Bora, previously of Titan Nose, yawned with his hand lazily attempting to cover his mouth. The sun was not even up yet, it would not be up for at least two hours. Yet here he was in the WorthWood Sea traveling with his new team, or rather a new team concocted by their boss who seemed as serious as a circus and just a sane as one.
"Why are we even here?" Bora asked while he rubbed his eyes.
"Ya don't know?" The criminal mage had to briefly ask himself if he was still half asleep due to the fact to his left was a green skinned troll who just spoke now. But his sober mind did in fact confirm and remind the rest of his brain that Bora was now working with other species. "Didn't ya get the message from da boss?"
Oshen was his name, and he was the very first troll Bora ever met. He was tall, lanky, but even then he was surprisingly muscular. He had two large tusks growing from the side of his teeth and the tusk on his right was chopped off and decorated with decorated bands. He wore a leather tunic with long brown leggings, a belt that contained many pouches and bags and he held a staff, or a crooked stick with carvings in the shape of animals.
"I..." Bora tried to think back to many of his confusing interactions with the man in charge of one of the most elaborate crime syndicate he could ever fathom. "He gave me a coupon for a restaurant called 8-Island?"
"I told him to come, Oshen." Fero spoke out from ahead while still looking at a piece of large paper that looked like a map. "Boss told me that he wants us to find a specific book that was hidden away in a special ruined city here in the Worth Wood Sea. From prior research, I think he was referring to Nirvana."
Bora snapped his head towards the one leading the three of them. "Wait, Nirvana? As in the rumored weapon that may or may not exist? What makes you think it's there?"
"As I said: I did research. According to some of our older members, Nirvana was a very advanced human city that was sealed away by it's makers and our boss wants a specific type of book hidden in their library." Bora wanted to ask how older members knew that, but his mind went to Oshen and the fact that around Otwill, he could see many different species. He wasn't expecting some older races to be part of the syndicate, but then again, he probably only scratched the surface of that place with how vast everyone made it sound and how little of it he actually saw.
Bora raised his brow. "Wait, so let me get this straight: he wants us, only three guys, to search for a legendary city no one's been able to find before, just to get a book?"
Oshen hummed as he brought his free arm under his chin. "What else did he say, Cell Leader?"
"He said a lot of casual things. But from what I got from his casual monologues was that he had someone with clairvoyance magic pay close attention to when and where we could find this book." Fero stopped and turned to the two, showing the map he was holding. A specific area was circled and a specific time around the afternoon was shown for that date. "This is where we need to be at this time. I'm currently moving us to a nearby cliff so we can overlook the area."
"We have a clairvoyant, like seeing the future accurately than simple fortune telling?" Bora asked in surprise. "Isn't that magic like... impossible?"
The blue haired mage flinched when he felt a large slap on his back which stung quite a bit. Oshen had done that, apparently laughing as he did then said, "Sha'tarn, we be having many types of magic. Der be nothing impossible in dis here world!"
Bora didn't even know what Sha'tarn was before a voice brought his attention back. "You're both right." Fero dismissed. "Even though we have a clairvoyant, or more than one—I've never met any of them, I was told by the boss that their clairvoyance, while accurate, has drawbacks on the users. It's one of the reasons why he gave me few details as possible."
"Isn't he just being lazy?"
"I guess it's a bit of both really. We're still supposed to be doing this job." Fero responded to Oshen's comment.
"So we sit around and wait?" Bora was surprised at how simple this all sounded. With such an expansive and big underground syndicate, he kinda expected—well, robbing some top secret stuff from the Magic Council, dealing with magic unheard off, like those bloated stories always write about.
"Basically, but there is a stipulation." Fero looked back to Bora. "Do you remember when you and I, with the boss, had to unload a large shipment of specialized Rhodonite Drugs to one of the major Dark Guilds?"
How could he forget? Meeting one of the infamous leaders of the Balam Alliance? He thought he was going to get a heart attack when they went to Phantom Lord. Just meeting two of the Oracion Seis, one of them being their leader, and one being a guy who liked to talk about money, was almost enough to put poor Bora into a coma if not for Fero watching his back.
"We've received intel that the Oracion Seis is going to be around this area too. Our team is going to a touch and go mission. The few of us go in and get out before we're found by our business partners and whatever war their planning to wage against."
Bora swallowed his spit. He just had to ask, didn't he?
