Mating season (NaLu)

Untitled Part 10

Well, would you look at that. It's past one in the morning. Well I guess, Juvia can have that, I really had a great time. I smirked to myself when I thought about the kiss. Who would've thought that Juvia was shy, huh?

After I washed my hair of that hideous colour, I got myself a cold drink and started with the book. Nothing much was in it, at least in the first five chapters I went through with the Gale-Force Glasses. Something about how to control dragon slayer magic and a detailed description of dragons. Bla-bla-blaah.

I decided to get some sleep. Surely, this book could patiently wait for tomorrow like it has waited for the last 8 years or so. But for some reason, I woke up again after an hour, at 3 am. I tried to fall asleep, but just kept tossing and turning till I got through with it and woke up peeved to read myself back to sleep. It was working, I was getting sleepy. But then I happened across a very captive chapter: Dragon and Dragon Slayer Mating Season. Basically, the stronger the dragon the denser they are and the less they want to spend mind on reproductivity, but since then only the weakest of dragons would survive, evolution developed a forced mating season upon all dragons. The info goes for dragon slayers too.

This is the info I picked up. They mate for life during a mating season, but the seasons will keep on appearing every year and be for about a week long. It starts with horny thoughts, an urge to mark their mate (whatever that means, there wasn't much info about that), masturbating, urge to mate in general. Usually the dragons conform to the season after two days. If the mating process is prolonged for whatever reason, the symptoms worsen. Depending on their sexual activity, age and strength, the season might get really uncomfortable. Even painful when too far away from their mate. When the actual mating process is delayed significantly, the dragon/ slayer will violently try to mate and possibly harm their mate during it.

Mating process itself is just sex with the dragon biting on their mate (marking them) someplace they have picked to be the marking spot. Only then, with the mark given, is the mating done. Usually after that the season withdraws slowly.

If the chosen mate denies the dragon or cannot mate with them during the season, the dragon will undergo severe migraine episodes after the failed season. There isn't a lot of history of those failed seasons, because the urge to mate is too powerful to control. Although, it is believed that the dragon will fall into a shortlived depression combined with the headaches afterwards, but the dragon will most likely live on. The author confirmed that no one has died from it, but death is a possible outcome if the dragon can't mate for several years in a row. They will suffer tremendously and may go insane. There is no "treatment" for the mating season and it can't be avoided.

The mates may live separately after it and proceed with their previous everyday lives. The season is only meant for reproducing.

Oh and a fun fact: if the mate dies during the mating season, the dragon / slayer will feel like they failed everything and will fall into deep depression instantly and kill their loved ones and themselves.

Wow, it makes sense now, why Natsu is always going away at this time of year. Which means, Natsu is purposely suffering every year. But wait, how many years has he denied the season? The book said it could kill him if he doesn't mate for how many years? I flipped through the pages searching for numbers or anything to give me hints how long has Natsu sustained failed seasons and how long can he keep on living like this if he hasn't been able to mate for, I don't know, like four years. That's how long Lucy's been in Fairy Tail, right? Not counting the timeskip, I guess then the mating season was paused. But all the info in the book was vague, barely giving any information at all.

What's going on? I don't get how this could ruin his life? How serious is this? And Natsu is going away in order to what? To not have sex with Lucy? But this doesn't make any sense at all! The season should mean that he only does want to have sex, at least that's what the book said.