Chapter 70: Chapter 70: Heartfilia

The Heartfilia family, a family that had hold it´s promise and duty for more than four hundred years, even though they didn´t know or understand what those were.

Every member of the Heartfilia family that was able to use magic became a Celestial Spirit mage and tried to collect all of the twelve zodiac keys, not knowing for what these keys would be used for.

But finally at the year 777 at the seventh day of the seventh month the Heartfilia family were finally able to fulfill their promise and opened the Eclipse gate, opening the gates for the hope of the dragons and Zeref against the monster Acnologia.

The Heartfilia family was at this point one of the wealthiest families in the whole kingdom and that pretty much overnight and it all begun with the meeting between Leila Heartfilia and her future husband Jude.

Leila met her husband Jude at the merchant guild Love & Lucky, at this point Leila had already gathered all twelve of the zodiac keys and was considered a powerful mage, but she was no fan of fighting and with her fading health, she was no longer able to go on adventures and work as a mage.

But before she quit as a mage, she gave her three most trusted servants; Grammi, Spetto, and Zoldeco; a golden key each, but also told them that one day, she would need them one last time

She also made them promise to return the keys if her child would pursue the path of magic.

Leila also made a contract with Capricorn, so that he would serve and protect the Heartfilia family for the rest of eternity.

Leila and Jude worked at the guild for a few years and got the inspiration for the name of their future child Lucy, because the k in Lucky was missing at the time, meaning it was now spelled Love & Lucy, which left a deep impression on the two.

Leila and Jude left the guild shortly before the birth of Lucy and Jude opened his own business, the Heartfilia Konzern.

Jude delved into the railway business, which had existed for some time now, but was not able to spread fast, because of the nobles that had a vast amount of land through which the railway needed to go through.

However, where many failed, Jude succeeded and managed to convince multiple nobles through different means, Leila also played a good part by befriending the wives of these nobles and brought them on their side.

And through this, they became one of the most important families in the kingdom in less than two years.

Of course, this quick rise in fame and power didn´t made people jealous or warry of them and there were many that tried to either kill, rob, or kidnap them.

But Leila and her Spirits were always more than enough to deal with them, but with her fading health it became clear that Leila would not be able to use her magic for a long time and Jude soon managed to deal with his opponents and build a reliable guard force.

After which, Leila focused her energy in raising Lucy, but the knowledge of their duty was still waying heavy upon her and she didn´t want that this burden would fall upon Lucy´s shoulders.

So, Leila decided that she would open that so called Eclipse herself, even if it was not the right time for it.

But, luckily for her, the time to open the Eclipse would soon arrive and Leila asked her friends to lend her the keys one last time, however she was not able to reach one of them in time.

Grammi, who had the zodiac key of Aquarius, had moved to Alakatisia and was to far away to receive and sent the key in time, so Leila decided that she would do it without Aquarius.

The location of the gate was no secret to her, her ancestors had found and watched over it for a long time, even before the royal family of the kingdom build their castle around it and hid it from anyone else.

Even than her ancestors had found ways to reach the gate, so it would not be difficult for her.

Leila reached the capital at night and went inside the secret tunnels beneath the city.

Leila would find and open the Eclipse gate using her own energy as a replacement for the missing key, losing all of her magic in the prosses and opening the path for the people of the path.

After opening the gate and meeting the people that walked through it, including her ancestor Anna who gave her family the task of opening the gate in the first place, only a few of the questions that Leila had would be answered.

Although Anna promised that she would tell Leila everything one day, Leila wasn´t sure how much time she had left.

Anna decided that she would go with Leila back to the Heartfilia family, there she hid the fact that she was the ancestor of the family.

But none the less, Anna was welcomed with open arms and stayed for a long time.

However, over time Leila´s health became worse and worse, and Anna knew that Leila had not much time left.