"Still, we should remain low as possible. I have some equipment, along with Oshen's own concoctions that should prevent us from being found by any magical means. The mission is doable, Bora, have some faith."
Bora really did have faith in his new Cell Leader's plan. When the forrest was set ablaze, Fero kept them calm and told them to wait, when magical energies kept rising around them, they still weren't found, when against all odds, the legendary city of Nirvana was summoned and flying right before them, at that point, Bora knew trusting Fero would get him far.
It was probably his fault for letting his guard down because he thought they were practically home free after all that waiting near a dangerous area, but they were eventually found out by one of the last people he even expected to find him no less!
"Bora! Run and find it! Oshen, pray!"
The former Titan Mage didn't need to be told twice before Fero pulled an impressive move by launching a bookcase down on the people who had found them. Bora ran to get away from the impact but was able to see Fero staring down that pink haired kid who apparently burned down one part of the ship. Bora watched as Fero said something before unleashing a wave of strings aimed right for the neck of the dragon slayer. Bora wasn't fast enough to even process the move, but at the last second, a pink haired monk with black highlights tackled Natsu out of the way from being hit, but in the process made the fire mage knock his head on the floor and close his eyes.
Fero instantly snapped his head back towards Bora. "I said, look for the book!"
Whatever Bora was about to reply with, it was cut short with their opponents starting to make their move.
Fero looked down and jumped out of the way from the earth literally trying to eat him whole. While mid air, he pulled on the fishing rod and some string, the result was some books nearby being pulled and launched at the priest looking member of the Oracion Sies.
That was Bora's cue to run off towards the side of the library where they weren't fighting.
Hot Eye noticed the runner and made a motion with his hand as he gathered energy. "And where are you going?!" He commanded the gravel stone beneath him to shoot up and rush up and form into a miniature wave and head for the escaping Bora.
Fero spotted this, but as he made a step forward, he made a large leap back to avoid being hit by a strong axe kick from Genji.
Bora instantly panicked as he saw the wave coming his way, and he was definitely not fast enough to out run it. "Baló darrrium, Baruby!" "Baló darrrium, Oshen!"
Something jumped off from the opposite side of the second floor where Fero originally was. It was glowing a deep brown and dove right into the earth wave meant for Bora. Hot Eye's spell was soon quickly dissipated, and all watched a rabbit seemingly made of brown light land on the stone.
"Wait, is that what I think it is?" Hot Eye looked at the small, glowing creature in front of him before glancing back up.
Fero looked back up to the monk and gave a soft whisper. "Cutting it close, Oshen."
"That's an earthen spirit!" Richard cried out as he summoned spikes to stab the tiny rabbit. However, his magic that were like missiles to the target were twisted away from the small brown rabbit, like the earth itself didn't want to even go close to the tiny creature.
Fero tried to use the string from his fishing rod to cut Genji, but the monk themed mage jumped away obviously seeing the near invisible string meant to cut him.
At that moment, Natsu got back up, rubbing the back of his head and shouting, "What the heck was that for?!"
"Natsu!" Happy flew nearby Natsu before pointing back towards the second floor. "We need to get to the second floor! Someone's there probably ordering something weird to attack Hot Eye!"
The dragon slayer didn't quite get it, but seeing Genji fight against the fishing pole guy while Richard struggled with a rabbit that seemed to turn his own magic against him, Natsu knew that there was more to this fight than he thought. He let Happy carry him to the second floor where the scent of incense and something he never smelled before caught his nose.
To Natsu and happy's surprise, they saw a green skinned troll standing some feet away from them with a staff that had one of it's animal carvings glowing. "Batrak nux barick."
"Ah! A troll!?" Both Happy and Natsu pointed with all the tact of a four year old.
"Suka, naldarium..." The Troll sighed quickly and put a head on his hand.
Natsu, getting over the shock, lit his fist aflame with obvious intention to punch his opponent. The Troll's eyes widened and he bashed his staff into the ground. One of the carvings, one that looked like a fox started to glow orange red. A fox made of fire then jumped out of the staff and then soon, Natsu's flames dissipated and the Troll was able to catch the fist of the Dragon Slayer and throw him into the floor, which also meant that Happy was thrown into the ground as well.
"Ēyasum borackta, Oshen." "Ēyasum borackta, Xulzi."
