Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail. Hiro Mashima does. This story was made for fun, and not for cash. (How unfortunate.)

The First Contest: The Fair Competitor and The Sore Loser

Lucy and Sting were currently sitting down at a table in the Sabertooth guild to have breakfast on this calm morning, as they wanted to have some plates of waffles to eat, and let's just say that today was going to be quite eventful. In fact, it was quite an important day for Lucy because this was where she would really get her chance to shine. This was the day of the Magic Contest that would take place in the town of Hakudan, the place where some beginners would tend to go for their first Contest Ribbon, and Lucy was quite excited for it. She was smiling happily while sitting down with Sting and Lector, her brown eyes full of determination for this great event.

The brown-eyed girl had spent the whole week with trying to improve her Darkness Magic, wanting to make her four spells become stronger while she also created four new spells as well, and Lucy knew that getting her abilities up to a good level would help her do well in the Magic Contest. She was not exactly a superb pro, however, so Lucy couldn't really expect to do better than everybody else. On top of that, Lucy was also smart enough to take into account that the other competitors could also be very good. She certainly needed to be ready for whoever she'd face off against, but there was one task that she had to take care of.

That was the appeal round, the portion of the Magic Contest where mages would have to show off the grace and beauty of their spells, and Lucy had truly trained for that. Battling was quite great, as Lucy could figure out the best moves to help her win in a fight, but appealing to judges was a whole different matter Trying to impress the judges would be the most mysterious part of a Magic Contest, as there was no surefire way to determine what they liked to see, and that began to make Lucy be a bit wary. She couldn't get careless with her performance, not even messing up a spell, and getting past the appeal round would make her breathe a sigh of relief.

Despite the fact that Lucy was slight nervous about her first Magic Contest, though, she knew that doing horribly in any of the rounds was not a good option. She really wanted to show off her abilities to Sting, as he'd probably be cheering her on, and he wanted to see her do greatly with her performances. The blue-eyed male had seen Lucy's practice sessions in the park, clapping happily for the times that she made her spells look incredibly beautiful, and Lucy knew that it would be bad to let Sting down. He was her main supporter, since Minerva laughed when Lucy once told her that she wanted to enter a serious Magic Contest, so there was no room for error.

The blonde-haired mage also realized that she would have to know the full set of rules about Magic Contests, as she'd hate to get disqualified on her first try, and Lucy had also heard about the rules from Sting. Some battles would have time limits, similar to the Grand Magic Games, and scoring a knockout on the opponent would be an automatic win for Lucy. If the timer ran out, the person with the most points remaining would win. If a tie occurred before the final round, though, then both competitors would be eliminated. All types of magic were welcome, but certain types of magic were restricted in the Grand Contest Festival.

"Hey, Lucy. I hope you're ready for today, and I know you'll be kicking everyone's butts." Sting told her in a calm tone while smiling happily, as he thought about how it would all go down.

Lucy told him in a somewhat nervous tone of voice, as she was starting to feel a mix of timidness and confidence, "I really hope I'll get a chance to shine. It's not like I'm the worst mage.. I mean, I'm a rookie at this.."

Sting could tell that his friend was not exactly feeling sure about entering the Magic Contest in Hakudan Town, and he made his left hand touch her right hand while he let her know that there would be nothing to worry about. The user of Light Dragon Slayer Magic told Lucy that he would be in the audience, so she would just have to let her eyes focus solely on him. Sting had a caring look in his beautiful blue eyes while he told Lucy that she could think of doing her performance as a tribute to him, and she did not need to stress over what the judges would think. After all, worrying about something would most likely make it fail to work out.

Lucy began to blush while she had looked at Sting, really liking his words of encouragement, and Lector also let Lucy know that the contest in Hakudan Town was strictly for beginners. Since Sting had been the one to really popularize the Magic Contests on this side of Fiore while he had also been a famous guild master, he had the right to set different levels of difficulty for the Magic Contests in different places. Contestants would have to show their Ribbon Cases before official entry, so someone who won a green ribbon could not obtain another. After all, it wasn't fair to people who traveled far and wide to become the best Magic Coordinators.

Lucy received a pink ribbon case from Sting on the previous day, which meant that she would have a place to keep her Contest Ribbons, and the cute girl with brown eyes pulled it out of the left pocket of her blue skirt. She had worn a simple white T-shirt and cerulean blue flat shoes as well, since she didn't really know which dress would be the best for a Magic Contest, and Lucy looked quite stylish. She also had her hair down while wearing a black bow on the left side of her head, and Lucy let her cheeks become filled with a pink blush while Sting told her about some good combos that would really get the audience excited.

