Hello everyone! Back with my writing for another chapter. After this one, i might take a longer break to work on my other story before returning. I hope that is alright with all of you.

With that said, let's just jump Into it. I have been using the Author's note way too much!

Also, in light of this chapter, and as some may have noticed in chapter 3, I will take small tidbits from various franchises, be it skills, items or character-names, but I do NOT make any of them a fully fledged part of the story, means that those appearances will not be held as crossover-accountability. Consider them...easter eggs, if you will.

PS: I own nothing except my own additions.


Rune knights were present everywhere one would look within the Arena, locking it down and securing it.

Since the Contestants were cut out from the Memory-Cube, it is highly suspected that the interference was not accidental and so everyone was currently being investigated. It was red alert as far as the Grand Magic Games were concerned. However, after hours, the search went empty and so, a public apology needed to be issued.

Toma E. Fiore, otherwise known as the short king and father of Hisue, stepped into the Arena and held his mic up to his mouth, hesitating for a moment before he spoke.

"Dear guests and participants. I am truly sorry for all this trouble. It was never intended to go south the way it did, and it was not meant to involve anything other than a good outcome for all. As the king of this country and host of the Grand Magic Games, I truly apologize to all. But I am strongly convinced that a simple sorry is not going to be enough..."

Confusion and curiosity were now growing amongst all the involved. The king had a plan, but considering that just now had happened, people were more cautious.

"So I will take the bill for every spending conducted for the entire day. Which means that I, king Toma E. Fiore, will be paying single-handedly for everything you buy or damage for the whole day. All of you can go wild on food and accesoires as much as you desire!"

Immediately, roars and cheers of happiness eluded from the entire crowd that listened. Anything expense-covered will go on the house for 24 hours was an amazing gift. Needless to say, Fairy Tail celebrated the most because it means for once they would not be held accountable for property damage.

Even so, the King seemed to be rather low on spirits. Something else was up and he was going to announce that much in just a moment.

"There is one more commotion I must clear up". He started off and visibly shook with the hand that held the Microphone. This was a disaster, one that would definetly haunt him for quite some time. "It was never intended to be a Memorial Travel to the Tower of Paradise. Whoever hijacked the Cube altered what it was supposed to show. For what reason, We do not know".

Erza was, for obvious reasons, downright furious. While she didn't show it on the outside, anyone who knew her well enough knew that she was a volcano waiting to erupt. Something about this was so off, and once again, it comes down to her past. Her torture. Her sorrow. Her Jellal.

However, the matters were not closed just yet. The Morning-Games still needed to be decided and Erza would hold off until then.

"Now, for the programm of the morning" The King resumed his speech, once the crowd calmed down a bit. "Since the initial plan backfired, we prepared a back-up. Despite the minimal chance of it having been needed, we made security our first Priority and so we will summon a new game called 'Trial'".

Before the King could go on and explain however, he heard the voice of Mordregar from the commentator's microphones echo in the Arena.

"What 'Trial' basically is is a re-confrontation of your greatest Enemy in a non-lethal simulation. The battle will be measured in duration. Means the person who wins within the shortest time scores the most points. Simple. And to prevent lack of fairness from different scales of power, both the contestant's and the Simulation's magical qualities will be matched to be exactly equal".

It did sound fairly biased. Those who had the incredibly bad luck to fight a potential counter could very well walk out in defeat and score 0. A Magical screen appeared over the audience, several ones showcasing the list of contestants and their order of participation. Erza was first.

She stepped towards the center of the Arena while the other combatants left the field and went to the observatory corners of their respective guilds, awaiting the show of Titania. A lot of bets were placed on her going out victoriously because Erza, as far as everyone else is concerned, does not know such a thing as losing.

Erza requipped into her Heaven's wheel armor as she awaited for the Simulation to appear, however, once it did, it shocked her as well as everyone else.

The Simulation was another Erza Scarlet, clad in the same Heavens Wheel armor.

Mordregar chuckled into the Mic before deciding to explain. "When you look into a mirrow. All you see are regrets. Flaws. You see yourself in either the best you could be or the worst you've ever been. Thats one of the few ground rules human psychology always holds itself onto with. It goes for all living humans with sentient intelligence. Transcended, it means that you yourself are the one who knows all your flaws, all your weaknesses, every breaking point and every turning event. You are your own greatest enemy. And 'Trial' is a magical spell that reprojects the worst things about you into an outside image, creating your ultimate enemy. Yourself".