After the fire fox and the troll spoke to each other, Natsu got up, scooped up Happy and backed away. "What the heck is that!? What happened to my magic?!"
Oshen stomped with his staff before twirling it with enough speed to create a wind draft from it's movement.
Natsu felt a sudden pressure and moved his body to the right faster than his mind could realize he had just dodged the staff attempting to stab him. For something so tall and lanky it could move as fast as some of Natsu's stronger opponents.
"Zabambi, wa'yai." Oshen turned and stomped his staff down.
"I don't know what you're saying, but I can tell their fighting words!" Natsu, a man who could get provoked from even a child's taunt, screamed out with frustration. After setting down Happy, he went for his opponent a second time with his flam—as soon as the first spark started, the fire fox started to glow. Natsu's flame was snuffed out quickly and when the Dragon Slayer was surprised, the Troll used his staff to stab him with enough force through several shelves.
"N-Natsu!" Happy yelled.
Oshen jumped off from the dust cloud to avoid a right fist coming his way. It seemed like at the last second, Natsu was able to catch the staff with his left hand before it hit his stomach. The attack gave a very distinct pain around his left hand as he felt something broken even though he could still move it. Still, this was rather annoying. It seemed like his fire was nullified by that weird fox thing.
Natsu smiled though, his mind trailing back to Galuna Island. "You think you're the first to stop my flames?!"
Natsu acted fasts and blasted off with fire gathering behind him. The fire fox nearby started to nullify the flames—but by then Natsu slammed his foot into the face of Oshen with enough force to kick him through the walls of the second library floor.
You see, from his battle with Lamia Scale's Yuka Suzuki, Natsu learned that even though magic could be nullified, physical force couldn't. The dragon slayer figured out the fox was nullifying his fire the moment they appeared. With that in mind, Natsu accumulated magic around his feet and like holding a finger back to flick with, he released the flame mage that rocketed him forward at great speed. It didn't matter that they were nullified the moment they came out, their job was done the second before they were activated.
However, while Natsu still could use his magic, he wasn't expecting the Troll to grab him mid air and toss him down into the dirt road of Nirvana. Natsu rolled on the ground before seeing something bright coming up from above him. One would think a ball of fire would cause alarm to any normal person, but for Natsu Dragneel, it was like an oasis in a dessert.
The pink haired mage didn't hesitate to inhale the flame, surprising Oshen who seemed to be taken back by the action of eating flames. As Natsu finished and saw the fire fox, a pernicious smile appeared on the dragon slayer's face.
The troll reacted fast as he saw Natsu come in and held his staff ready. However, Natsu jinked and circled around Oshen, moving closer towards the fire fox. Natsu got ready to eat the flame animal—
Only for Natsu to suck on air rather than magic.
That allowed Oshen to swing his staff and smack the dumb-looking mage at the face to ward him away.
Natsu got back up, being the glutton for punishment that he was, then pointed over to the fire fox. "Hey! What gives!? I can't eat that flame!"
"What are ya? A Slayer mage?" The troll finally spoke in a language Natsu could understand. "But there ain't no way you can eat Xulzi here. He be from the planes of Fotiá."
That was an answer Natsu had no context before. "What the heck is a Xul and a Fotee?"
"What, don't ya be havin Shaman and Earthen Spirits here in Fiore?" At that moment, something burst through the first floor of the library, revealing it to be a thrown Hot Eye who looked beaten and battered with dirt and mud all over him.
Natsu looked towards the new hole in the building where of all things, a brown stone, bunny hopped out.
"You're getting beat up by a bunny!?" Natsu yelled out and pointed at the small thing that did a little hop off the first floor and into the ground.
Richard/Hot Eye looked at Natsu with more confusion than any other emotion. "What? Don't you know that earthen spirits have are invulnerable to elemental attacks and the only way to defeat them is to—" Whatever exposition he was about to reveal was cut short when the ground shot out two giants rocks that tried to crush the two of them.
"Are ya really be talkin about facts in da middle of a fight!?" Oshen screamed out. "Why are most of you pig-skins so nur'mirial?!"
"You're making that last word up! And quit calling us out on our skin color!" Natsu pointed at the troll before trying to attack him once more this time. However, this time Oshen had both the stone rabbit and the fire fox with him.
Hot Eye, who got back up and saw the two about to clash screamed out, "Natsu, wait! Shaman's weakness are—" Sadly for him, a sudden hail of stone and fire forced him to drop whatever message he was trying to say.
