The Celestial Spirit World

Project P: Lucy's POV

Magnolia, 10:31 PM, Lucy's POV

"Ugh! I am sooooo bored!" I complained to my best friend Levy. She slammed the thick tome she was reading shut.

"I knoooowww! I'm all out of new stories to read!"

"I'd go shopping, but there's nowhere to gooooooo!"

"Why are we saying so much 'ooooooooo's', and ow! I just stubbed my tooooooooeee!" Levy hopped around in pain. 

"Anyways Lu-chan, why can't you summon up some spirits to tell us a story? I bet they've seen it all."

"I've thought of that before..." I tapped my chin thoughtfully. "But Horologium and Plue are terrible storytellers, and it takes up too much magic to summon the Zodiacs." Just then, Cancer popped out of nowhere. 

"Ba ba ba ba, BAAAAAA!!" He sang his theme music. "Lucy, have you forgotten that we can summon ourselves?"

"No, but Cancer, have you forgotten that it's rude to eavesdrop on private conversations?" He adjusted his sunglasses. 

"It wasn't my fault, alright? Babe, I was just coming to remind you that I haven't cut your hair in a long time, but then I heard your conversation and decided to pause a minute. 'Cause you know that's important for barbers to know all the grub right? It wasn't my purpose to tell Capricorn what I was doing, or to move aside for Taurus, or let Virgo stand on top of me, or-"

"Oh Mavis." I groaned. "Do it Levy." Levy took out her pen and wrote 'open' on the place where Cancer was standing. 

"Solid Script open!" She barely had time to dodge out of the way as an avalanche of spirits tumbled down through a portal. There were curses and groans as a mound of Zodiacs formed a mountain high enough to rival Altana. 

"Seriously?" I asked. 

"Great timing I guess..." Levy shrugs. "They probably heard the part abut the story and all, so just let 'em rip!"

"Yeah!" Gemini chorused. "We know a lot of stories. Do want funny, romantic, moving-" 

"Funny." We both automatically said. "Besides," I added. "Romantic probably just consists of Scorpio and Aquarius."

"Okay." Mini floated onto the lamp. "Once, Taurus was walking down the road, and then Libra waved at him frantically while shouting. Since Taurus had that huge bell around his neck-"

"Next." Taurus grumbled. 

"Okay. Once, Loke was running a race, and-"

"Skip." Loke blushed. 

"Okay. Once, Aquarius was going to ma-" Icy water flew forwards.

"NO WAY ARE YOU TELLING THAT ONE!"

"Come on! Those were the best ones!" Gemi sobbed. 

"Okay." Virgo untangled herself. "Once, Gemi and Mini were flying down the street together-"

"NONONONONONONONONO!" The twins shrieked. 

"AND THEN, THEY RAN INTO SCORPIO AND AQUARIUS MAKING OUT. You can probably guess that they were more than a little pissed, so they gave chase. Those two were so busy looking back that they didn't see what was in front of them. Then, they flew into a pole."

"Wai..." Gemini sobbed while the others laughed. Just then, a clap of thunder reverberated throughout the room.

"VIRGO AND TAURUS!!!!! HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN YOUR SHIFT FOR PROJECT P?!?!?!" It sounded like the Celestial Spirit King.

"No sir," Virgo answered calmly. "We're at the princess'." 

"Oh. Alright then." The thunder stopped.

"What's 'Project P'?" Levy inquired immediately.

"Idiot." Capricorn muttered. "Has he forgotten that it's supposed to be a secret? Well, since you've already heard of it, there's no use in keeping it from you guys right?"

"Alright." Loke sat down. "Project P concerns the absence of the 13th Golden Spirit."

"The 13th Golden Spirit?" I asked. "But I've never heard of such a thing! It's not even in the old texts."

"I doubt you would. The 13th spirit is both the weakest and the strongest Zodiac spirit. So powerful, in fact, that he doesn't have a key."

"Well?" Levy leaned forwards. "Don't leave us hanging! Tell us who it is!"

"The Winged Horse," Capricorn answered. "Pegasus. In the old days, Pegasus was a normal Zodiac, with no defining magic powers. He didn't even have wings as he does today. He practiced Arcana, a magic that utilized raw power for it's base. But the one thing that Pegasus was known for was his wits and ambition. He wanted to become the most powerful Celestial Spirit. So he began to trick the 12 other spirits, one by one, into giving him a bit of their magic. Some, he challenged to a fight. The strongest, he outwitted. When he obtained all of our magic, he fashioned feathers out of each magic. Using those feathers, he created wings."

"Wait." I interrupted. "Are you saying that Pegasus can use all Zodiac Magic?"

"Exactly. Which is why Pegasus is so powerful. He can single-hoofedly perform certain actions that take the 12 of us to do. For example, if you had his key during the Eclipse Gate incident, you would've just needed to summon him, and he would've closed it by himself."

"That's too hard to wrap your mind around!" Levy frowned. "How could a spirit like him even exist? Even the Spirit King would have trouble defeating him!"

"Yeah." Loke muttered. "When we all found out what he had done, it was too late. The Spirit King was furious at him, but he couldn't do anything because he hadn't broken any major laws. The Old Man was worried that the humans would try to use Pegasus as a gateway into the Celestial World."

"You see, Celestial clothing keeps you alive temporarily since the material is infused with Zodiac Magic." Virgo picked up. "But if a human wears it, the magic is eventually drained out, and it loses that ability. However, Pegasus had the ability to fly through dimensions with that kind of power. If he gave one of his feathers to a human, the recipient would be able to stay alive in the Spirit World forever, since the feather is pure magic itself. Therefore, this ability put the entire Spirit World in danger. The King solved this problem by destroying his key, and implanting a tracking lacrima inside the spirit."

"But how is he the weakest spirit then?"

"If a spirit can't do anything, it's will to live goes away." Aquarius said exasperatedly. "Pegasus had all that power but his lack of will restricted what he could do with it. It didn't really come as a surprise when he disappeared."

"Ooof course yoooou can guess that the oooold man was desperate. We knew that he couldn't have gone anywhere, but that didn't stop him from wooorying."

"And that's how Project P started."