"This is bad" Erza thought as she threw a lot of blades at the projection which did the very same thing, each blade being countered by the opposite's blade, creating a perfect draw between the two.

Erza requipped into her Blackwing Armor and charged head on against the Projection and it did the same thing she did, changing to the Blackwing Armor and charged. They met at the very middle of the Arena, blades clashing with a furious power behind them, causing the ground to crackle a little each time they met.

Wolfheim scoffed at the Mic while watching the teo Erza's duke it out. "Hey hey hey..they are almost too evenly matched. This battle might take it's while unless one of them starts playing dirty tricks".

Sim-Erza (A/N: Gonna use a short-term name for the simulated versions of the characters) Requipped into the Morning Star Armor and focused her magical power into her twin blades before firing two sharp lines out at Erza who requipped into her Clear Heart Clothing and drew her Benisakura, cutting through the beams and dashed towards Sim-Erza, their blades clashing once more.

Due to the Morning Star's ability to manipulate Light, Sim-Erza used an emission of Light to blind Erza and made a solid swing at her right arm. Erza managed to narrowly dodge it, but a large cutting scrap across almost her whole upper arm was visible, blood flowing, albeit only minimally.

Sim-Erza Requipped yet again and this time wore her Ataraxia-Armor and let her 8 Blades dance, commanding them with the flicks of her wrist to slash at Erza who parried and dodged her attacks, but as the fight went on, more and more scraps appeared on Erza's body. Her Defence was breaking.

Erza made a daring and wide lunge backwards, backflipping a few meters away and focused herself, Requipping herself into an Armor Set that had yet to be known to the world. One of her newest additions.

As the Requipping finished, Erza stood in a pitch-black fullbody-Armor that possessed Scale-like surfaces and a pointy tail, the helmet shaped like a jaw.

"Dorma Anim-Armor!"

Natsu, Gajeel and Wendy got very clear flashbacks from where that Armor Came from. It was that Dragon-Armor which the king of Edolas used in an attempt to fight the Dragonslayer-trio, and horribly failed when he made the mistake of pissing them off enough.

Gildarts pat Natsu on the shoulder assuringly. "After the whole Acnologia-Catastrophy in Hargeon, Erza decided that she would never again be useless against anything Dragon-related, so we arranged a very Ethernano-costy travel to Edolas where we interrogated the former king under permission from the current king, Edolas-Jellal. He told us everything about how to build it, which material to use and all the details of his craftsmanship".

Natsu made wide eyes for a moment before he nodded his head and looked towards the Erza's again, focusing on the fight once more. "So she can use Dragon-Related magic in this Armor?"

"You catch on quick, Fire Brains". Gray mockingly noted before throwing Natsu's Scarf towards him. Natsu, got visibly furious and headbutted Gray before taking the scarf back.

"I KNEW IT! YOU TOOK IT!"

Gray pushed his forehead back into Natsu's and they engaged in their typical rivalrious anger-manangement exchange. "I had to, your Scarf is able to deflect death-magic".

Natsu suddenly stopped and made a more serious look again. He was just about to ask what Gray meant, but a loud Bang from the Arena took their attention.

In the time Natsu and Gray were having their arguing, Sim-Erza cut through Erza's Dorma Anim-Armor using the golden Scythe-Armor and used the incredibly sharp Scythe to cut through it. Erza laid on the ground, unable to comprehend how this happened.

"I am you" Sim-Erza began and jumped up high, preparing to dropkick Erza's face into the ground. However, Erza narrowly dodged by rolling to the side, pushing herself up from the ground with both arms.

"I know everything you know. I know every weakness of all your armors. You cannot win this". Sim-Erza continued, adding a mocking tone in her voice. Erza's eyes burned up with more focus, trying to come up with a plan.

"That Scythe is dangerous. Of course I knew as much, I collected it after all. But I had no idea it was able to cut through Obsidian" She thought to herself. She requipped once more, this time taking on her Purgatory-Armor.

"What, that useless goth-junk?" Sim-Erza noted with a condescending tone, remembering how that armor has been useless against Ikagura and Asuma, the two times it truly mattered.

Erza only focused herself more, taking on a Stance. Her legs were bent, she was ready to sprint, however her hands were positioned weirdly for a springing-stance. Her Right hand was put on her neck, as if scratching it, and her left hand was right at her foot.

