"So, are you going to sing tonight during your evening performance?" Rekea asked with a slight smile on his face.
"No, currently, I don't plan to. While I do love playing music, I don't think I like having many people listening to me sing. Just having Hisui and you listening to me was enough." Jax said with a smile as he walked down the stage where the piano was located.
"Well, we won't bother you anymore. We were planning on going to the pool before lunch, and we only made a brief stop to see whether I could sing well," Jax said while smiling. He took Hisui's hand before leaving behind a young woman laughing when she saw the two youngsters hold hands so quickly and familiarly.
She then went towards the stage as she also started to practise her singing. After hearing Jax sing, she felt like she had some inspiration, and she planned on improving herself with it.
As Jax and Hisui walked hand in hand towards the pool, Jax couldn't help smiling at the memory of Hisui being in a daze after hearing him play a song. He turned towards the princess with a smile and walked calmly while holding her hand. When Jax had held her hand, he just wanted to bring her out of the room. However, since then, she grabbed his hand, and he eventually just accepted being pulled by her.
As they arrived at the ever so silent pool, Jax and Hisui changed into their swimsuits and went to play in the pool. Since Jax hadn't brought a swimsuit with him, as he hadn't planned on using it on his job, he simply bougnt one. They played together until it was time for lunch, where they dried off thanks to his fire and wind magic, which made a dry wind dry their clothes. They then played together in the afternoon, and in the evening, Jax played the piano once again without singing before going to sleep.
The next morning, Jax managed to increase his air magic and once again made a breakthrough. And finally, on the seventh morning, he made yet another breakthrough in his nature magic, allowing him to install the second pearl in his fourth magic.
At midday on the seventh day, it had been a week they stayed in the castle, and it was about time they went back to the guild. Not only did they have to report, but Gildarts wanted to start another job soon. He was a complete workaholic. As Gildarts said his goodbyes to the king and miss Robin, Jax said his goodbye to Hisui, who had a few tears coming out of her eyes.
"Come back visit soon, alright? Take this. With this, you can come to the castle whenever you want, and the guards will let you enter. However, be sure not to lose it, alright?" Asked Hisui as she gave him a piece of wood with the crest of the royal family. There was a magic inside of it that made it impossible to copy.
"Alright, I'll be sure to come and visit sometime in the future." Answered Jax as he hugged her.
After a few more words, Jax and Hisui went to the king, where Jax thanked him for his hospitality. As he shook his hand, he felt the king give him a piece of paper discreetly. Without changing his expression, Jax took the piece of paper and fluently put his hand in his pocket afterwards, hiding the piece of paper from the view of everyone.
As they said their goodbyes, Jax and Gildarts went towards the gate. Jax took the opportunity to take the piece of paper and take a look at the content of it.
'The 25th of June is the birthday of Hisui. I give you an invitation in advance. Be sure to be there, and you are welcome to the castle any time you want.' Giving a quick look at the invitation, Jax smiled and took back the paper piece before turning around and waving goodbye at Hisui while providing a discreet nod to the king, who smiled in return.
"So, what was that last piece of paper the king gave you?" Asked Gildarts as they both left the castle.
"Of course you saw it. How could I believe you would miss that?" Jax laughed before showing him the piece of paper.
"Oh? The king invites you to the birthday party of the little princess. It seems he likes you quite a bit. I bet that in the future, whenever there is a job from the royal family, they will ask you directly." Gildarts laughed while the two of them made their way back to Fairy Tail through the train.
A few hours later, Jax and Gildarts had both gotten down the train in Magnolia, and as they both made their way towards Fairy Tail, Gildarts crushed a few houses and shops with his magic unintentionally. It made one confused at how he could be so strong but have so little control over his magic.
As they arrived in front of the guild a dozen minutes later and after exploding over three houses and two shops, Jax stepped once again into the guild he hadn't seen for over two weeks.
He then went with Gildarts to the master to confirm the success of the job.
"So, everything went well?" Asked the master as he eyed the two members who came back from an S-rank job.
"Yeah, no problem except for the last fight where Jax took a whole fireball right in the face!" Gildarts finished the sentence, almost shouting as everyone started laughing at Jax's expanse.
"Oh? And why didn't you dodge it, Jax? I'm sure you knew and now know if you didn't know that a fireball in the face hurts." Said the master while chuckling slightly.
"I wouldn't have had to take that fireball in the face if mister here wasn't too focused on the ass of the ladies in the stadium to notice the twenty-one A-rank mages and three S-rank mages attacking me while I had to protect the target of our mission alone," Jax answered back towards Gildarts who stopped laughing as if he had eaten a fly. After all, it was true that he had been looking at the ladies' asses, but it hadn't slowed him down.