Meanwhile, inside the library, Genji of Phantom Lord was feeling rather disappointed. This was mostly due to the fact his opponent was throwing many of the ancient city's long lost books at him like rocks. There was probably literature and knowledge that could potentially enlighten people in modern times and here he was forced to avoid and even hit away these tomes of forgotten knowledge.
This sea captain with the fishing rod wasn't all that skilled really. He was just using a magic fishing rod of all things that was very easy to avoid. However, a problem started to occur mid fight when Genji lost sight of his opponent for one second, leaving him in an area filled with enhanced string that could cut the ground from where he was.
The monk-themed mage with pink hair looked around but saw no sign of his opponent. However, he saw the hook end of the fishing rod lash out towards him like a snake. Genji was about to smack it away until the last second where the magic around the hook felt different from the strong. He jumped out of the way to see the hook phase into the stone floor as if it was thrown into a lake.
The Phantom Lord mage realized what the hook's ability was and jumped back as something made a splashing noise beneath his feet.
The hook moved like a viper about to bite, yet Genji was able to avoid every strike which he soon found out was aiming right for his heart.
With how the hook seemed to phase through solid objects it didn't take long to figure out that his opponent was aiming right for his heart with the intent to stab right into it. Genji realized he need to find find his opponent fast. However, as he tried to move, he felt a stinging pain in his ankles. He looked down, seeing the string of the rod was tightened around his feet.
The Phantom Lord mage panicked for a second when he looked back up to see the fishing rod flying right for his head.
In that instant—Genji vanished into thin air and the string around his feet were quickly cut.
Behind a book shelf, Fero's eyes darted around the area. He acted fast, holding on to his string to sense for any movement around the immediate area with all the string he laced around the battle field.
There was a sound coming from above Fero, making him realize: he didn't think to put string atop the shelves.
An instant later, Fero felt himself flying and crashing into several bookcases toppling over. Fero's hand trailed towards his stomach where he felt a heavy blow contract his lungs inward, as if his body just realized he was hit after the initial impact.
He heard the sound of a scream coming from beside him and looked to see Bora in stupefied horror.
"W-What, are you doing!? Get the book!" Although Fero said that, he coughed more in that one sentence than he wanted to.
"R-Right!" Bora then turned and ran, leaving Fero to stand back up and sigh.
"His magic, is it…?" Fero held on to his rod and put the reeling pat close to his ear. He closed his eyes and then, two seconds later, felt a light tug. His eyes snapped open and he pulled on the string, Suddenly something was snagged to his right and Fero didn't hesitate to whip his fishing rod right into a different stack of books. He saw something his string was tied to get picked up and slammed into the direction he wanted. "It is invisibility." Fero muttered to himself before proceeding to do his best impression of a batter in a practice cage.
Bora in the meantime was sweating like someone without a bat inside of a batter cage. Why? Because no one bloody told him what the dang booked ever looked like! He was about to bloody ask Fero until they were found out, and now all bloody hell was breaking loose!
If this kept up, he was going to be a bloody corpse! What the in all corners of Earthland did this dang book even look like!?
While Bora was having his mental crisis, the wall he was running near exploded. The former Titan Nose mage screamed again as he flew, seeing flaming rocks being thrown out and Oshen along with those rocks.
"Ugghh..." The green skinned troll groaned as he rubbed his head. "Dat be at I needing now, a splittin headache."
Bora soon realized that this was technically a blessing in disguise. "Oshen, what was the book we were supposed to find!?"
The troll looked over to him as he got back up. "How am I supposed to know?! All the boss said was somethin about a magic tome!"
"How does that narrow this down!?" Bora's lamentations were cut short as Osehn started to move again to avoid Natsu and Hot Eye attempting to attack him with their elements.
"See!? I told you Shamans themselves are the ones to aim for, not their Spirits! Yes Yes!" Hot Eye began.
"Okay then! You know, I've never beaten up a different race before!" Natsu spoke as he pumped his fists.
"Natsu, Hot Eye, look out!" Happy's voice came from outside before Natsu was tackled with a boulder and a fire blast exploded right next to Hot Eye, forcing him away in the opposite direction Natsu was tackled.
"Just be looking for it!" Oshen screamed at Bora. "I can't be holding off the two of them forever now!"
