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Early in the anime, Lucy asked Natsu if he could eat his own fire. Natsu explained that it would be like Lucy eating one of her Celestial Spirits. While this tells us that Natsu won't do it, it leaves the possibility open.

Given how Angel treated her spirits, I could imagine a more evil wizard being willing to eat their spirit if desperate enough. So, could a more evil dragon slayer eat their own magic? Would it make them more powerful or just back to the state they were in prior to casting the spell?

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  • Probably most likely. E.g. Natsu can eat his own flames but to him it seems unethical to do so.
    – Izumi-reiLuLu
    Commented May 2, 2014 at 16:31
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    Lol, That sentence with the evil wizard. For some strange reason i found it funny. Eating celestial spirits. Reminds me of eating pokemon question.
    – Izumi-reiLuLu
    Commented May 2, 2014 at 16:32
  • @MiharuDante I think I could enjoy some Taurus steaks every now and then. And I'd imagine Farfetch'd is just begging to be cooked.
    – David Starkey
    Commented May 2, 2014 at 16:36
  • Qiri is probably right but I wanted to point out the mortality of Celestial Spirits, like when Loke endured being in the human world to prevent the same fate for Aries because it's believed fatal to the spirit. So presuming they can die, being minced might do the trick which means Lucy actually loses her spirits compared to Natsu who'd probably have no change.
    – Daz C
    Commented May 2, 2014 at 22:50

4 Answers 4

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They can't eat their own magic. It was only recent (in chapter 391) that Silver reminded us of this during his fight with Gray.

We saw a flashback of Natsu saying he can't eat his own flames.

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Then two panels later, Silver confirmed this by blocking Gray's attack, using Silver's magic, instead of eating the ice as he did before. As Natsu has, Silver then mentioned he can not eat his own magic.

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To be honest it doesn't make sense that they are physically incapable of eating their magic, but if they could Silver would have been able to eat Gray's attack instead of having to block. I guess Natsu being Natsu made an incorrect analogy, back in chapter 5.

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  • I actually came back to this after talking with my brother so you got in before i could get a chance. my bother said that we find this out in the anime at the very start when Happy (at least he thinks it was Happy) says to Lucy that Natsu could eat his own magic but it would make him sick or something, my brother even compared it to someone drinking spoiled milk.
    – Memor-X
    Commented Jul 31, 2014 at 5:24
  • @Memor-X Does your brother know the chapter it was mentioned in? I cantseem to find it.
    – Peter Raeves
    Commented Jul 31, 2014 at 11:07
  • He's only seen the anime and said it was indicated at the start so i'd say at least somewhere in the first 4 episodes? was going to look into it but your answer references the manga which would be more accurate as the anime may have added it just for convince and may not be canon. i was telling him about this question and the "evil wizard being willing to eat their spirit" and before i could finish he said "Natsu can't eat he's own flames, he'll get sick. it's like when Naruto drank spoiled milk. possible but stupid"
    – Memor-X
    Commented Jul 31, 2014 at 22:56
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I think they can, but they just wouldn't gain any energy like they would from other sources, so it's just completely pointless. There have been points with dragonslayers in pretty tight pinches, and I'm pretty sure one of them would have at some point eaten their own magic if there were any point in doing so/ if it's even possible.

I think Natsu was just making a bit of a stupid analogy when he said it was like Lucy eating celestial spirits, at no point has there been any suggestion that a dragonslayer's element is in some way alive, and he's more than happy to fire off bursts of fire that presumably must burn out eventually, I don't think ethics come into it at all, just practicality.

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  • I like your point of view.
    – Izumi-reiLuLu
    Commented May 3, 2014 at 10:04
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    maybe natsu was making a stupid analogy but nothing else has been said .still if you consider Wendy eating air, can she distinguish which air she ate and which air she gave out. she might be eating her own magic element.
    – Sp0T
    Commented May 3, 2014 at 16:46
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I might get a bit technical here, forgive.

My claim is that they can but will not consume their own magic because it is pointless.

Consider the mage as an entity of energy. With the dragon slayers, when they consume their element, they get a boost in energy which they use to fight (Gajeel consuming steel, Wendy consuming air, ...and so on). I presume they are using these elementals to top up on their depleted energy of to give them a boost.

If they were to eat their own magic, it will give them a boost but it would only return them to the level of energy they had before they produced that bit of magic. They see no gain in doing such. To produce magic, they have to use some energy. This energy has been converted from them into the elemental. When they consume it, it goes back into them. Arithmetically, x - 1 = x' where x is the amount of energy they originally have and x' is the amount of energy they have after producing the magic. Consuming the magic they produce will be x' + 1 = x which merely returns them to the starting point.

In the case of consuming their element which they did not produce, arithmetically, that would be x + 1 = x*, where x remains as above and x* is the augmented energy level. This augmentation is made possible because this energy did not originally reside in them.

So yes, they can eat their own magic but it would be pointless

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  • But couldn't Natsu use magic to make a small fire that grows, then eat the larger fire for more returned energy?
    – David Starkey
    Commented May 13, 2014 at 19:49
  • True. He creates a small fire using his magic. This then consumes air (per se) and turns air's energy into fire. Natsu consumes the fire and gains more energy because it is not of the same quantum he originally created
    – Igbanam
    Commented May 13, 2014 at 21:35
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    That assumes poorly that the thermodynamic properties correlate easily with magical properties. That is impossible due to the observation that different colored fires exist when burning the same material. That means that any magical fire Salamader produces even if it grows still is infused with his magical power and that edible magical power may no grow as the fire consumes material (like we would assume it would if proportional to thermodynamic properties such as enthalpy, mass of burned material, etc).
    – kaine
    Commented May 14, 2014 at 13:09
  • I don't think that's right though, because the Slayers can eat a pretty small amount of their element to gain huge amounts of energy. The fight between Natsu and Gajeel is a good example, because there it's obvious that Natsu is firing out huge amounts of flame through his breath and punches and Gajeel is firing out iron rods, and then they each eat a tiny fraction of what they have put out and become vastly more powerful, instead of the flames Natsu eats replenishing like 3% of his magic as you would expect from what he's already given out.
    – Qiri
    Commented May 14, 2014 at 13:20
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Well he can but he just chooses not to because he is uncomfortable doing it but if it's absolutely necessary he will.

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    Welcome to the Anime/Manga SE site. Do you have anything to back this up?
    – Maroon
    Commented Jul 29, 2014 at 2:39

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