Chapter 177

Chapter 177: Chapter 177

It was painfully obvious that Lucy knew almost nothing about her own family history.

Marshall wasn’t particularly surprised.

He had never exactly expected Lucy to be some brilliant historian.

Still, one thing could now be treated as practically certain:

there was something extraordinary about the Heartfilia bloodline.

The Celestial Spirits were famously strict about contracts and the laws governing their world.

If any random human could summon the Celestial Spirit King, argue with him for a few minutes, and make him temporarily rewrite those laws, then the entire contract system would be a joke.

"R-Really?"

Lucy stared at Marshall in disbelief after hearing his theory.

"My ancestors were actually that incredible?"

She had never heard anything remotely like this before.

"Everything I’ve found points in that direction."

Marshall shrugged.

"At this point, I’m comfortable treating it as fact."

Lucy still looked doubtful.

"Think about it. Why did the Celestial Spirit King keep calling you ’old friend’?"

Marshall raised an eyebrow.

"Are you two close?"

"Uh..."

Lucy froze.

Only now did her somewhat empty head finally notice how strange the King’s choice of words had been.

Old friend?

He had called her that?

Could Marshall actually be right?

’Wait...’

Lucy’s eyes gradually brightened.

’Were my ancestors seriously that amazing?’

A dangerous thought immediately followed.

’Does that make me some kind of... nth-generation Celestial Spirit royalty?!’

Lucy had very little resistance to information that made her sound impressive.

The corners of her mouth began creeping upward before she hurriedly forced them back down.

Marshall noticed anyway.

Then he asked casually, "Lucy, do you want to get stronger?"

"Eh?"

Lucy blinked.

"Your current strength is kind of stuck in the middle."

Marshall looked her over.

"For the heir to a bloodline connected this deeply to the Celestial Spirits, you’re honestly a little underwhelming."

Lucy’s eyebrow twitched.

"But if you want to become stronger, I can help."

Her irritation disappeared instantly.

"R-Really?"

"Of course."

Marshall smiled.

"All you have to do is participate in a few of my experiments, and I’ll help improve your strength."

Lucy was immediately tempted.

Then she remembered how satisfying it had been to stretch Marshall’s cheeks earlier.

She unconsciously shrank back.

"You..."

Her eyes became suspicious.

"You’re not planning to secretly get revenge on me, are you?"

Marshall looked offended.

"What kind of person do you think I am?"

He placed a hand against his chest.

"I’m not petty."

Lucy stared at him.

Marshall continued without shame.

"Look at Cana, Erza, Mira... Most of them became as strong as they are now partly because of my help."

That was difficult to argue with.

Lucy hesitated for only another moment.

"All right!"

She clenched one fist.

"I’m in!"

Her eyes burned with determination.

"I want to get stronger too!"

Marshall’s smile immediately became much brighter.

The fish had taken the bait.

"Great."

He reached out.

"Then let’s head back. We’ve already been away from your party for quite a while."

Marshall teleported them directly back to Cake Tower.

The instant they arrived—he vanished again.

Lucy blinked.

"...Marshall?"

The reason was simple.

The moment Marshall reconnected with the Gugas stationed throughout Cake Tower, he received an extremely alarming report.

[Boss! Emergency report! Miss Levy is using Magic inside Boss’s bedroom!]

Marshall stopped dead.

’???’

What?

He had only been away from home for a little while!

What the hell had Levy been doing upstairs this entire time?!

There was no way Marshall could ignore that.

Space twisted as he teleported straight into his bedroom.

Then immediately realized he had made a terrible mistake.

’I should’ve teleported outside the door first!’

Too late.

Marshall looked up, Levy was curled up on his bed.

Her clothes were rumpled from whatever frantic nonsense she had been doing, her face was bright red, and the moment she saw him appear, she froze completely.

Marshall froze too.

Neither of them spoke.

They simply stared at one another while an atmosphere of unbearable awkwardness spread through the room.

Levy’s face went pale first.

Then, little by little, the color returned.

Redder.

Redder.

Redder.

Marshall could practically imagine steam rising from her head.

And then, thanks to Information Magic, he can easily hear her thoughts.

[W-Well... I’ve already come this far. I might as well finish what I was doing first.]

Levy abruptly grabbed the blanket and pulled it over her head.

Marshall’s eyes nearly popped out.

"?!"

He finally broke.

"LEVY!"

He rushed toward the bed.

"What are you doing?! Get out from under there!"

"It’ll only take a moment!"

Her muffled voice came from beneath the blanket.

"I won’t waste much of your time!"

"Huh?!"

Marshall’s brain stopped working.

"You—you—"

For perhaps the first time in his life, Marshall genuinely had no idea how to respond to a situation.

He had faced monsters.

Wizard Saints.

Ancient demons.

Spatial catastrophes.

Dangerous magical experiments.

Yet somehow, the first time he truly experienced the crushing sensation of helplessness... was while standing beside his own bed, staring at a suspicious lump beneath the blankets because Levy McGarden had apparently lost her mind!

Marshall stood there like an idiot.

The blanket wriggled.

His expression slowly went blank.

He felt like some completely useless dude who had lost control of his own house.

...

A few moments later...

Levy finally poked her head out from beneath the blanket, looking deeply satisfied with having completed whatever bizarre objective she had set for herself.

She remained there for another moment, seemingly savoring her success, before climbing out and straightening her clothes.

Then she carefully tucked a small piece of fabric she had taken earlier into her possession.

Marshall’s eye twitched.

Levy waved cheerfully.

