Chapter 287

Chapter 287: Chapter 287

"Come on, come on... It’s started, it’s finally started..."

Marshall remained hunched over his workbench, rushing to finish the last adjustments in the laboratory while keeping one eye on the live view of Tenrou Island through Telescope Magic.

At this point, however, his biggest concern wasn’t whether Fairy Tail could hold the line.

What he was seriously thinking about was what kind of entrance would look best when he finally sent his secret weapon into battle.

So far, the situation on Tenrou Island was actually much better than Grimoire Heart’s overwhelming numbers made it appear.

The gray rain and mist hanging over the island had broken the battlefield into a series of isolated pockets, while Cana’s magical beasts had smashed through the ordinary Grimoire Heart troops and thrown their formation into complete disorder.

Their officers weren’t doing much better.

Nearly every member of the Seven Kin who had joined the assault had already been dragged into a hard fight.

Natsu’s battle was the most straightforward.

He had challenged Zancrow, the Fire God Slayer, one-on-one.

Zancrow had gone into the fight extremely confident because he believed he understood Natsu’s abilities.

Natsu was a Fire Dragon Slayer, while he himself wielded Fire God Slayer Magic.

In theory, the matchup heavily favored him: Zancrow could consume flames created by Dragon Slayer Magic, while Natsu couldn’t do the same with the black flames of a God Slayer.

Zancrow had even prepared to bait Natsu into trying to eat his fire, expecting to catch him with that elemental incompatibility.

Once the fight actually began, however, he quickly realized that his assumptions had a rather serious flaw.

Natsu had more Magic Power than he did.

Even stranger, Natsu never once tried to eat the black flames.

The reason was simple.

Natsu had already seen God Slayer Magic through Marshall and knew perfectly well that those black flames weren’t something he could casually swallow.

The idea of eating them never even entered his head.

Rather than gambling on some clever trick, Natsu simply intended to overpower Zancrow with his own strength.

And when Mages fought, raw magical reserves still mattered tremendously.

Zancrow’s God Slayer Magic might have had an elemental advantage, but it wasn’t enough to erase the difference in Magic Power.

Almost everyone present from Fairy Tail had undergone Marshall’s Second Origin development, and their reserves had grown far beyond what outsiders expected.

As the fight dragged on, Zancrow found himself being suppressed despite supposedly holding the superior element.

Once he realized he was actually losing, his confidence cracked.

Zancrow blasted a path through his own allies without hesitation and fled.

"You bastard! Don’t run!"

Natsu charged after him immediately.

"Idiot! Don’t go wandering off alone!" Gray shouted from another section of the battlefield, but there was no chance Natsu was going to listen.

Gray had his own problems anyway.

His fight with Rustyrose had gradually turned into a bizarre contest between two creation-type Mages.

Whatever Rustyrose imagined into existence, Gray responded by making a similar form with Ice-Make, until the whole thing had started to resemble some ridiculous copying competition.

They had been exchanging constructs like that when an iron sword suddenly came flying into the fight from the side.

Gray twisted away and shouted, "Gajeel, what the hell are you doing?!"

"Gihi." Gajeel walked over with a deeply irritating grin. "You’re taking too long. I already finished with the guys on my side, so I’ll take this one."

Gray stared at him in disbelief. "What the hell?! You’re stealing my target? You’re not even participating in the S-Class exam! Why are you trying so hard to score points?!"

"That’s none of your business. This guy’s mine now."

Rustyrose’s face twisted in fury. "You bastards! There’s a limit to how much you can look down on someone! Tower of the Gods!"

...

Elsewhere, Elfman and Kain Hikaru were having a much more direct fight, trading heavy blows at close range.

"Give me one of your hairs!" Kain shouted. "Otherwise I can’t activate my Magic!"

Elfman looked at him as though he had just said something profoundly stupid.

"Are you an idiot, or do you think I’m an idiot? Who the hell would hand over their hair in the middle of a fight?! Take this—Beast King’s Fist!"

"Damn it! Then I’ve got no choice! Self-Enhancement: Iron!"

Before Kain could properly defend himself, Freed suddenly cut in from the side.

"Dark écriture—Darkness!"

The sword strike tore through Kain’s defenses and left him heavily wounded.

"You... you people!" Kain staggered backward, glaring at them. "That’s despicable!"

Freed showed no sign of guilt. "This is a war between guilds. There’s no question of fairness anymore. The moment Grimoire Heart chose Fairy Tail as its enemy, all of you should have been prepared to die."

With that, Kain Hikaru became the first of the Seven Kin to fall.

Only four members of the Seven Kin had joined the initial encirclement.