"You should know that I made some upgrades on it". Erza replied to Sim-Erza before she jumped up very high into the air, using the way her hands were positioned to stretch herself as straight as she could, minimalizing Air-Collision to maximize the height she could achieve in one jump. Once she was high enough at roughly 2500 Feet, she gradually started to fall down, speeding up more and more until the ground came close.

Erza's collision with the ground caused almost the entire Capital city to shake and tremor, the impact causing a quake across the Area. The Arena-ground was considerably shattered and broken from the Impact of Erza with Sim-Erza. However, Erza's Meteor-Drop was ineffectinve since Sim-Erza requipped into her Adamantium-Armor and completely blocked the hit, reflecting all damage to the ground underneath.

Erza was at a loss for words, yet again one of her very strongest armors is proven so ineffective. That was when Sim-Erza struck. She Requipped, but only the shields, and summoned Benisakura, slashing across Erza's torso, causing her to fall back a few feet.

Erza let out a cry of pain from the cut and held herself at the cutting wound on her stomach, pressing down on the wound in an attempt to subdue the pain.

"I will repeat". Sim-Erza said and walked closer to Erza, using Benisakura to stab her left shoulder, aiming right through the nerves to completely incapacitate her arm.

"I know everything you know. I am you, and therefore I will never lose to you". Then Sim-Erza dared say something that Erza would pay her back for no matter what.

"It was that weakness, that lack of ruthlessness within you that allowed Simon to die".

Erza's eyes widened, her world went completely silent. This had to be just a taunt, something so spiteful could only be aimed at her to emotionally disrupt her.

"You are trying to make me angry, careless! I won't fall for it!" Erza roared and lifted herself up, letting Benisakura stab all the way trough her shoulder and headbutted Sim-Erza from below, hitting her chin. However, Sim-Erza only looked down at Erza and headbutted back, hitting considerably harder and knocked Erza's head down into the floor hard enough for said floor to crack a little.

Sim-Erza then requipped her left gauntlet, taking the Morning Star Armor's gauntlet instead and lifted Erza up with her right hand, leaving Benisakura to impale her shoulder. She focused a ray of light in her left fist and fired it right into Erza's gut, throwing her across half the Arena before Erza hit the ground and then she rolled around on the ground for a bit more before halting.

"You think I would lie about this?" Sim-Erza roared and summoned her Ataraxia-blades right above Erza, letting them rain down on her body, impaling Erza's body on several different spots.

Erza could only let out cries of pain as the 8 blades impaled both her hands and feet and her knees and elbows, completely nailing her to the ground and immobilize everything other than her head.

Sim-Erza then walked closer to Erza and Summoned the Scythe from the Scythe-armor once again, aiming it at Erza's neck.

"I am everything you hate about yourself. All your weaknesses, all your regrets, all your misery. I am the truth of everything you failed to do. If you didn't carry even a remote responsibility for Simon's passing, I wouldn't be able to know".

Erza's eyes widened once more, this time her vision went nearly black. She looked up to Sim-Erza who readied her Scythe to strike down at Erza's neck.

However, She stopped when she suddenly felt a massive surge in Erza's magical properties. Something was changing, and it did so a lot.

Erza's mind was overloading. First the Tower of Paradise memory, then her projection taunting her. She was being thrown back into her past once again, and she didn't want it anymore. She dealt with it for so many years, suffered so much pain and so many fights because of it.

It had to stop.

"IT HAS TO STOP!" She roared in her mind.

Sim-Erza dashed back a lot all of a sudden. Erza was doing something that clearly threatened her simulated counterpart enough to make her back away.

Erza was soon engulfed in a pitch-black, dark light that surrounded her body, dissolving the 8 Ataraxia-blades and Benisakura alike. Her body soon rose from the ground and she balled both fists, roaring out a loud warcry into the sky while the black light completely engulfed her.

She continued to roar out, a mixed tune of hatred and pain in her voice until the Black light subdued and Erza stood there in a Pitch-black pair of jeans, a black pullover and a Militant combat-vest over her upper body. Said vest had one specific trait on it which had it stand out, which was a painted, white Skull with 4 teeth pointing down, reaching all the way to her belly.

Erza's face was distorted in anger, teeth bared and clenched, fists balled.

Mordregar leaned forward from the Commentator's seats as he noticed her armor and whistled into the microphone. "Now this is something you don't get to see every day".

Wolfheim and Hyberion also leaned closer to their seats, the level of magic coming from her new Armor-ish clothing tipping the scale of everything Erza's magic was known for.

Mordregar decided to enlighten the situation since a lot of spectators seemed to be rather confused since they didn't know what it was.