"Well, I’m going now!"

She smiled as though absolutely nothing unusual had occurred.

"Bye-bye, Marshall~~"

Then she walked toward the door.

One step.

Two steps.

Three—

A hand descended onto her shoulder.

Levy froze.

Marshall had no idea what expression he was making.

His voice, however, emerged through clenched teeth.

"My dear..."

His fingers tightened slightly.

"Le-vy-chan."

Levy swallowed.

"You weren’t seriously planning to just walk out of here like that, were you?"

Marshall smiled.

It was not a friendly smile.

"Don’t you think you’ve forgotten to explain something?"

"..."

Levy immediately realized that her plan to bluff her way out had failed.

She spun around, sprinted back toward the bed, and dropped into an exaggerated kneeling apology.

"I’M VERY SORRY!"

Marshall stared.

"I was wrong!"

Then Levy raised her head.

"I’ll probably do it again!"

"HAAAH?!"

Marshall nearly exploded.

"What the hell are you apologizing for, then?!"

Levy climbed back to her feet, pressed her palms together, and tilted her head with the cutest expression she could manage.

"I apologized."

She smiled.

"So can we just forget about the whole thing?"

Marshall finally understood exactly how Lucy had felt earlier.

He was being toyed with.

"Are you joking right now?!"

He pointed furiously at the room around them.

"What were you even doing?! In a boy’s bedroom, of all places!"

His face reddened from sheer disbelief.

"Are you even human?!"

"I couldn’t help it!"

Levy’s embarrassment immediately transformed into indignation.

"What was I supposed to do?!"

Then she pointed directly at him.

"Besides, this is all Marshall’s fault!"

Marshall recoiled.

"WHAT?!"

He pointed at himself.

"My fault?!"

"Yes!"

Levy planted both hands on her hips.

"Even if I’m ninety-nine percent responsible, are you seriously claiming you did absolutely nothing wrong?!"

"I DIDN’T EVEN KNOW YOU WERE IN HERE!"

"That’s not what I mean!"

Levy’s face became red again.

"You clearly understand way more than you pretend to, yet you’ve spent all these years running around acting like some completely innocent little kid!"

Marshall’s expression stiffened.

Levy jabbed a finger toward him.

"Give me back all the guilt I used to feel!"

Her eyes narrowed.

"You little pervert!"

Marshall sputtered.

"W-What?!"

His face flushed.

"What nonsense are you talking about?! I have absolutely no idea what you mean!"

"You’re still pretending?!"

Levy’s eyes gleamed.

"I already discovered your secret!"

She slowly emphasized his name.

"Mar—shall—"

Then, without warning, Levy apparently taught herself some mysterious martial-arts technique on the spot and lunged toward him at terrifying speed.

Marshall reacted instinctively.

What happened next lasted only an instant.

Levy’s hands met exactly the sort of evasive response she had apparently expected.

She landed, looked up and smiled triumphantly.

"Got you."

Marshall froze.

Levy pointed at him.

"You can’t talk your way out of it anymore."

"..."

Marshall’s entire face turned bright red.

Veins appeared on his forehead.

What the hell was this development?!

How had they gotten here?!

Why was any of this happening?!

Levy folded her arms, looking considerably more confident now that she believed she had seized the advantage.

"Marshall."

She cleared her throat.

"You were hiding things first, and I made a mistake afterward."

She nodded sagely.

"So I think the fairest solution is that we call it even and pretend none of this ever happened."

Then she turned toward the door again.

Marshall grabbed her before she made it two steps and threw her straight back onto the bed.

"LIKE HELL WE’RE PRETENDING NOTHING HAPPENED!"

Levy bounced once against the mattress.

"Then what do you want from me?!"

The two stared at one another, breathing heavily.

Then both suddenly became aware of how absurd the entire situation was.

Silence descended again.

By now, Marshall had mostly reconstructed what had happened.

Levy had apparently begun questioning just how "innocent" he actually was.

So during the party, she had sneaked into his bedroom looking for evidence.

Somewhere during that investigation, she had discovered a certain little secret among his personal clothing that confirmed whatever theory had been forming inside her head.

Then Levy’s imagination had run completely off the rails.

For reasons Marshall did not want to understand, she had proceeded to behave increasingly reckless at the scene—including apparently resorting to ’Water Magic’ at some point—only for Marshall to teleport home and catch her in the middle of the whole disaster.

The embarrassment had immediately fried Levy’s common sense.

The evidence was too solid for her to bluff her way out.

She couldn’t think of a graceful escape.

So she had simply decided to blow everything up and drag Marshall down with her.

Marshall stared at her.

What an incredible battle of wits.

Truly.

A magnificent duel between two great minds.

...Like hell it was!

Fine!

If Levy wanted mutually assured destruction, then mutually assured destruction it would be!

Who was afraid of whom?!

Marshall pointed accusingly.

"You spend all day reading weird books! What right do you have to call me a pervert?!"

Levy’s face immediately went crimson.

"And give me back what you stuffed in your pocket!"

He pointed.

"That’s mine!"

Levy instinctively covered her pocket.

"No!"

"Give it back!"

"It’s mine now!"

"You stole it!"

"It’s a trophy!"

"You shameless little thief!"

"AAAAAAAH!"

Levy covered her ears.

"You’re not allowed to say it! Stop saying it!"

"Then return it!"

"NO!"

Marshall finally ran out of strength.

He stared at the ceiling.

Somewhere deep inside, a terrible premonition emerged.

His happy, carefree childhood... might officially be over.