However, Gildarts wasn't ready to admit defeat as he turned to Jax and shouted: "Do you want me to say how you spent your week in the royal palace?"
While Jax had played with the princess, it was typical for his age. However, due to the way he acted in the guildhall, it was utterly beside his character.
"Oh? And do you want me to tell what you did with the king?" Jax asked back while smiling evilly. After all, the two of them had spied on the woman's bath in the city after having drunk too much.
Once again, Gildarts erased his smile from his face as he didn't mind being seen as a drunkard since he loved to drink. However, at that time, he had drunk too much and didn't want to be seen as a pervert.
"Fine, fine. You win. Jax had to take the fireball in the face, or the target of our protection would have died. He alone took care and put down all 21 A-rank dark mages and an S-rank mage while protecting a normal civilian. His seemingly infinite magical power due to his ten different kinds of magic, all having their magical reservoir, is a cheat. He only needs to throw spells after spells at his target while they can't even defend due to the limit of their magical power." Gildarts finished with a sigh.
Not only was the master, but even the other mages in the guild seemed pleasantly surprised at Jax's record, who took down not only a large number of A-rank mage but also an S-rank mage.
"Alright, alright. Everyone go back to whatever you were doing. Jax, go and relax a bit. It's been a while since you've been gone. We also received a large payment in the guild for you. Now that I guess, it must have been the payment for the mages you captured and took down." The master said while turning his attention to Gildarts.
"Alright, master." Answered Jax as he moved to the counter of the bar to eat. However, just as he was about to start eating, he saw a young girl with brown hair and eyes at a guild table.
Jax then took his plate and glass before going to the table of the new girl he had never seen in the guild. He sat in front of the quiet girl wearing a short orange dress and looked at her before asking: "Are you here alone?"
Upon noticing a nod from the quiet girl, Jax continued: "Have you eaten yet?"
"No. I don't have any money, and they will give some food at the church later." She said in a small voice, which Jax could only hear thanks to his sound magic.
Jax lifted a hand towards the bar as the worker came with a menu he took and gave to the young girl in front of him. The brown-haired girl seemed a little anxious as she received the menu from Jax.
"Is there something wrong?" Asked Jax as he eyed the girl.
"I don't have any money." She said a little louder so that Jax could hear her without the need of his sound magic.
"Oh, that's alright. I'll pay for you." He said upon which he received a questioning glance from the girl. "Isn't it better to eat with someone else than alone? If you're not going to choose, I'll choose for you." As he said the last sentence, the last trace of hesitation from the girl disappeared as she chose what she wanted to eat, and the worker smiled gently before leaving towards the kitchen.
Jax, who had simply taken a sandwich and an apple juice from the kitchen, waited for the new girl's food to be served before starting to eat. There was a reason why he came closer to the girl. He saw from her the feeling of being lost and not knowing what to do. While it wasn't very present in the girl, Jax could still feel a bit compassionate since he used to be this way after being released from that torture room. Besides, if he were right, she would be a new guild member. Currently of his age, there was only Laxus. With her, at least, he would have a friend of his age when Laxus was on the job, which was almost always these days.
"So, what's your name? I'm Jax." Asked Jax as he still didn't know her name.
"Oh, nice to meet you, Jax. I'm Cana Alberona, but you can just call me Cana." She answered while smiling slightly at the boy of her age.
"It's a nice name." Jax tried encouraging her a bit more by complimenting her, and it seemed to work as she opened up a bit more during the conversation.
As they continued to chat, the food of Cana finally arrived, and they both started to eat together. From what Jax could tell, she had been hungry for a while, and she most likely didn't eat until she was full at the orphanage.
"So, I didn't ask, but can you do magic?" Asked Jax while they were eating.
"Yesh, I can do card magic." She answered immediately while having a bit of food in her mouth.
"You can swallow before answering, you know," Jax said while chuckling.
"Hum," Cana answered with a slight blush on her face.
As Jax saw her eat everything in less than two minutes, he asked: "Are you still hungry?" Upon which she immediately shook her head only to have her stomach rumble, betraying her.
"Haha, just take anything you want. It's not much anyway." Jax said while laughing and ordering some more food for himself.
--- Author note
There may be some problems with the numbers from here to ch.41 for the birthday of Hisui when I reread this part I noticed that I meant June while I wrote April so there may be some numbers wrong but the birthday of the princess is a bit over a month later.