Not only would the judges be doing the judging, but they would also be making sure that there were no signs of cheating involved. For example, magical power that got cancelled out in a sudden manner by unknown means would result in both competitors losing. The Raven Tail guild's antics from the Grand Magic Games in the previous year had reached the news of Magic Coordinators, and anyone who was foolish enough to have unauthorized assistance would be disqualified for at least five years. Lucy hoped that nothing bad would happen, and she slowly got up out of her chair.

Lucy raised her arms high above her head, before stretching them out in opposite directions, and she looked at a nearby clock on the guild's left wall to see that it was 9:30 a.m. right now. The Magic Contest would start in 1 hour and 30 minutes, but Lucy decided to get a head start to Hakudan Town. Sting had guided her there three times in the past week, and she wasn't shocked to see him get up with the intent to race her there. Lector followed the duo while they giggled with joy, really seeing that Lucy was pretty excited for her first Magic Contest, and it seemed like nothing could go wrong.

Meanwhile, at the Fairy Tail guild...

Gray and Juvia were both thinking about the fact that they were lucky to get out of Kinan Town with no severe injuries, as they had fled from the job that required them to give a good battle to someone who disliked weak mages, and the black-haired male was quite shocked by what he had to deal with. That battling style was not standard at all, causing Gray to be utterly thrown off by how his opponent used her spells, and the ice mage was surprised at how even his ice was no match for his opponent's fire. Gray's ice was normally quite strong, but this girl's flames tore through it.

Juvia thought it would be an easy mission that could satisfy anyone, but the opponent used flames in such unorthodox ways to really throw off the Rain Woman. Her technique of fusing fireballs together was really a new move for the Fairy Tail mages to see, and even some spinning twisters of flames were quite strange. Those twisters shot out fireballs, causing Gray to realize that the client was no ordinary mage, and he retreated with Juvia. While Gray had been the type of person to give up, he had also been stunned by lava puddles that viciously exploded from within the ground's cracks. Really, weren't those flames cleverly used?

They had gotten no reward for the job, as Gray thought that their lives were far more important, and Fairy Tail was not used to that style of battling. Normally, people like Gray would use standard attacks and create strategies when it was a dire situation. Magic Coordinators, however, would get creative while making standard battling look very tactical. In a sense, brute force would not be very useful against mages who were quite clever. Gray still remembered how the opponent could make a shield of fire surround herself, and she sent his icy projectiles back as flaming spears. That was quite brutal, was it not?

The explosive power was far more dangerous than any flames that Natsu could create, which was really saying a lot, and Gray looked quite frustrated at how he was not able to defeat a powerful mage. Well, to be fair, she had been one of the best winners in Magic Contests. Kinan Town was a place that had really been meant for just the elite people, meaning that anyone who wasn't up to the standards would not be considered worthy, and even being in Fiore's best guild did not mean a thing. After all, being the winners of the Grand Magic Games gave Fairy Tail no real correlation to being experts with Magic Contests.

In fact, they did not even really know what the contests were even about. Kinan Town was an exquisite town with a place known as the Battle Maison, which was where the most skilled people in Magic Contests could go, and the Battle Maison was a fancy place where only the finest mages could fight each other. It was no place for people like Gray and Juvia, who couldn't even land one blow, and they definitely needed to meet the qualifications as well. They were only allowed into the Battle Maison because it was part of a job that was created by a client, which was allowed, but they wouldn't be allowed in on matters that were unofficial.

Juvia asked Gray in an apologetic tone while having regret in her blue eyes, thinking that it was her fault that they lost, "Gray-sama, was Juvia too weak to help you?"

The ice mage replied calmly, trying to tone down his frustration, "No, Juvia. We simply took on the wrong opponent. She was not normal."

Gray recounted the thoughts of how there were spectators even whispering that the mages from Fairy Tail had to be fools for taking on one of the Battle Maison's most elite people, and getting a public butt-kicking was not exactly the best thing for a person's reputation. He even created ice in the ocean, since the ocean's water had been quite cold, but that didn't help at all. The opponent was far too strategic for him to handle, even going as far to make the flames detonate around the ice for the sake of creating intense heat waves, and Gray did not know what he'd even be able to tell the other members of Team Natsu.

