That evening, the remaining three of the original team had taken to exploring the island in the evening when the volcano seemed to be garnering the most magical energy as the city officials had said. And it seemed to be true, everyone could feel the difference between the amount of magic in the air from when the Sun was out and when the moon is out now. It was coming close to a full moon soon, and it seemed like the tides were raking in all the energy it could.

 

Chanyeol had taken to keeping a comforting arm around Tai’s shoulders, since she had been quiet for the rest of the day since D.O’s disappearance. She could only nod vigorously at Chanyeol’s words of reassurance that they would find the earth mage soon.

 

Suho walks towards a bushel of trees and pushes large leaves around in search of something. When Chanyeol inquires what, Suho replies, “Kyungsoo had said that he felt something different about the ground around here when we were searching, I remember.” He goes on looking for something, possibly a secret passageway. But even Chanyeol who was the most imaginative of the Fairy Tail members present doubted that there would be any special rocks that open a side door to a volcano.

 

Tai solemnly moves forward, out from under Chanyeol’s arm, and lays her hand flat against the side of the volcano. She just looks at it with furrowed eyebrows for a little while as Suho continues to rummage through leaves. Then she looks up into the night sky at the waxing moon. Reflecting back on the story Baekhyun had told her when he had utilized his power during a lunar eclipse, she wondered who else could become more powerful with the use of the moon, “Suho,” she calls.

 

The S-Class mage stops rummaging around to look up at Tai who’s looking up at the moon, “Did you find something?”

 

After shaking her head once, she asks, “What kind of magic enhances under the powers of the moon?”

 

“Well,” he starts, “That’s a very broad question. And the answer is many.” The water mage steps away from the trees and walks back towards the two near the side of the volcano, “I actually become more powerful during a full moon, because the tides and currents are a bit more under my grasp when bathed in its light. And speaking of the light side, Baekhyun finds a lot of strength in a full moon too. But there are also people who can enhance their powers from a new moon, because the dark side enhances the shadows during the night for some darker magics. And then there are power like Luhan who just pull in magic from the gravitational pull it has on us.”

 

“So maybe the magic around here is taking in energy from the moon too.” Chanyeol catches on to Tai’s thoughts.

 

Suho nods and contemplates the possible magic that could be used from a volcano to create a whirlpool powerful enough to in a strong wizard. But Tai interrupts his thoughts by saying, “Let’s go in from the mouth.”

 

“What?” Chanyeol utters.

 

“You want to go in from the vent?” Suho raises an eyebrow before looking up to the crater at the top of the volcano. It was a crazy idea because they didn’t know how active it was, or what would be down there, or how narrow the vent would be. But Fairy Tail was full of crazy, so, “Why not?” he smiles, and starts leading the climb up the side of the volcano.

 

When they finally make it up to the top of the volcano, Chanyeol leans over to sniff the air coming out of the large crater, “It smells like… sea water?”

 

Suho furrows his eyebrows and reaches his hand forward and a blue disk of magic appears over the crater of the volcano, and a faint rumble is audible to the three even from far above at the top. The water mage waves away the magical disk and hums thoughtfully, “Well, what do you know?”

 

“Let’s go in.” Tai advances.

 

“Tai wait, we don’t know what we’re goin—“ Tai doesn’t even listen to Suho’s warning as she steps up to the edge of the crater and scales down vent with blindingly hasty steps.

 

“Are we sure that she’s not a wizard?” Chanyeol asks lightly before following her down the vent, sliding down the summit with a hand on the side, ready to grab onto a jagged edge to catch himself. Suho sighs before doing the same. The boys meet Tai hundreds of meters down where she’s found solid ground to stand on.

 

The Chi blocker leads the way through, touching the walls as if searching for a clue for D.O. When she stops, she finds a small tunnel at the bottom of a corner of the cave they’re in. Bending down, she voices that she thinks they should go through to see what’s on the other end. And once again, ignoring the protests of the others, she slithers into the confined hole and disappears.

