Natsu's eyes turned wide, staring at the piece of paper waving gently between two pins against a noticeboard. Thick black writing twisted ornately in words which sent the Dragon Slayer weak with anticipation. "A-a-a WIZARD TOURNAMENT?!" he shouted, more than a little too excited.
Erza's sharp eyes caught onto his reaction, and quickly folded into a frown. "Natsu we are on a mission. We don't have time for that."
Even as she spoke she could tell that she was talking to thin air, as Natsu had already pulled the flyer from the board and was holding it with shaking hands, a manic grin across his face. "I can finally prove that I'm the strongest and fight my way to the top!" he told himself.
With a roll of his eyes, Gray had obvious disagreements. "You wouldn't make it past the first round," he muttered, arms folded.
"Oh yeah well I'd get further than you!" Natsu yelled, his frown deep and already making fists as the body temperature around him blazed, steaming against Gray's cool air.
"Neither of you are fighting!" Gray and Natsu were the vision of fear at Ezra's strict retort, falling to their knees obediently in front of her. She kept her frown as she continued to lecture them both. "Don't forget that this is an S-class mission, do not make me regret taking you along with me!" she snapped, holding up her own flyer detailing the S-Class mission.
"Yes Ms Ezra!" they both replied, as Erza grabbed each one of them by their collar and began to drag them away. Natsu of course was particularly disappointed. The only thing that could possibly rival the excitement of being on an S-Class mission was a contest of strength, and now he was faced with both so close to him. He let out something a cross between a sigh and a wail, looking back at the flyer. "But the reward was 5 million jewel…"
Lucy's ears were perked. 5 million jewel…. That was seventy month's rent! That had stopped her in her tracks. Although the S-Class mission would pay far more than most of the missions they had been on lately, between all four of them (five if you included Happy), the reward was no-where near in comparison, even with an equal split. With an awkward laugh she approached the question cautiously. "Do we all need to go on the mission?"
Erza stopped her march, looking back at herself slowly. Even Happy looked surprised, looking at her quizzically. "What do you mean, Lucy?"
"Well…" Lucy kicked the dirt awkwardly, hoping that her cute and girlish charms might help her win over the group – and the money. "If we know who the strongest of us is then they're the only one that really needs to stay and win! And we can manage this mission while they're gone!"
Natsu blinked. "I didn't think you'd be interested in this sort of thing."
Lucy almost jumped a mile. "I'm not going to be the strongest!" she yelped. "One of you will have to fight while we're getting the other money-uh, mission!"
Erza frowned, disliking both the money-hungry matter and the fact that she had already said no and it was being overturned. "This is an S-Class mission, that means you can't accept it without an S-class wizard." A small smile appeared on her face. "So it would be between Natsu and Gray" she told them, quietly agreeing.
Natsu jumped to his feet quicker than they could have thought possible. "Ha! Then it's no contest at all! I'm obviously stronger! And I'm going to win the whole contest!"
"In your dreams!" Gray grumbled through gritted teeth. "I'm stronger than you and you know it!"
The two disappeared into threats and a wisp of smoke made mostly of the heat and ice cold air twisting against each other, leaving the two girls and Happy watching them in dismay, instantly regretting their decision to put the two against each other. "I'm not so sure this was such a good idea anymore…" Lucy groaned.
"Aye…." Agreed Happy, as they descended into more chaos.
"Is this any way to decide? You can do better than that. We've had a long journey and the contest doesn't start until tomorrow. Come back here in two hours and we will settle this. Winner gets to fight – on behalf of Fairy Tale!"
Erza's words ran through Natsu's mind as he walked the town, his hands behind his head and lost in thought. He had told himself that he had been ready to fight, but the grumbling in his stomach told himself otherwise. A grin came to his face at the thought of it, already looking around for some tasty fire to consume. If he could take in as much fire as possible in the next two hours there would be no way that Gray would be able to compete, he realised as he already felt victorious, imagining Gray lying helpless with him standing above him with crowds adoring him. But first he had to find some fire.
Gray only watched Natsu running around, quietly confident himself. Unlike Natsu who was spurting fire and hot air everywhere he went in his mission, Gray was conserving his magical energy and physical strength. He knew it would take everything inside of him to take on his rival, and he had already used so many tricks against him it was hard to think of any new ones that may work. "Erza, Lucy, are you sure you'll be alright without me or Natsu?"
Erza gave a short sharp nod, "We will. If we're lucky we may have more time than we expected. We still have a lot of information to gather," she said, once again looking at her flyer.
Gray nodded, "I'll start seeing if anyone has seen anything about this Lacrima," he said as he turned to leave.
"Doesn't it seem strange to you?" He stopped in his tracks at Erza's voice. "This town doesn't have a guild for miles around and yet it has a wizarding tournament. At the same time that we have been sent to retrieve this new Lacrima." Her words seemed to hang in the air.