Erza would probably scold him for failing at a job so miserably while Natsu would laugh in his face, and Lisanna would probably be the only person to feel any sympathy for Gray. It wasn't his fault that he and Juvia got stuck with fighting an opponent who used abnormal moves, as Juvia did not even know what the job would truly entail, and the male with dark blue eyes had at least tried to put up a fight. It wasn't enough for him to win, though, and Gray really never liked it when he lost to any opponents. This loss reminded him of when he lost in the event known as "Hidden" in last year's Grand Magic Games, and that was humiliating.

To be fair, though, the only upside to this loss was that no one had been interfering with him during the fight. Gray still wanted redemption, as he began to clench his fists tightly in frustration, and he knew that getting stronger would really be the key to never running away from a fight ever again. He could also see that Juvia also hated to know that they did a pathetic job on that request, and they would simply have to pick out jobs that were more reasonable for their skills. After all, this loss was a real wake-up call for them. Well, it was truly a wake-up call for Juvia.

She realized that they could've ended up dead on that job, had Gray not grabbed Juvia's hand for the sake of running away from the fight, and they'd probably suffer the same fate that Lucy did. Even though it was never confirmed that she was dead, Juvia didn't want to actually end up dead. She did not want a fiery end to send her into the afterlife, as this poor choice in job choosing had been really detrimental, and Juvia was feeling lucky that she did not lose her life. Of course, this one occurrence of luck would not come in a streak. After all, relying on luck was something that could either be good or bad.

Both of the mages began to look quite down while they thought about how this loss meant that there were some strong enemies lurking around Fiore, enemies far stronger than what they could handle, and it seemed like their foes would also be getting smarter as well. Brute force meant nothing to the woman who beat down Gray and Juvia with flames, as the fire was used in strategic ways, and there was really no way to take out a foe who possessed such a high level of intelligence. Magic Coordinators were certainly an interesting type of wizards, as they could make some crafty attacks, and they were quite dangerous. (Note: The woman who beat Gray and Juvia will be revealed later on, so don't think I'm forgetting to specify a name.)

Elsewhere, in Hakudan Town...

Lucy and Sting arrived in Hakudan Town, a town that had been surrounded by a large stone wall, and the mages took notice of how the town had brick pathways that were interwoven between European-style buildings. There was a large flower-shaped statue on top of a fountain that had blue water flowing quite beautifully, and some of the townspeople had gardens behind their houses. The gardens were filled with flowers that came in different colors, which was quite cool to look at, and the scent of mint perfume flew through the air to make Lucy sigh happily. This town had its own little Mint Perfume Shop, so its scent went well with the flowers that also smelled great.

The trees behind the wall had been situated on lovely green grass that had been taken care of quite well, as it looked very clean, and the gentle breeze of wind blew some green leaves off of the trees. While they slowly flew into town, Lucy curiously looked around for the building where Hakudan Town's Magic Contest would be taking place. She had a puzzled look in her cocoa brown eyes while she noticed that most of the buildings had red rooftops, but Sting calmly told her that the building for contests was nearby. It was a large building that had a pale green rooftop, and the golden ribbon painted on the front of the roof was not quite hard to miss.

Lucy and Sting walked towards the building's blue automatic sliding doors to see them slowly open up, and they let the two mages see the lobby of the place. It simply had blue walls with light green tiles on the floor, and the red reception desk was right across from the entrance. There was an open doorway to the left of the desk, and it led to the backstage area where the competitors would mostly be when they were waiting for their battles or turns in appeal rounds to begin. The doorway to the right side of the desk, however, was a simple hallway that led to the audience seats in the main room where the Magic Contest rounds would take place.

With a great look of delight on her face, Lucy pulled out the pink Ribbon Case from the left pocket of her blue skirt for the sake of showing it to the receptionist. Sting let her know that this would confirm that she was indeed a rookie, which meant that she qualified for this Magic Contest, and the blue Lacrima Crystal on the desk began to scan Lucy's face while it also scanned the dark green guild mark that was now on the right side of her waist. This scan was done for the sake of putting a person's face on the Lacrima Vision screens that would appear in the auditorium, as well as making them appear in events that could take place in a jungle or a desert, so it was a cool little feature of Magic Contests.