At the beginning Anna wanted to stay and help raise Lucy, since she felt responsible for Leila´s situation, but Leila didn´t blame Anna for it and told her to head out and continue her task, for Leila felt no regret.

In the end Anna headed out, but not before teaching Lucy a few things and telling Leila everything.

Grammi would arrive shortly after Anna left the estate, Grammi blamed herself for Leila´s illness and wanted to leave the zodiac key of Aquarius behind, but Leila told Grammi that it wasn´t her fault and that she should take the key with her.

The only wish she had of Grammi was that both Lucy and Grammi´s daughter Brandish would become friends, to which Grammi happily agreed.

Shortly after Grammi left, a letter from Grammi arrived that had Aquarius´s key inside, it said that she had changed her mind and that Lucy should have Aquarius.

Leila would die in the year 777 at the age of twenty-nine, not even half a year after opening the Eclipse gate.

Both her husband, Jude, and her daughter, Lucy, were devastated by Leila´s death and Jude would drastically change afterwards.

Jude started to solely focus on his work and would start to neglect Lucy.

Jude would even forget Lucy´s birthday and yell at her if she tried to spend some time with him or other things.

This ended up in Lucy trying to run away for multiple times and would finally succeed at the age of sixteen in the year 783.

Lucy inherited two keys from her mother, Aquarius, and Cancer.

Cancer was the key that Leila gave to Spetto, who continued to serve as a servant for Leila and Jude.

As for the other keys, they vanished into various parts of the world.

At this point the company had grown beyond the railway business, Jude had bought multiple companies from different areas, making the Heartfilia Konzern deal in multiple areas.

Jude, of course knew that his daughter, the only thing that Leila left him, was gone and he didn´t care.

No that was not true, he felt a sense of relieve, because the distraction was gone, and he could finally concentrate on his work.

However, one year after Lucy ran away from home, Jude hired the Phantom Lord guild to bring his daughter back, not because he was worried about her or anything like that.

No, Lucy had been completely and utterly right in her assumption that her father wanted something from her, because now she was nothing more than a tool for him to increase his wealth and influence.

Which leads us to the current situation.

Lucy entered the work room of her father, dressed in a formal dress worthy of a noble lady, it was of the kind that her mother had worn most of the time.

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Her father was of course sitting at his desk, not even looking up to look at his own daughter.

“Welcome back, Lucy.” said her father.

“I have returned, father. I apologize for leaving home without a word. I deeply regret my actions.” Lucy said while bowing down her head.

“It seems like you have come back to your senses. If you had remained at that guild any longer, I would have used the wealth of the family to crush that guild.” Jude said, finally looking at his daughter.

As Lucy heard her father´s words, she imagined what would have happened to the guild, but could only imagine how everything her father tried would fail miserably and the faces of Natsu, Gray, Erza came to her mind, but also the faces of the other friends she made in the guild and the faces of the two older siblings of Natsu, Zeldaris and Aversia.

 (AN: Don´t underestimate the financial power of the guild, it can pay of the destruction that Natsu and the others causes and that means something.)

“You have finally grown up, Lucy. You have learned how damaging and destructive your selfish actions can be. You are the daughter of the Heartfilia family, you live in a different world than everyone else.”

Jude stood up and walked a few steps forward, his demeanor serious as always.

“The reason why I have brought you back is because your husband has been decided.”

And with these words everything became clear to Lucy and her decision became even more firm and the last remnants of doubt disappeared.

“He is the prince of Sawalu, of the Julenelle. I am sure you remember him, as he had shown interest in you before.”

Lucy remembered the so-called prince; he was a notorious pervert and only had interest in her body.

Even only remembering him made Lucy shiver a little.

“Yes… I remember.” Lucy answered.

The Julenelle were a family of nobles that had a lot of lands and power in the southern region of the kingdom.

“By marrying into the Julenelles the Heartfilia Railways would be able to expand to the south. This marriage has tremendous value to the family.” Jude, while saying that turned around and walked toward the window and looked through it onto the estate.