"A magic tome, where am I supposed to..." The former Titan Nose mage saw smoke rising from beneath him and saw one of the books in front of his feet catch on fire. Oddly enough it burned and was absorbed by fire very quickly, but instead of turning into ash and dust, the book retained it's shape. The ash around it blew off, and a brilliant red book bound in runic, flashing chains was seen where the regular book was last seen.
Considering how special that book looked even after being burned clued the two to the obvious.
"I think that be it." Oshen duly noted before Bora bent quickly to pick up the book.
To the two's right, Fero came in, flying through the air before landing near his two teammates with a slide after being hit again.
"Fero, I got it!" Bora threw the book in the air with his hands much like a kindergartener who believed their hand painting was the best thing ever.
Without even looking back, Fero jumped back closer to them and started reeling in his string. "Alright, stick close, we're getting out of here!" As that happened, he put his free hand into his suit and brought out a glass orb with some kind of glowing pink light in it.
"We're not letting you get away!" Natsu screamed up as he broke down several rocks and made a beeline for the three with white flames.
Bora screamed, Oshen got ready to fight back, but Fero was already moving, sliding his finger as his string continued to return to his fishing rod. And then, with one fast and powerful yank, the broken stone right under Natsu at that moment, shot up, stopping and moving the Dragonslayer's momentum upward instead of towards them. Fero threw down, and the rock with Natsu ended up falling like an asteroid right atop of Hot Eye, who was getting back up from a fire attack.
With that done, Fero threw the glass orb into the ground of the three's feet, and a pink portal opened up and swallowed all three of them like a pothole. A second after it closed, there was a thud, and Genji reappeared. The usually stoic monk seemed frustrated not being able to follow after the three after they seemingly got their objective.
Natsu slowly got back up, pushing up the rock and screamed. "What the heck! I'll beat that guy for that cheap shot!"
"Natsu?" Happy's voice made the dragon slayer look over to the blue cat pointing nervously behind him. "Umm, you're stepping on..."
Natsu followed the point to see that he was stepping over Richard/Hot Eye's face, who looked completely knocked out cold. "Ahh! Richard! I'll definitely beat up that captain guy for beating you up to!"
"Natsu, I think you were partly at fault too..." Happy gave a soft comment.
Genji walked up to his fellow pink haired mage. "They all escaped with a strange book. Do you have any idea what is was about?"
"No, but… something about them being all the way out here for a book, doesn't sit right with me." Again, something in his gut didn't like this. Why though? It was a book—if only Lucy or Kain where here. They were the smart ones.
"Natsu, you're still on top of Richard."
Happy was unintentionally ignored when Genji spoke out. "Do we go after the others now? We are battered up from this, how are we supposed to surprise attack the remaining members now?"
Before any of those questions could be answered, there was a loud shout and a spike of strong magic that everyone sensed. Happy, Natsu and Genji all ran towards the source of the spike of magic and to their surprise, they saw the familiar face of Midnight losing consciousness with an injured man standing over him.
And that man was none other than Jellal Fernandes himself.
"Jellal!?" Natsu yelled, all anger returning to him tenfold.
The blue haired Wizard Saint turned around and it almost seemed like he really, really, really, really, really wanted something, but Genji and Happy didn't know what.
Yet if that wasn't enough, they were all distracted when they felt an oppressive magical aura blanket over the isle.
Death has more effect on the living than those who actually died. Gray Fullbuster knew this more than anyone considering how many of his loved ones were in graves long before he was ready to understand what death meant. He also knew what happened to Lyon when their teacher Ur died. The rather mild manner young kid turned cold and ruthless after Gray left him the first time. So, with that in mind, Gray should have seen it sooner. Lyon may have acted cold towards his teammate but there was another change in his character, something subtle, but none the less prevalent when his guild mate died.
"Lyon, you're getting too far from us! Get back from here!" Gray was quick to notice his friend seemingly attacking anything on sight with little restraint, freezing and shattering the incoming automatons like a grinder to thrown meat.
Gray wouldn't say that they have a proper formation, but from his experience, fighting with someone watching your back was so much easier than going in solo. With Lyon advancing too far ahead, Gray noticed the giant Automatons where tilting their head towards the member of their group that was straying away from them with obvious intent to destroy what was alone and easy prey. Gray cursed under his breath, asked Lucy to watch his back, and ran after Lyon before she could even respond.