After the brown-eyed girl had gotten her Ribbon Case back from the receptionist, Lucy was told that she would have to go wait backstage with the other contestants who had already arrived. She really didn't want to part ways with Sting so early, but he gave her a warm kiss on the cheek for good luck. The blue-eyed dragon slayer let his good friend know that he'd be sitting down in the front row while cheering her name, and she could bring her skills down on any of the other competitors. Lector also wished Lucy good luck while giving her a high-five, and he confidently smiled while telling her to think about being the strongest wizard in the competition. The two mages parted ways from each other, Lector following Sting to the auditorium, and the day seemed to be going well.

20 minutes later, backstage...

When Lucy had gone backstage to open a door that featured seven girls wearing fancy dresses while guys who wore different-colored tuxedos had walked in, she could only look somewhat embarrassed at the fact that she didn't get dressed up at all for Hakudan Town's Magic Contest. Even though she had known in advance by Sting and Minerva that it would be good to not look like a casual rookie, Lucy still made that mistake. She was able to brush it off, however, and began to think about her performance that would transpire in the appeal round. Whatever she did, it had to impress the judges.

She took notice of how some of the girls were trying to use their magic to juggle or attempting to use it in some kind of dance routine, and Lucy also noticed that some of the guys were just looking really chilled out while smirking a bit. One guy with dark green hair tied in a long ponytail had even rudely nudged Lucy while he walked by, muttering something about how he deserved this more than any of the rookies, and Lucy started to glare at him while hearing him say that they weren't even real beginners. If they were lesser than him, then why the heck was he even here right now? Really, wasn't Lucy grouped in with some interesting people?

The blonde-haired girl also noticed that there was now a Lacrima Vision screen right in front of her, causing her to step back for a moment, and Lucy began to see it create a little slideshow of the faces of people who had registered for this Magic Contest. She also got to see that some of these people had guild marks while some of the contestants spoke of how this contest would give them enough popularity to join a cool guild, and Lucy even got to hear that a few of the girls wanted to be strong like the great Minerva Orlando. If they wanted to be at her level, they had better hope that they never crossed paths with Erza. For some reason, though, the guy with dark green hair was not seen. Was that a glitch, perhaps?

Lucy even dropped her jaw at the screen now turning to the judges who sat at a table that was to the left side of the golden rectangular stage, and Rufus Lohr was one of them. He simply took the job of substituting for the judge who had gotten sick yesterday, and Rufus was the type of guy who could tell if a performance was worthy for a Magic Contest. The next judge was a woman named Kasumi Tanaka, and she wore a green shirt with white jeans while her long black hair fell to her hips. She also wore glasses over her green eyes, and the glasses had red frames. The final judge was a man with short black hair, and he simply wore a black business suit with black pants to match.

This man was known as Takumi Takahashi, the director of the Magic Contest Comittee, and he simply smiled happily while waving at the audience. The announcer of the event was a woman with purple hair who wore a fancy red dress with fancy black shoes to match, and this lady's name was Yuki Aizaki. She had a white card in her left hand that displayed the order of how the contestants would perform before the final eight would be shuffled into four different matches, and Yuki also had a microphone in her right hand. She was about to start welcoming the audience to the Magic Contest on this fine day, but Lucy's ears would have to hear something different.

"Hey, you. I'm Eita Suzuki. Just know that I'm gonna outshine all the losers here today. It'll be really nice to see, and that ribbon will be mine. After all, a garden of idiots watching me will be nice." The green-haired male rudely told Lucy while pulling out a dark green tome from the left pocket of his khaki pants.

Lucy retorted in a somewhat offended manner, "I don't think it's right to judge people who you hardly even know. Save the arrogance for the circumstance where you get to do a victory dance."

She noticed that Eita wore some shoes that were dark green like his T-shirt, and Lucy also noticed that this guy had orange eyes. He began to look at her in a rude manner, thinking that this would be a piece of cake because of how he trained for a year, but let's just say that this guy was not just planning to get that green ribbon. He'd be putting on a nice little show for the audience, and it would make him laugh with excitement. Lucy could see that there was something a bit off about Eita, but she couldn't really put her finger on it. Her thoughts were quickly dispelled by the announcement of the first performer who would take the stage, and it was a girl with long blue hair.

The Lacrima Vision screen let Lucy see that this girl looked quite confident, as she ran out of the door to go further down the hallway to be behind some red curtains, and Lucy also took notice of how Hikari wore a fancy blue dress. Her performance began quite quickly while the curtains opened up, as she spat out seven large bubbles of water from her mouth, and she fired some small needle-like projectiles of water at the bubbles that floated high in the air. They quickly turned into a multitude of small bubbles that popped in midair, creating a vast amount of blue glitter that seemed to make the audience look very happy, and even some kids were cheering greatly about it.