“You also must give birth to a son… To continue our family name.” (AN: If Anna or your wife would hear of this, no one would be able to safe you.)

Lucy clenched her hands together, her father really didn´t saw her as a person anymore.

“That is all. Return to your room and stay there.” Jude said and waved with his hand. (AN: Ok, my desire to kill this waist of a human is at the boiling point and I know that death by half dragons, twin calamities, normal dragons, Acnologia, Kyoka or Jupiter would not be logical and would make absolutely no sense, but it would be so satisfying. Also adding death by Anna and or Leila.)

Lucy breathed one last time in, to gather herself for what she was about to do.

“I am sorry, father, but it seems that you are misunderstanding.” said Lucy, her eyes filled with determination.

Jude turned around, unbelieving what he just heard.

“The reason I returned was to make myself and my intentions clear. And I know that it was not right to simply run away. I should have said something, but back then I wasn´t sure if my words would even reach you, but no more, I will no longer run away from you. Now, I will finally express my feelings. Father, I am leaving this house, this family, and I won´t come back!”

“Lucy…” was all Jude managed to say.

“I will walk my own path and you have no right to decide who I am marrying! AND DON´T YOU DARE LAY EVEN ONE FINGER ON FAIRY TAIL!!!”

Lucy grabbed the upper part of her dress and rips the upper part into shreds, raveling the garments beneath.

“THE NEXT TIME YOU EVEN TRY, I… NO, THE ENTIRE GUILD WILL SEE YOU AS OUR ENEMY!!!”

Jude watched in stunned silence as the pieces of the ripped dress flew in the air.

“If you hadn´t interfered, then maybe we could have continued our conversation in a civil atmosphere, but now it is far too late for that, you have caused too much harm too my friends. I don´t care about money or beautiful clothes! I want to live in a place where I am respected for who I am and not for whose daughter I am. Fairy Tail is now my family. They have been more caring than this family had ever been.”

Lucy stopped for a moment as a look of nostalgic and sadness came over her.

“I admit that because of the memories that I made with mom it was painful and difficult to leave this place. But also because of the memories I made with Ms. Spetto, Grandpa Belo, Libon, Eido and the other servants it was difficult to leave.”

While Lucy was having her great speech, the servants were listening through the door and were currently crying their hearts out, except for Belo; Lucy´s magic teacher, because his hearing is pretty bad.

“If Mother was still alive, I know that she would tell me to follow my heart.”

And as Lucy mentioned her mother Leila´s image appeared in Jude´s mind, right beside Lucy.

“Leila…” he muttered in shock.

Lucy turned around, her heart light after finally saying her mind.

“Farewell, father.” and after saying her final words too her father Lucy stepped out of the room, only to be greeted by the crying servants.

Lucy tried to calm the servants down and later changed back into the clothes in which she arrived.

Lucy said her goodbyes to the servants, who practically raised her after her mother’s death and was now standing before her others grave.

Lucy closed her eyes, saying goodbye to her mother as well, as she heard a few familiar voices.

As Lucy turned around, she saw, Happy, Natsu, Gray, Erza, Zeldaris and Aversia rushing toward her.

Happy slammed into her breasts, bowering his head between them as he cried, “Lucy!”

But Lucy didn´t had the time to deal with the cat, because Natsu, Gray and Erza berated her with questions, like why she left, if she was ok and stuff like that.

The fact that they were so worried about her, that they came all the way here, made Lucy quite happy and she had no regrets, if anything she fell even more in love with the guild.

Zeldaris and Aversia had their own questions, but the way that the three were bombarding Lucy made it clear that they would have to wait, and they had no problems with that.

Aversia and Zeldaris noticed a stare and as they looked at the origins, they found Jude standing at the window, staring at them.

The two stared back for a moment, before looking back at the scene of Lucy trying to answer their questions.