The giant guardian had his eyes glowing as a loud humming noise increased in volume around the battlefield. Considering what they had seen so far, it wasn't a surprise that the Giant Automaton could also shoot eye beams, it's just the one from the giant had way more fire power than even the wave of attacks that caused them and their fliers to separate. The attack sped for the other half naked ice mage and the beam crashed onto the area with a deafening boom.
Gray was worried for his friend until something zipped past the giant lasers and into the sky. Out of the dust, it was revealed that Lyon was riding on his own ice Pegasus construct and flying high into the air.
The sound of an incoming machine forced Gray to look towards his right, only to briefly see an incoming four-legged automaton get stopped by the smack of a large, familiar tail with the force and speed of the end of a whip.
His brain processed that he was just saved from an attack and looked to see who had just protected him. A smile cracked under Gray's face as he saw who it was. Ignis gave a low growl before giving folding his wings and looking right at Gray.
"If anybody asks, you are my favorite fake fire dragon in the guild." Gray lied. Even if no one asked, he was definitely going to go out of his way to tell everyone that Ignis was better at being a dragon than a certain someone the moment they got back into the guild. But his bias was put aside as Gray rode back on Ignis and the wyvern flew back up in the air with the intent to catch up to his friend.
The two titans were firing lasers into the sky, all with the purpose of attempting to hit Lyon out of it. The ice mage himself ignored his attackers and motioned his construct to move closer towards the tower itself.
Inside the tower, Kloda was watching the perimeter alerts about an incoming object. "You think such a simple plan of heading right for the control room would be that easy!?" As he said this, the staff summoned and activated more screens.
Lyon sensed a shift in the air and a spike of unrecognizable magic. He noticed the top of the tower started to cover all of the surrounding area. Wasting no time, Lyon forced his construct to move faster with obvious intent to get through before the forcefield was erected. However, as he moved closer and closer, his brain started to recognize the speed of his construct was not going to make it, but instead of listening to that little voice in his head, Lyon pushed forward faster than he attempted to before.
He was going to make it.
He was going to get in, beat Brain, destroy that blasted machine corpse, and avenge—
It's all your fault she's dead!
Ur's not dead…
For the tiniest fractions of a second, Lyon felt a sense of déjà vu. Within that moment of his distraction Lyon realized he was about to get hit by the barrier in front of him. His survival instinct kicked in, forcing himself off the fast moving Pegasus from a good two hundred feet in the air. But the height of the fall wasn't the problem: it was the two remaining titan guardians now having a clear shot at the falling ice mage.
Lyon panicked as he saw the two giants already about to fire, but a streak of red appeared before him, and he found himself atop of a wyvern saddle climbing higher up the force field while moving away from an explosion that he didn't have the power to stop by himself. It took another moment for him to realize that Gray had saved him, along with the wyvern that had used him like a mallet to a wack-a-mole game.
"Damn it, Lyon, you're being as stupid as you were back on Galuna Island!" Gray screamed over the winds as he held tightly into the reigns of the crimson Wyvern.
It was then that the two ice mages and wyvern saw glyphs being written on the side of the tower wall. As soon as one was completed, it fired a green laser that caused Ignis to barely dodge out of the way. This clued in that the tower was now shooting at them the second before a hundred or more so glyph signs were completed and unleashed a hail of lasers.
"Hold on! Ignis, time to show us your flying from all those laps around and inside Magnolia!" And with that, Gray and Lyon held tight as Ignis rose even higher into the sky than they already were to avoid the lasers.
"Wait, we need to get back to the tower! It's the only way to stop these attacks!" Lyon cried out as he held on. It wasn't long before the ice mage of Lamia Scale realized that they were still going faster and higher up, as it was becoming much harder to breathe due to thinning oxygen.
"I'm trusting that to the others below!"
Meanwhile, with all the laser pointed at the three above, down below the others had made their way closer to the tower.
"Are you sure that'll work?" Lucy looked incredulously towards the blue-haired, gold eyed knight from Phantom Lord.
"No, but Raina and Lahar already went ahead to the other titan, so we don't have much of a choice really. What do you think, Alex?" Jason responded before looking to the bronze, green-haired gladiator, who had a polite, but nervous smile on her face. "Well, if Kara were here, she'd be elated to hear this plan which means if we don't die from this, she'll be jealous that we did it without her."