The judges gave Hikari some good critiques, Kasumi telling her that the simple display showed how she could create a stunning display of great beauty, and Hikari's blue eyes were filled with joy from hearing Rufus say that he wouldn't forget how the Magic Contest started off with a good performance. Takumi simply told Hikari in a calm manner that her performance was good, and she had a good chance to be in the next round. If she was that good, then how good would other people be? After Hikari had left the stage, Lucy simply noticed how the performances only lasted about one or two minutes at the most. There was a time limit of five minutes for a performance, by the way.

Surprisingly, five contestants created a shocking streak of unfortunate flubs. One girl accidentally shocked Kasumi with Lightning Magic, resulting in her elimination, and one guy was even nervous enough to make his Smoke Magic cover up the entire stage. His performance couldn't be seen at all, so he was cut from the competition. A girl with red hair had tried to dribble with a fireball, before it fizzled down into dust, and she was eliminated. Another girl became nervous enough to start singing horribly, which caused Kasumi to cover her ears while appropriately shouting in an annoyed tone, "Elimination, for sure!" The last loser was a guy with white hair who had tried to impress the judges with a yo-yo that was frozen over by his ice breath, which would seem like a winning performance, but the fact that the yo-yo became motionless in a chunk of ice was enough of a reason to remove him from the competition.

Lucy knew that she couldn't get nervous, as that would ruin her chances of winning, and she chose to not pay attention to the fact that the next person was quickly cut for using Earth Magic to create a rock that knocked them out when they threw it straight up into the air. Lucy knew that she was not going to mess up like an idiotic chump, as that would just be disgraceful to the guild of Sabertooth, and the blonde-haired girl looked quite confident while she walked out of the room to go down the hallway. Her turn was coming up quite soon, and Lucy also knew that Sting would be watching. He was gonna support her, and she couldn't let him down.

Yuki Aizaki announced to the crowd in an excited tone to get them pumped up, "All right, everyone! Let's give a warm welcome to Lucy Heartfilia from Hearthome Town! Some of you may have seen her in last year's Grand Magic Games, so this should be interesting!"

As the curtains opened up, Lucy ran out on to the stage with the intent to use the spell known as Shadow Seance, and she created four purple rings of Darkness Magic in midair. They were now forming a small square, which led Lucy into pulling out one of her Celestial Spirit Keys, and Lucy decided to open the Gate of The Ram. She summoned Aries for a brief moment, the pink-haired spirit looking apologetic while saying that she was sorry for making her wool very fluffy for today, and Lucy smiled with confidence while she told Aries to use Wool Shot at the center of the rings. The pink-haired spirit shot out four little bursts of wool that landed in the center of the rings, the pink fluff starting to become purple while the Darkness Magic caused it to levitate, but Lucy wasn't done yet.

She used a new spell known as Dark Soul, and this move simply caused a small violet vortex to form in between Lucy's hands. It grew quite large when she shot it out towards one of the rings, and the attack struck one of the purple bursts of wool. Instead of a large blast transpiring for a while, the violet blast only transpired for a moment while its waves of power caused the other rings to detonate as well. The purple blasts formed a square around Lucy, before resulting in a large amount of purple glitter falling down on to the stage, and the blasts faded away to let the judges and the audience see that Lucy and Aries were gracefully spinning around while enjoying the sight of the purple glitter like it was snow.

The audience also liked how some of the purple glitter had reached them as well, and Sting was cheering loudly for Lucy while he looked very pleased. Lector also shouted with joy, really liking Lucy's performance, and Lucy kept dancing around while the audience liked how the purple glitter had such a mystical quality to it. Lucy even made two purple flames dance around her and Aries in a circle, which was amazingly mystifying, and the cheers from the crowd were really showing the judges that this was a good performance. It was ghostly, but beautifully creative. After a few more seconds, Lucy sent Aries back to the Celestial Spirit World while she bowed politely to the crowd with a happy smile on her face.

Despite the fact that everyone in the audience seemed to like the performance, what in the world would the judges think about it? They'd either like it or hate it, and Lucy knew that Rufus would not be biased for a fellow mage in the Sabertooth guild. She began to twiddle her thumbs while giggling a bit, almost like she wasn't expecting the performance to go that well, and Lucy hoped that the judges wouldn't say anything too harsh. She could take constructive criticism, but Lucy was wanting the judges to not be incredibly rude like how Natsu would be. After all, he only had interest in talking about her faults while finding hardly anything good about her.

