Fairy Tail: Solid Iron

[11]

The summer's night was starting to get chilly. Still, Gajeel and Pantherlily were outside in the mountainside with only pants on and plenty of injuries littering their bodies. They had been there for several days, maybe weeks. They had lost count of the days.

"Come on, Lily! You can hold out longer!" Gajeel roared out as Pantherlily fell onto the ground back in his small form.

"Give me a second," Pantherlily panted out as he struggled to push himself up.

"Yer holdin' on pretty well. We'll head back once you transform once more."

Pantherlily nodded as he focused and transformed back to his bigger form. He and Gajeel began to do hand-to-hand combat once more.

Gajeel swung and Pantherlily blocked. They had been fighting for hours upon hours trying to lengthen Pantherlily's transformation time.

After seven seconds, Pantherlily popped back to his smaller form.

"I think that's the last of my power," Lily bit out as he stared up at the night sky.

"Yer time has increased a lot," Gajeel said as he plopped down on the ground to catch his breath.

Pantherlily flicked his tail as a response. He was now able to hold his form for seven minutes and a few seconds after resting for a few seconds.

"We should wash up once we get back, we must reek," Lily said after a minute of silence.

"Yeah, yeah," Gajeel grumbled.

The two fighters got up and headed back to Magnolia. Gajeel ended up falling asleep the moment his body touched his bed resulting in his wet hair being a tangled mess in the morning.

After Gajeel and Lily worked through his mess of hair, they walked into the guild.

"We should probably go on a job," Gajeel said as his stomach rumbled.

"Right, I wonder what my first job will be," Pantherlily said.

"Gajeel!"

Gajeel and Pantherlily turned their heads to see a blue flash rushing at them.

"Oi! Oi!" Gajeel shouted as he tried to dodge the madwoman but failed resulting in them both falling to the ground.

"Gajeel, are you okay? Do you know this woman?" Lily asked as he looked at the two.

"What's the matter with you?! Yer not exactly light, Juvia," Gajeel grumbled as he pushed her off of him.

"Gajeel! Juvia needs you and Pantherlily's help on this job! Please, Juvia needs the reward!"

"Tch, fine. Pantherlily and I were lookin' for a job anyways," Gajeel grumbled as he stood and brushed the dirt off of him.

"Thank you! Thank you! Let's go!"

"What is this job, exactly?" Pantherlily asked as Juvia stood up.

"We need to pull out a family's prized necklace from underwater," Juvia explained.

"Why do you need my help? Yer a water mage," Gajeel grumbled as they walked.

"It's under a ruined mansion in a city that got flooded. Juvia needs you two to help clear debris and lift things. Juvia isn't that strong and Juvia can't simply slice through things in case it's valuable."

"Ah, so we're just there to lift things up?" Pantherlily asked and Juvia nodded.

"Fine, how far is this place?" Gajeel asked.