 

Being an acrobat, she’s used to squeezing and bending in compromising situations, unlike her two partners who struggle to squeeze through behind her. Tai obviously makes it through to the other end of the tunnel and she’s surprised by the brightness on the other side when she crawls out. She stands up and sees a pool of fresh water reflecting off of the walls of the cave from the moonlight. The crater is directly above the pool of water, and she can see that the bright moon is in perfect line with the vent of the volcano.

 

Hearing a soft clatter of rocks, Tai ducks between the large rocks just as several figures appear from another larger tunnel of the cave on the other side of the pool. The one in the middle is obviously the most gruesome of the three. His skin is ragged and cracked as if he’s part of the volcano himself, especially considering the cracks in his skin glow a bright orange as if there’s live magma boiling inside his body. The other two just seem to be his cronies, regular humans dressed in black jumpsuit uniforms, walking three steps behind him at all times. A man and a woman.

 

The volcano man holds his arms straight out, and the two followers pull the thick leathery-looking coat that reaches the ground off of him, revealing the rest of his cracked volcanic body. His skin is a gravelly sand color and the lines the crack all around his body shine with hot orange. Somehow, the trunks he’s wearing seem to be made of the same leathery material as the coat that can withstand the figure’s heat stay on.

 

Suddenly, the shining blue water in the pool starts shimmering even more, even radiating a faint purple color. Tai gazes up and sees that the moon is now completely aligned with the crater of the volcano and is causing this great surge of magic to happen within the island. But when she hears the loud splash from the cave floor, her eyes flash back to the pool within the volcano. The image before her sends her into a shock as she almost gasps aloud had Chanyeol’s hand not clapped against in time.

 

Tai’s frantic eyes shoot from Chanyeol and Suho who are holding her still to the monster in the pool who has turned the crystal blue water into a bright orange magma underneath the moonlight. Chanyeol nods understandingly but gestures for the girl to calm down while Suho watches the scene with immense focus, trying to deduct the process that’s happening between the moon and the magic that’s emanating from the volcano man. As the pool and the cave seem to grow hotter, the entire volcano seems to start rumbling. For the next ten minutes that the moon seems to stay in perfect alignment with the volcano crater, the Fairy Tail mages break out in sweat, practically drenching their clothes without having moved at all.

 

When, finally, the molten man seems to cool down and the moon moves out of the line of the crater, and the pool of magma dissolves back into the crystal blue water it had once been earlier, he hoists himself out of the pool and the helpers cover him with the coat again. “Still not yet, my lord?” the woman asks.

 

“It seems it might require another full moon for our plans to carry out perfectly.” He grumbles in a rumbling, gravelly voice, one that reminds Tai of an incoming earthquake.

 

“My lord,” the man steps forward before deciding to step back again, “You may not have enough time for another moon cycle. The mage we have captured for you will not hold out for that long without sustenance.”

 

Tai starts wriggling in Chanyeol’s hold at the sound of what could be D.O, but the dragon slayer keeps her under control and quiet, hoping that it’s enough to not be noticed.

 

“So provide it for him, in whichever way you must. I will not have anything going awry.” The volcanic man gruffly orders, looking up through the crater at the moon.

 

“But lord, if the mage continues to live, he might cause problems within the plan due to his unpredictably rebellious behavior.” The man replies.

 

“Well we’ll just have to deal with that then.” The volcanic leader ends the subject and walks out of the cave the way they came.

 

The Fairy Tail mages stay still for a good three minutes after their suspects have left before letting Tai go. Tai scrambles to her knees, clutching onto Chanyeol’s shirt, “You heard them! They have Dyo oppa! We have to follow them now!” she jumps to her feet, cartwheeling over the rocks they’ve been hiding behind to chase after the culprits who had taken D.O, but before the other mages can run after her, Tai runs into solid earth.

 

Grunting and pounding at the walls of the cave, she touches around in search of the tunnel the others had come through, but it seems to have disappeared behind them. Chanyeol stops her before she can start screaming and getting caught. The Chi blocker is still slippery with sweat, but Chanyeol manages to keep her still after a while, “Tai, Tai, Tai! Hold on!” he shouts at her for the first time and Tai stops, panting with new beads of sweat falling down her temples, “This isn’t a battle you can fight like others. You saw that guy. He’s like a volcano himself. You can’t touch him.”