Rufus told her in a calm tone while smiling calmly, "Well, that performance is another one to really remember."

Kasumi spoke to Lucy in a delighted manner, an excited smile on her face while the feeling of amazement was in her green eyes, "Darling, that was splendid! Truly magnificent, if I may say that! You and your Darkness Magic worked in a great balance, and including your Celestial Spirit was a nice touch as well."

Takumi told Lucy in a stern tone while folding his arms, his eyes closed while looking somewhat stern, "Well, Lucy, I must tell you that I was shocked and completely appalled.. at how much I enjoyed that performance. You're not a klutz like the six people who just got cut, so we'll see if you did well enough to reach the next round."

Lucy could only open her mouth a bit while her eyes twinkled with delight, and she put the golden Celestial Spirit Key into the right pocket of her blue skirt. The blonde-haired girl cheered quietly to herself while walking off of the stage, proud that she did a good job, and hearing Sting cheer her name was something that caused her to blush a light shade of pink while she went back to the room where the other contestants were waiting. Hearing him give her that support had really helped Lucy bring out her best skills for that performance, and she would certainly have to thank him later for being such an awesome friend.

15 minutes later...

After the judges had made their decisions about who had the best performances out of the remaining 11 contestants left in the competition, all of the competitors were required to be on stage to directly receive these results. The top eight competitors would stay in the Magic Contest while three of them would be cut from the competition, and Yuki smiled happily while she had the card in her hand. The white card had the results on it while Yuki would read the names of the eight finalists, and she was quite excited to see who would move on to the battle rounds. After all, the quarter-finals led the semi-finals and the final battle.

The first name announced was Lucy Heartfilia, which really came as a shock to the brown-eyed girl, but the results were in no particular order. They weren't going to be from best performance to the worst out of the eight that were considered to be great, but Lucy's performance had been quite awesome. She smiled happily while hearing the audience cheer her name, especially from hearing Sting cheer excitedly while saying that was how Sabertooth mages could rock a Magic Contest, and Lucy was surprised to see some people even give her a standing ovation. They were really pleased with this result, were they not?

The next name to be called out was Hikari Azure, the girl who did a splendid job with the water bubbles, and the crowd also cheered greatly for her. A group of Hikari's fans sat next to Sting and Lector, rooting for her while saying that she could put Lucy in her place, and this caused the user of Light Dragon Slayer Magic to start booing about this result. He was quite surprised to see Lyon Vastia from Lamia Scale also booing in the audience, saying how any girl who wielded water would be no match for his sweet Juvia, and it seemed like some people from other parts of Fiore were starting to hear about Magic Contests.

Lucy turned around to notice that Eita was missing, which was weird like how Yuki seemed to have skipped over his performance because of how only fifteen were seen, and skipping over a name was something to only be done when someone wasn't present. Perhaps he had gone to the bathroom or something, but he would have to be a complete idiot with poor timing skills that tied in with drinking liquids or eating too much. Judging by how he had boasted about taking the green ribbon in this Magic Contest, there was no reason to skip over him without an explanation. What was going on?

Being a good competitor with curiosity, Lucy was about to ask Yuki and the judges about why Eita had been skipped over. However, there was something fishy about this. Why would he register for a Magic Contest, and miss the appeal round? He sounded like the Contest Ribbon would be his for the taking, so what was going on? As Lucy began to wonder about this, her brown eyes widened in pure shock from remembering that Eita had a dark green tome. He had said that his performance would be good to see, and a garden of idiots would be watching him. This greatly coincided with how Yuki happily stated that the battle portion of the Magic Contest would take place in the Hakudan Forest, but what happened next had really caused Lucy to see that this contest was about to be turned into no contest at all.

"All right, everyone! We'll have Lacrima Vision screens giving you footage from the forest battles that will take place in 15 minutes, so- Ahhhhhhhhhh!" Yuki stated with a happy smile on her face, before a giant brown plant root rose up from underground to constrict her.

Several more brown plant roots appeared from underneath the ground to strangle the other contestants, one of them almost being Lucy, and the audience looked shocked at what was going on right now. Sting couldn't even believe what he was seeing, as this didn't seem like part of the Magic Contest, but Lector alerted him to a guy who was using explosive green leaves to break open the glass case on a table near the stage. He laughed evilly while picking up the green ribbon from the case, before commanding a plant root to emerge from underground for the purpose of strangling Kasumi, and many people in the audience began to run away in terror.