"Listen, dear audience. This is a very special occasion and one you all should burn into your memories". Mordregar began, glancing over at Fairy Tail's guild-section to notice that some of them looked his way, caught by his announcement.

"This is one of the few things in this world that possesses no recorded documents and can only be studied in the ancient Archives of Count Honnaheck, the legendary Librarian-wizard claimed to be the only human to ever gain knowledge of our world's complete history. While the Archives itself are since decades no secret anymore, it's containments have barely been scratched. But the thing I was able to take from the decyphered content was something I couldn't really tell what it was until now when I saw it in person".

Hyberion tipped the Microphone to test if the sensitivity was okay since he wasn't a loud speaker. "Explain, Mordregar".

"Gladly" The Number one replied. "Before magic existed, before this world we knew, there was a time where this world was just humans. No magical beings, no Ethernano. It was an age dominated by technology and war alone. A time that is accursed of being the worst of all of human history. And within this time, there existed one human who stood out above all others".

As Mordregar explained, Erza dashed towards Sim-Erza, her speed having improved drastically so she caught Sim-Erza off-guard and landed a solid punch in her chest, tossing her back a lot. However, before Sim-Erza even came to a halt, she felt Erza's foot kick her in the back and toss her high into the air. After such, Erza let out another loud warcry and dashed up into the air, throwing a rain of punches at Sim-Erza which she tried to block, but even that took a heavy toll. Her arms were heavily bruised, she could swear she had several bone-fractures.

"He was a man who was driven so far by his desire for revenge, by his agency of madness, that his name is one of the very few things that survived the great catastrophy that reset all time known to Man, the catastrophy that marked Year X000".

Erza let out more Warcries as she continuously assaulted Sim-Erza with furious blows, gripping her head by the hair and rotated her a few times before catapulting her back to the ground. Before Sim-Erza could even remotely recover from the landing, she was dropkicked into the ground by Erza who aimed down with both her knees into Sim-Erza's stomach, burrowing all the way down to the mines that were 'Accidentally' Discovered a few years back when Natsu and Gajeel fought Sting and Rogue.

"This man lost his family to criminality, but had the misfortune to survive. So what did he do? He avenged them, of course. However, he did so by mercilessly killing his way all the way to the root of all evil. In his wake, in his time of reign over Vigilante-justice, this man murdered hundrets of thousands of people, all criminals. His name was branded in the books of history under many titles. Reaper of the damned, Boogeyman-killer, but there was one name that stuck out the most. One name he was known amongst to all of his fellow humankind".

Sim-Erza managed to get up onto her feet. Her body was bloodied, her arms were useless from having her bones cracked and broken on too many spots at once. She was profusedly bleeding from her nose and mouth, coughing nothing but blood. Her legs were wobbly, her eyes halfway closed. She barely managed to stay conscious in the state she was in.

Erza clapped both her hands together and raised them above her head, like she would do so with a blade if she had one in her hand.

"Semper Fidelis!"

Erza Aimed her hands down at Sim-Erza, causing the spell to break and the Simulation to destroy itself after being cut clean in two.

Mordregar waited for the Spell to finish it's disappearance before he ended his own monologue.

"The name he was known for was 'The Punisher'. And Erza has somehow found and adapted his clothing. His 'Armor' If you will. It possesses the capability to pump it's wearer full with Adrenaline, subdueing all pain no matter how great it is. It fuels it's wearer by sheer hatred and vengeance alone to the point where the wearer becomes so immune to anything other than their own anger that their body stops responding to anything else. Cut her arm off, she will not stop. Cut her head off, she will not stop. Dismantle her atom by atom and she will not stop. As long as she bears hate in her heart and wears this armor, Erza becomes absolutely undefeatable until her enemy lies defeated before her. That is why it is known as the 'Undying Punisher-Armor'".

Erza's Punisher-Armor dissolved itself and she fell down on the ground, instantly Knocked out by the drain of magical power as well as the injuries sustained in her short but brutal battle with herself.

Rune-knights immediately rushed to her aid and carried her to the hospitalization wing where Porlyusica would be waiting.

The pumpkinman caught himself again after a very long stare and finally announced the results.

"Erza Scarlet wins her trial!"

However, despite the announcement, no cheers were made. Instead, amongst the audience, specially amongst the guilds, only a silent sorrow was shared. What they had seen today was something that would be branded into their memory for years to come.

The day Titania awoke the depths of her own madness.


Welp, I sure do love to drop some synergetic surprise-content.