 

“But I can stop his workers! If he has no help, he can’t do anything else!” she protests.

 

“Even if you do, how are we going to find Kyungsoo?” Suho interrupts from his position kneeling beside the pool of crystal water, “You heard them say they would have to wait another full moon cycle. They’ve been preparing for this for a long time. That must mean they’ve got a pretty efficient process set up for this plan they’re conjuring. We have to be careful around them. They have a strategy, so we’ll need one too.”

 

Tai looks down quietly before pulling her wrists away from Chanyeol’s grip, “Fine.” She mumbles.

 

“The sooner we act, the better.” Chanyeol continues, pulling Tai underneath his arm affectionately yet again, “They said that they’re almost ready, but they still have to wait. So we have time. And if we stop them while they’re still working on it, we’ll be good.”

 

“I’m not so sure about the time option…” Suho remarks, dipping his hand into the pool and sweeping it to the side, causing ripples to form in the water. “They said they needed another full moon. And tonight isn’t actually a full moon, although it might look that way.” The water mage looks up into the sky through the vent in the volcano, “The full moon is going to be tomorrow, and I’m afraid that they might be ready to strike.”

 

“Strike in what way?” Chanyeol asks.

 

“They’re going to reactivate the volcano.”

 

 

 

 

After Suho’s cheerful deduction of their miscreant’s aims, the three try to find a way to wherever the three had gone through. “It seems that one of them must have been an earth mage. They can create and close tunnels if they have the right technique or enough knowledge of the geography.” He guesses.

 

“If only Dyo was here…” Tai sighs, and Chanyeol squeezes her shoulder comfortingly.

 

“Well if there’s a way through the earth, maybe there’s a way through the water too? Suho hyung?” Chanyeol tries.

 

“Wouldn’t that just lead us somewhere outside of the island?” Suho tilts his head to the side in thought.

 

“Better than nothing. We’re not going to be able to find a way out otherwise.” Chanyeol brings up.

 

Suho nods in agreement. Stepping forward towards the pool again, he holds his arms out, “Hold onto me.” When each Fairy Tail member has a latch his hands, they jump together into the pool. Except there isn’t a big splash, and no one gets wet, because when they jump in, the water dips when they’re deep enough, a sphere of air closes around them. Suho then lets go of the others and directs the air bubble down deeper. Even though they’re not in the water, they can still feel the pressure of being below sea level.

 

The water mage directs their air bubble down the earth formed tunnel while Chanyeol provides light from the flames in his hand. If she wasn’t so worried about Dyo, Tai would have been totally stoked to relish in the experience of lighting a fire underwater. As they plunge deeper, they finally reach an end to the pool. Chanyeol’s flame illuminates a fork in the tunnel, and Suho sticks his hand out of the air bubble to feel the currents on either end, “This way leads back out into the ocean.” He deduces for the left tunnel.

 

“So what’s on this side?” Chanyeol asks, nodding toward the other tunnel.

 

“We’re going to find out.” Suho announces as he moves their air bubble into the right tunnel. They travel in a darker enclosed space for a while before it narrows. “Stick together, hold onto the person in front of you.” And Chanyeol immediately places his free hand on Suho’s shoulder while Tai holds onto Chanyeol’s shoulders.

 

Soon, they start crawling as the tunnel grows even smaller and Suho’s air bubble has to stretch into a long caterpillar shape in order to keep covering his friends. But then, there’s a crash from somewhere deeper under the volcano, and the earth starts shaking. The Fairy Tail members are thrown back and forth between the sides of the small tunnel and the connection is severed. Chanyeol’s fire goes out and the air bubble disappears. Tai holds her breath and tries swimming forward to grasp onto Chanyeol again, but she can’t feel anything no matter how far she reaches.

 

The tunnel is extremely narrow now, and she has to wriggle through like a slug to move any more forward. She was running out of breath. She wasn’t a wizard, so she had no magic that helped her breath in whatever circumstances she was in like the others. She was running out of time. This can’t be the end, can it? Not without seeing D.O safe, it can’t be. With all her strength, she kicks forward for what feels like minutes but she can’t see to find the end of the tunnel.