The plant roots began to explode in large blasts that were dark green, severely injuring many of the contestants, and Lucy had created a purple flame to destroy a plant root that lunged at her. She narrowed her cocoa brown eyes while seeing that the thief causing this chaos was none other than Eita, as he smirked evilly while holding the green ribbon in his left hand like it was a trophy, and Lucy was quite shocked that this was what he had been talking about when he said that there would be a garden of idiots to watch him claim the ribbon. Whatever he was thinking, this was a complete violation of the rules.

"Eita, what the hell is your problem?! Don't you know that you have to win the battles, in order to get that?" Lucy asked angrily while clenching her fists.

Eita explained to her that a previously disqualified contestant didn't have to abide by stupid rules, and he claimed that this was payback for how Kasumi criticized his performance from last year as being violent with no room for any sort of beauty or flair to it. She said that he had a lot to learn, which caused him to try punching her in the face, but now he showed her that she had a lot to learn about his vicious Plant Magic. Eita calmly smiled while telling Lucy that playing fair was no fun for him, as he found it better to be unfair with destructive power that could blow away the other contestants with ease, and he could make threats like this with no consequences.

The male with green hair let anyone know that if they tried to attack him, then he'd constrict them to death. This building was built on grass, so it was no surprise that his plant roots could break through the floor of the building with ease. He even purposely made some plant roots slam down on the other competitors, before they exploded in dark green blasts of Plant Magic, and Lucy couldn't watch this any longer. She was going to fight Eita in a battle, but it wasn't for the ribbon. It was for everyone's safety, and to unknowingly avenge the death of a green-haired mage who had actually registered before Eita had taken him into an unattended hallway to kill him quickly with a plant root that stabbed him right in the heart.

Eita started off this battle by using a spell known as Fanged Vines, and this spell caused him to shoot out seven green vines from his left hand. They were spiky while also being dense like metal, and these vines could also explode. Lucy quickly countered by using a spell known as Dark Confusion, and this spell caused Lucy to move her hands in a psychic manner while she began to take control of Eita's vines. She moved her hands upward to make the vines rise up into the air, before they came back down to create violet blasts of Darkness Magic, and Lucy was definitely going to win.

She was caught off guard when Eita spit out some green seeds at her feet, though, and Lucy looked a bit shocked to see them create miniature dark green blasts of energy! She was sent flying up into the air, prompting Eita to jump high into the air for the sake of giving her a hard punch to the left eye, and the antagonist slammed his left elbow against Lucy's chest. She was sent crashing down into the ground, creating a cloud of smoke, and Rufus looked quite worried. He was about to go on the stage to fight Eita, but Sting gave him a look of refusal while telling him that no mage of Sabertooth would ever be defeated easily.

Lucy slowly stood up while telling Eita that this wasn't some silly game where the innocent contestants would be seen as toys for him to play with, and nothing good could ever come out of breaking rules to get revenge. She activated a new spell known as Dark Gurabirei, and this move simply caused Lucy to shoot out a purple sphere of energy from her left hand. It simply floated in midair while doing absolutely nothing which caused Eita to laugh at her in a hysterical manner, and Lucy found herself having to deal with a very dangerous spell. In fact, it seemed pretty hectic.

Eita used a move known as Garden's Frenzy, and this move caused him to shoot out a copious amount of green thorns from his right hand! They all headed straight for Lucy, causing her to leap back, and she found herself having to deal with many dark green blasts of energy that transpired! Lucy took notice of how the sharp thorns near the purple sphere of gravity had now turned violet, causing her to throw one straight at Eita, and she did not even care that he created a tree for the sake of blocking it. That little purple thorn gave her a clue about how to make this plant-wielding villain get a taste of his own creations.

As more of the thorns began to turn purple, Lucy chose to throw them all at Eita while she seemed like it had to be done in a furious frenzy. She saw that he could only create so many types of plant-based attacks with limits to his power, as he now created a Venus Flytrap that was starting to melt because he didn't have enough magical power to perfectly summon it, and the green-haired villain was shocked to see Lucy follow up with a move known as Dark Crescent. This spell caused a purple crescent-shaped projectile to be in her hand, and she threw it into the path of the purple thorns! They began to become attached to it, increasing its power to quite a high level, and what happened next was quite epic.

