain golden archer for Ambrosius' comfort and causing the stars in Erza's eyes to grow even more.

"Wow, you're all grown up now." says Azula as she raises her hands in a placating manner.

Seeing Azula's action Mordred returns her weapons to her requip space and gives the group one more glare before launching herself into the sky and leaving a lingering silence. As the group watches her fly away, Erza walks towards Ambrosius and pulls his hand, causing him to look down towards.

"Yes?" he asks even as his instincts tell him exactly what she is going to ask.

"I want to learn that from her." answers Erza with stars in her eyes.

As Ambrosius promises her that he will have Mordred mentor her, he cannot help but quietly say a prayer for all of the future trouble makers of Fairy Tail. Meanwhile, not far from the duo, Jason, Jellal, Gray, and more children throughout Earthland cannot help but shiver as an ominous chill goes down their back.

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AN: Another chapter down, and the kids have begun their training and Erza has found herself an idol. As for who could have possibly called the rune knights on them, those who have watched Fairy Tail should know easily. She's old, lives in the East Forest, is Fairy Tail's main go to medic, and she claims that she 'hates' humans. For those of you who don't know, don't worry because she'll show up eventually in the story.