 

But a current suddenly pulls her forward with a force she can’t fight, and she emerges out of a small hole in the ground like a geyser and collapses into Suho’s arms, coughing and spluttering for air. Everyone is dripping wet but Chanyeol is holding up new flames to light up the small area they’ve managed to pop out of, and the heat is so radiant that Tai can feel herself drying up already. “You’re okay, right?” Suho asks just to be sure.

 

Tai nods as she continues coughing. When she regains her breath, Chanyeol leads the way through the space that grows wider and brighter as they get closer to what feels like the heart of the volcano. The farther they go, the dimmer Chanyeol makes his fire. Until finally, they reach a wall. They can’t go through it, but there is undoubtedly activity teeming on the other side. Chanyeol presses his ear against the earth and uses his heightened dragon slayer senses to listen to what’s going on just beyond them.

 

His eyes widen, “D.O got out!” he shouts in a whisper.

 

“What? Really!?” Tai whispers back.

 

“I think so. They’re saying ‘hurry and retrieve the earth wizard’ and it sounds kind of frantic.” He deciphers with a smile, “I knew D.O wouldn’t take crap from anyone.”

 

“That’s Kyungsoo for you.” Suho nods in agreement, “Is it crazy enough for us to break in and win?”

 

“Let’s find out.” Chanyeol smiles smugly before sending a flaming fist into the rock wall and breaking a huge hole into it. “D.O!” he shouts immediately when he sees the earth mage.

 

Tai pushes the two boys in before jumping into what looks like a lair made entirely of rocks. There are some computers here and there checking the seismic activity and temperatures of the area, but other than that, it’s all eroded rock around them, and D.O seems to be using that to his advantage. He raises his arms and s them forward, sending moving waves of rock towards the molten man they had seen at first.

 

The rock slides smash right into the hot rock man, but it only seems to have the effect of water splashing on him instead of doing any damage. He doesn’t say anything, but merely stands there with his rocky arms crossed, waiting for D.O’s next attack. D.O lets out a roar as he runs forward to jump and land solidly on his two feet to slam his clapped hands onto the ground towards the molten man. The very room starts shaking in his rage. Cracks in the ground appear and the line makes straight for his target, but it stops just in front of his feet. “You have made yourself useful after all, mage.” The gravelly voice scrapes out of his throat.

 

D.O stands up with an angry but confused look on his face before he realizes that the area beneath the volcano is shaking even more uncontrollably than before. “Dyo!” Tai screams as she runs to him.

 

“Tai!” Suho shouts in warning.

 

“Tai!” D.O shouts in shocked relief as the girl comes crashing into his arms and pushing him to the side to avoid the large chunk of rock that had somehow lodged its way out of the ceiling. It didn’t look like it just naturally fell either.

 

They’re both on the ground and another large rock starts to dislodge from the ceiling, but Chanyeol throws a ball of fire at suspicious cohort who seems to be controlling the rock that will lead to his comrades’ destruction. But just as the henchman falls to the ground with a shout, so does the large rock. In a swift sweep of his arm, D.O swings over to land on top of Tai, creating a barrier of earth above them to protect them from the crash landing. He steadies his hands on either side of Tai’s head to keep his bridge stabilized.

 

“Dyo.” Tai gasps as she clasps her arms around the earth mage’s torso.

 

“I got you.” He whispers as he stealthily moves his arm back, making the bridge disappear back into the earth as quickly as it had appeared. He picks her up and uses a jut of earth to boost the two of them over to where Suho and Chanyeol are. “We have to get out,” the earth mage orders, “We can’t stop the eruption from the inside anymore.”

 

“Are you saying…” Suho looks at D.O with anxiously worried eyes.

 

“Yes, young Fairy Tail wizards.” The molten man cackles from his trembling stage in the center of the room, “Your earth mage friend was powerful enough in his escape to create enough tectonic activity to reactivate this volcano. And now its power will be mine.”

 

“You reactivated a volcano?” Tai looks at D.O with large eyes mixed with both fear and admiration.