Many massive purple blasts of Darkness Magic transpired, mainly forming a small circle around Eita, and that was because the Dark Gurabirei spell actually made gravity be focused around the target. It also converted all spells around itself to be part of Darkness Magic, so it was a nice way to make a move betray its owner. Lucy could hear Eita screaming in pain from the blasts that were striking him with great precision, and the purple clouds of smoke cleared up to reveal that he was struggling to stand while he had been covered in blood. It looked like he really didn't know his own strength, if it had been enhanced to such a deadly level.

"I'm.. not planning to lose here. I'll get that Contest Ribbon and redemption for last year, even if I have to kill you. It deserves to be mine." Eita told Lucy in a serious tone while preparing to put all of his power into one final attack.

Lucy responded while sighing in annoyance, closing her eyes, "You know, it's too bad that you think something is rightfully yours when you don't deserve it. You don't care who you have to hurt, in order to satisfy yourself? That's too bad. Someone like you will never know how it feels to care about other people, and that's why I'll defeat you."

Eita put his power into creating one giant plant root that was headed straight for Lucy, even making the root grab her by the legs to slam her against the walls, and he was surprised to see that Lucy wasn't giving up. Even as she was getting slammed around the room, her body being covered in bruises and blood, Lucy was creating the eighth spell of Darkness Magic. It was known as Lunar Gravity Crush, and this spell caused the gravity around Eita to shift quite weirdly. It sent him up toward the ceiling, which really made him scream in pain, and the gravity came up towards him in the form of ten purple beams! He couldn't move at all, and this move could really blow the roof off of the place.

Even though it would cause ten massive blasts of energy to transpire while purple fireballs could rain down from to sky to strike opponents, Kasumi aimed her left hand at the move to cancel it out with her magic. She let Eita fall to the ground, but Rufus was nice enough to heal the guy with his Memory-Make Magic. He also memorized Minerva's Territory Magic, teleporting Eita to the center of the stage while glaring at him for ruining the Magic Contest, and Rufus wasn't shocked that everyone else glared at Eita as well. Sting and Lector were the only people who didn't leave the auditorium in terror, so they got to see how this would all end.

Eita wondered how he was suddenly feeling better while he could now move without any injuries, but he quickly bolted out of the building from seeing that the competitors were angrily glaring at him for what he had done. The antagonist left the green Contest Ribbon and his dark green tome behind, making some of the female competitors think that he was too scared to continue a battle, and the weird thing was that the battle ended when Kasumi had stopped it. She saw it as a battle in a Magic Contest, meaning that there was a time limit of five minutes, and a battle in Magic Contests could be stopped when there was a clear victor.

Kasumi put the green Contest Ribbon on top of the green tome while smiling at Lucy, telling her in a very pleased manner, "Killing is not allowed in Magic Contests, but that's not entirely why I stopped the fight. Lucy Heartfilia, you saved our lives and showed off absolute creativity with your moves. Therefore, this green ribbon has been earned by you."

As Lucy was quite shocked to see Kasumi stretch out her arms to hand her the prizes that she had earned, Sting could only come up to the stage with a happy look on his face. He hugged Lucy in an affectionate manner while telling her about the fact that her battle was extremely awesome, and some of the competitors even calmly stated that it was like watching a fight in the final round of the Magic Contest. In that sense, winning a battle that was like the final match had meant that Lucy truly just won her first Magic Contest. She turned around to the other competitors for the sake of seeing if they had any arguments, but people agreed when Hikari Azure let Lucy know that she deserved it for saving everyone from a vicious guy who really could've killed the other beginners.

Lucy stated in a happy tone while she began to smile, holding up the dark green tome and the natural green ribbon in her right hand, "All right! I just earned my first ribbon! This is definitely going in my Ribbon Case!"

Sting smiled a bit while wanting to know if Lucy wanted to celebrate by going out for some pizza, but he was quite surprised to see that her response was a kiss to his lips. It was her way of thanking him for supporting her today, even if the Magic Contest did not go as planned, and Lucy blushed while Sting wrapped his arms around her waist. She felt really glad that she was starting to become a skilled mage, especially since she used her intelligence to beat someone who only thought that strength was needed in Magic Contests, and let's just say that her great performance in the appeal round with great critiques had really caused Lucy to start getting ideas for the contests in the future.

How was Chapter 10? Did you like it? Lucy has done well in her first Magic Contest, but winning will not always end up being somewhat easy. With that being said, however, this victory has improved the StiCy! In fact, Sting and Lucy will decide to celebrate with some fun. Will Lucy's victory be realized, though? Standby for the update!