saeculum - lat. 1. age, era; 2. (rel.) this life, this world; 3. generation; 4. century
It happens so suddenly that no one sees it coming. The aftermath of a fight, a decision and they're gone.
Just like that.
It doesn't matter that they've just recently come home from seven years of suspended animation, that they've fought so hard for place one in the Grand Magic Games to show the world that they're still here, goddammit, notice it already!
Because they're not. Not anymore.
No one actually has much of an idea why Fairy Tail disbanded so suddenly and silently as it has. Because silent was what the whole affair had been. There weren't any signs for infighting, not like during the almost legendary Battle Of Fairy Tail, and rumour has it that that was the most severe case of guild infighting in almost a century, only to be topped by the massacre that happened during the infighting in a semi-dark guild more than ninety years ago. But they had pulled themselves back together after that fiasco and were going on as strong as before. This time though – there aren't enough words to describe the confusion spreading through all of Fiore.
Because it's not like they had any of the problems that would cause a guild to split up, or at least it's that way for outside spectators, even if they were close to the guild that once was, everyone and anyone and they are all at a loss as to what to make of this. No, Fairy Tail has been normal – for their standards. Fighting battle after battle against foes so powerful that any normal guild wouldn't dare lay a hand on them, much less stand up against them and fight to the very end, no matter how many injuries they have to endure. It's just how they work and – maybe – how fate works for them. Trouble finds Fairy Tail, always, and it ends up in the most spectacular and desperate fights people talk about.
And now it's all over.
They have fought hard, again, and they won, again. It's nothing out of the ordinary, just with a little more damage, because the guild hall is, well, not, if you don't count the rubble and the broken statues of fairies. It's such a shame, they say, just when the building was renovated again, now they have to the whole work again.
The guild hall never does get rebuilt again.
Instead, the next day, Fairy Tail is gone, as are its members, leaving the world to make sense of it all. They were just rising again. They were just renewing their era after seven years of being forgotten. And yet, they aren't anymore. The era has ended, too suddenly and much, much too soon and life goes on in the light of another era. An era without name, because it's only known as the Era After Fairy Tail. None of the other big guilds make any move to take this era as theirs yet. It isn't quite their right to, not without Fairy Tail to even compete, and if they can leave it like this, it's almost like a tribute to Fairy Tail, that deserved more than any other guild to shine at the top and that disappeared halfway on the path to their greatest glory. And in a way, Fairy Tail still lives, if just in the mouths of people and in the hearts of its former members.
One year.
That's the time it takes for people to not think of this era as Fairy Tail's anymore. And at the end of that year stands a meeting between two people, who might not quite be starcrossed lovers, but whose bonds are strong enough to fuel resolve.
And the era of Fairy Tail begins again.