Chapter 2: The Eyes That Saw the Void (Flashback)
The night was a blur of fire and screams.
Menma remembered it vividly, though he wished he could forget. He had been only ten, too young to carry the weight of what he saw, yet old enough to understand what loss meant.
The village burned around him, flames licking the sky. Shadows with twisted wings and claws—creatures born of corrupted ether—descended upon his home. The people called them "space fiends," demons torn through dimensional cracks left behind by careless mages. They weren't supposed to exist. And yet here they were, devouring everything.
Menma's parents had fought bravely. His father, a Devil Slayer, cloaked in the black flames of his magic. His mother, a summoner, wielding carved masks that birthed spectral guardians. Together they stood against the fiends.
And together, they fell.
Menma watched as the monsters overwhelmed them. His father's flames flickered out, his mother's masks shattered one by one. Their final act was to push Menma behind a collapsed wall, their voices hoarse but filled with love.
"Run," his father gasped.
"Live," his mother whispered.
He did neither.
Something broke inside him that night. A storm of grief, rage, and desperation that clawed at his very soul. His body shook, tears blurring his vision, but through them—something changed.
His eyes burned.
The world slowed, sharpened, every movement clear as crystal. The flow of magic lit up the darkness, streams of color weaving through the monsters. His left eye bled crimson, a single tomoe spinning like a wheel. The first stage of his Sharingan.
At the same time, something deeper awakened. His mother's shattered masks pulsed faintly with power, fragments of her summoning magic searing into his veins. From the rubble, nine masks reformed—not of her design, but his. They whispered to him, voices both ancient and loyal, binding themselves to his grief.
The first beast he called forth was the Mask of the Wolf. Its spectral form howled into the flames, tearing through the fiends with jaws of darkness. Menma rose to his feet, his tiny body trembling but his eyes blazing.
He fought with reckless desperation, masks spiraling from his side, beasts tearing into monsters. His hands bled as he struck clumsily with raw magic, his voice hoarse from screaming.
Yet it wasn't enough.
The fiends swarmed, endless, unrelenting. One lunged, its claw aiming for his heart—
And in that instant, his right eye cracked open.
The world inverted. Space bent, reality folded, and the fiend's claw vanished into a void that wasn't there. Concentric rings spiraled into existence, glowing violet. The Rinnegan.
Menma staggered, barely understanding what he had done. The creature shrieked, half its body erased, and for the first time the swarm faltered. His power was unstable, but it was enough. Enough to survive until wandering mages arrived to finish the battle.
When the flames died, Menma's village was gone. His parents were gone. Only his eyes and masks remained.
Years blurred together after that.
Menma wandered from town to town, never staying long. Some feared him, others tried to use him, and some attacked outright. His magic—the Space Devil Slayer flames he inherited from his father—manifested violently whenever he lost control, black fire that devoured light.
The masks, too, were burdens. Each had a will of its own, testing him, pushing him to prove worthy. He learned to summon them one by one: the Wolf, the Serpent, the Beast, the Hawk, and others whose names etched themselves into his soul. Each represented a facet of his will—wrath, cunning, loyalty, despair. They became his companions, his protectors, his curse.
But it was the eyes that marked him most.
The Sharingan grew with each battle, evolving tomoe by tomoe until his vision became razor sharp. He could see spells before they were cast, trace the weave of magic through the air, mimic techniques with frightening accuracy. The Rinnegan, meanwhile, revealed doors no one else could see—cracks between dimensions, pockets of space that hummed with untapped ether.
And when the grief of loss pushed him past his limits, his Sharingan twisted further, bleeding into its Eternal form. The Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan, a starburst pattern glowing crimson-black. With it came the ability that defined him: Kamui.
The first time he used it, he nearly died. His body screamed as he warped space, dragging a mountain beast into a void. The backlash tore at his cells, nearly burning him out. But he survived, and with time, he learned control. Kamui became his deadliest blade and his strongest shield.
Still, the power carried loneliness. People saw his eyes and whispered of curses, of devils and forbidden pacts. Menma grew quiet, cold on the surface, but deep down his heart yearned for bonds he could never hold.
Until Mirajane.
He first saw her in a small border town, years after the night of fire. She was already a mage of Fairy Tail, young but strong, her Take-Over magic roaring as she fought off a pack of rogue monsters. Her siblings were with her—Lisanna and Elfman—but she stood at the front, fearless.
Menma had no reason to step in. He was only passing through. Yet when one of the beasts slipped past her guard, instinct roared. He summoned the Mask of the Beast, a hulking jackal-guardian, which crushed the creature before it touched her.
Mirajane turned, startled, their eyes locking. For a heartbeat, the world stilled. She didn't look at him with fear, nor suspicion. Only curiosity.
"Thanks," she said, her smile genuine.
Menma blinked, caught off guard. "Don't mention it."
That was the start.
They met again weeks later, and again after that. Each time, Mirajane teased him for being too serious, too secretive. Each time, Menma found himself lingering, watching the way her smile warmed everyone around her.
She didn't flinch at his eyes. She didn't recoil at the masks or the whispers of Devil Slayer magic. She simply saw him.
For the first time since his parents' death, Menma wondered if he could stop running. If he could belong somewhere.
The memory faded, and Menma blinked, returning to the present. He stood once more in Magnolia, Fairy Tail's guildhall looming before him.
His hand brushed against the masks at his side, their weight familiar, their whispers quiet. His crimson eye spun lazily, tomoe shifting, while the violet rings pulsed softly.
He remembered fire, loss, loneliness. He remembered the first time someone had smiled at him without fear.
And he knew, without doubt, why he was here.
This was no longer just about surviving. This was about finding a home.
Fairy Tail was waiting.
Word Count: ~1,750