One had fled, one was still locked in battle, one had already been defeated, and that left the final target—Caprico, or rather Zoldeo occupying Capricorn’s body.

The instant Zoldeo recognized Lucy as Layla Heartfilia’s daughter, his expression changed completely and he began pursuing her with disturbing single-mindedness.

"You! You’re the one person who has to disappear here!"

Lucy was riding one of Cana’s summoned miniature dinosaurs at full speed, screaming while the creature carried her through the battlefield.

"AAAAAH! Why is this guy only chasing me?!"

Cana kept pace beside her and analyzed the situation with surprising calm.

"From what he’s saying, he knew your mother. You seriously don’t remember him?"

"I think I might’ve seen him when I was little, but who remembers someone from that long ago? Loke! Hurry up and beat him!"

Loke was already chasing Caprico from behind, and Lucy’s demand nearly made him stumble.

"Then stop running and turn around! Can’t you help me fight him?!"

"No! His face is terrifying! I’m scared!"

Cana watched the ridiculous chase for a little while longer before losing interest.

"This is getting boring. Let’s just end it."

She raised her Duel Disk and inserted a card.

"Activate Trap Card—Bottomless Trap Hole!"

A pitch-black pit abruptly opened beneath Caprico’s feet.

Zoldeo had no time to react and dropped straight into the darkness.

Lucy immediately cheered. "Cana, that’s amazing! Wait... I hear something like an engine. He’s coming back up!"

"Relax." Cana smiled. "I still have the rest of the combo."

She calmly activated several more cards into the hole.

Brilliant light erupted below, followed by violent lightning, waves of heat like molten lava, and finally a crushing collapse that shattered the surrounding earth and buried the pit completely.

The entire sequence flowed together so smoothly that almost anyone caught in it would have been lucky to leave a recognizable body.

Loke stared at the filled-in crater, his eyelid twitching.

"Cana... Caprico is a Celestial Spirit, and he’s probably being controlled. If you actually kill him like this, there’s a chance he won’t return properly to the Celestial Spirit World. That could become a serious problem."

"Then don’t ask me!" Cana replied without the slightest guilt. "We’ll get Marshall to deal with it later!"

Caprico was effectively finished.

...

Around the same time, the fight near the Tenrou Tree was also approaching its end.

Azuma stood covered in wounds and breathing heavily as he stared at the "knight" in front of him, whose entire body was wrapped in strange armor. His expression carried both pain and excitement.

He genuinely enjoyed challenging powerful opponents, but even he hadn’t expected Erza to be this overwhelming.

What made it worse was that Mira—the woman known as the Bloodthirsty Witch—hadn’t even joined the fight yet.

Another flying slash screamed toward him.

Azuma immediately manipulated the surrounding trees and roots to defend himself.

As the wielder of Arc of the Great Tree, he could command trees, manipulate their roots, draw upon the life force within them, and even detonate that vitality to create explosions.

In a forest like this, he should have possessed an enormous home-field advantage.

Against Erza’s swordsmanship, however, that advantage barely mattered.

The roots he raised could shave a little force from her slashes, but they were carved apart almost as easily as tofu and had no hope of actually stopping her attacks.

Azuma exhaled heavily. "I had hoped to fight you properly, but it looks like I should stop wasting time and complete the Master’s objective."

Erza narrowed her eyes. "What do you mean?"

"My Arc of the Great Tree can control not only trees, but the Magic Power rooted throughout the earth. I came to this island early so I could establish control over the magical flow beneath it."

Azuma spread his arms.

"You probably don’t know this, but Tenrou Island itself is one enormous Super Magic. It is connected to every member of Fairy Tail who bears the guild mark. That connection is both a blessing and a weakness: while the Super Magic remains active, it continuously supplies you with Magic Power and protects you from dying easily."

A smile appeared on his face.

"But once that magical structure is destroyed, every Fairy Tail member connected to it will immediately fall into a weakened state. It may not be the most honorable way to win, but this is war."

He raised both hands toward the towering tree.

"So I’m sorry, but this battle belongs to Grimoire Heart. Fall—Tenrou Tree!"

Nothing happened.

For several seconds, the forest remained completely silent.

Azuma’s expression changed. "W-What? Impossible. Why didn’t my Magic activate?!"

A small voice answered from nearby.

"I’m terribly sorry. My magnificent Master made a few preparations in advance as well."

A little girl slowly emerged from the trunk of a nearby tree as though the wood itself had grown her.

Horns rose from her head, a tail swayed behind her, and a faint halo floated overhead.

One of Marshall’s Apostles—Lust.

She smiled pleasantly at the stunned Azuma.

"Sorry to disappoint you."