 

“Let’s get out of here. Now!” Suho yells, but just then Chanyeol steps forward hissing fire.

 

Flames erupt from his fists and he seems to be steaming, “No one steals my friend away from us.” He growls before taking a large breath so deep that it seems to expand his very stomach before he roars out, “Roar of the Flame Dragon!”

 

Tai’s eyes grow larger than they ever have before and she feels that she dried out through one loud gasp when she feels the powerful heated aura around Chanyeol. The dragon slayer is radiating magic so strong that she never thought she would be able to stand near without getting hurt. His very presence screams power. Fire power.

 

“Chanyeol no!” D.O shouts, reaching to grab his friend’s shoulder. But he’s too slow, and the room is engulfed in flames, and yet, the cackling is still loud and clear.

 

“He’s immune to fire and earth! We have to get out of here right now! We can only stop it from the outside!” D.O orders before pulling Chanyeol and Tai out of the room through their hole in the wall, Suho following right behind.  Somehow he creates a clear path for them like the molten man’s henchmen had done for him and it’s a quick trip before they’re right underneath the crater of the volcano. “Suho hyung!”

 

“Get on!” Suho creates a water bubble for them to hop into without hesitation, and they all jump in just as quickly. Tai makes sure to take a deep breath before hopping into the water bubble. When the four are safely inside, Suho levitates the large bubble up into the air and out of the volcano. They continue flying until a small burst rumbles from the volcano, knocking the sealed water bubble down into the ocean below them.

 

It takes a few seconds for Tai to regain her balance and muscle from the large splash, but she has to reassure her friends that she’s fine, she kicks towards land with the fastest she knows. The next time she pops out of the water, she’s only a few meters from the shore, and she turns to see her friends swimming in her direction as well. She dips back underneath and races back to the shore and stumbles onto the beach and coughs out the water from her lungs and she waits for the rest of her comrades to catch up.

 

Although everyone is panting from the fall into the ocean, Suho is still the most oriented, so he gets back to the problem at hand, “Kyungsoo, did you get any information while you were in there?” he interrogates immediately, waving his hands over his friends’ clothes to remove the water from them. Tai suddenly doesn’t feel a drop of water sticking to her body or clothing. Chanyeol on the other hand, just bursts his entire body into flames, and within seconds, he’s dry. Tai can’t keep her eyes from widening at the power he still radiates from his smoldering eyes.

 

“He goes by Magma. He’s an earth wizard too, but he specializes in controlling the molten rock like in volcanoes. He probably plans on destroying the island and creating a new one for him to rule.” D.O summarizes.

 

“Then why does he need other earth wizards as his cohorts? And why does he need the power from the full moon in that pool of water at the base of the volcano?” Suho continues.

 

“Probably gathering more energy to control the volcano when it was strong enough to erupt, which I guess his henchmen weren’t powerful enough to do and he wouldn’t be able to do it without losing a great amount of his own power to control the volcano afterwards.” D.O infers. “His entire body has been molded to some sort of earth material, so I have no effect on him, and neither does Chanyeol because he’s good with heat.”

 

“So it’s up to Suho oppa…” Tai deduces.

 

“Hyung, I can hold down the fort to try and slow him down.” D.O offers help immediately.

 

“And I can cause an annoying distraction.” Chanyeol offers a slightly humorous proposition although his face is still more serious than Tai has ever seen him.

 

“Then it looks like we’re winging it.” Suho nods before turning to the Chi blocker, “Tai, stay safe.”

 

“Yes.” Is all Tai can say before her Fairy Tail comrades are all running off in different directions with their own jobs with their own magical powers. She sighs uselessly, looking down at her hands that are only meant to defend. What can she possibly do to try to protect her friends when all she can do is make them worry about her?

 

When she hears footsteps scraping in the sand and with a turn of her head, she spots groups and groups of Magma’s cohorts in the same black jumpsuits she had seen on those two henchmen at the moon pool. Suddenly she finds a job for herself. “Hey!” she yells at all of the men and women in black scurrying away from her towards their dingys and ships. This would be a long night.