"That does not inspire confidence." Lucy sighed. "But then again, it does sound like something my friend would come up with." The former heiress thought back to her lawyer friend. "Let's do this quick! Alright, Taurus, we're ready!"
"Go get'em, Miss Lucy's Hot Bod!" Taurus the Celestial Bull Spirit screamed before he slammed his axe down. The earth shook around the three before a solid chunk of rock burst out of the ground like a boulder being shot out of a volcano.
"Stop saying that!" Lucy screamed while holding on to her Taurus Axe planted on to the flying boulder.
"Incoming!" Jason drew his blade as the boulder was reaching fast towards the back of the right titan's head.
Alexandra acted first, jumping high and doing a pulling motion with her left hand while it had a black aura around it. Jason and Lucy's metal gear was magnetized and yanked high into the air along with their users. The boulder kept flying and smashed into the side of the skull of the titan to their right. The impact of the hit caused the titan to topple slightly and as it tried to regain balance, the two Phantom Lord mages and Lucy landed on the shoulder. Without waiting for a second, they attacked the head of the ancient automaton while it was imbalanced, causing it to topple and fall right into the forcefield.
What was impressive was that on the other titan guardian, a shadow trailed up to it's shoulder and jumped out both Lahar and Riana who also used heavy attack to topple over the imbalanced machine and it started to fall in to the same path as the other one.
When both titans fell, their heads crashed into the forcefield at the same place, causing a large strain over the magical barrier. At the same time, up from above, Ignis was now diving towards the impact zone with both Lyon and Gray gathering magic in both their hands.
"Ice Make: LONGINUS!" The two yelled out before an elaborate and massive Ice Lance was summoned and thrown right at the impact zone of the two crashing heads. The force field seemed to hold up… for only a second before being unable to take in all those heavy hits simultaneously. The forcefield fell to pieces like a glass mosaic, signaling that it was no more.
The remaining people atop the titans began running, jumping over the heads and beyond the forcefield before a streak of red swooped down and flew back up, seemingly catching all five of them before continuing upward.
"There!" Lyon pointed to gray as everyone was resetting atop of Ignis' saddle. "I noticed that hole on the side of the tower! I was trying to get there!" What Lyon noticed was the hole that Jellal used to escape the Machina King previously before, and it just so happened to be the same room where Kloda and an unconscious Brain currently were in.
"No! Not now! We're so close!" The talking staff, which genuinely confused many, along with the fact that Brain was sprawled unconscious in a different side of the room, cried out as he saw the Wyvern descend into the room.
"There's Brain!" Lahar pointed and made a beeline for the fallen leader of Oracion Seis. Kloda, seeing that gathered energy in his maw, but Riana moved fast and kicked the staff some distance away.
As Raina made a motion to stop the security controls, as Lahar moved in to bring out cuffs for Brain, something else happened elsewhere.
Or rather, two things happened. Before they could finish, Hot Eye was defeated by Fero with a surprise falling boulder with Natsu, seconds later, Jellal had defeated Midnight in his own nightmare realm.
Those two were the last remaining Oracion Seis members, and with them both falling, all of Brain's markings vanished.
Lahar was finally close and made a motion to reach for Brain's hands. Lahar didn't expect something to reach out and catch his hand with the vice grip of a viper bite. He didn't expect Brain to get back up slowly, with no markings on his face, and his eyes looking to be almost filled to the brim with pools of blood.
Before Lahar could react, the hand that grabbed him applied enough pressure to cause Lahar to drop to his knees and the cuffs he was about to lock onto Brain. Even though he cried out in pain, it was muffled compared to the different sounding voice that came out of Brain's body. "Once upon a time there was a monster who slept in a deep cave."
Brain (?) stood up, seemingly taller than before with all of his tattoo markings gone from his face. His usually calm and stoic look was replaced with a wilder, more sadistic appearance as if he was another man all together. "The monster was fierce, attacking anything and getting whatever it could. It didn't take long for those with power to band up and attempt to fight the beast."
Lahar's concentration returned as he tried to use his free hand to get his pistol. However, the second he pointed, he was thrown into the air and smacked with a powerful backhand.
"But by a twist of fate, the waking monster was slayed by many foolish 'heroes'. They thought they had killed an evil monster wrecking havoc in their lands."
An oppressive amount of magic filled the air—covered the entire surface of the Nirvana Isle.
Those in the tower could only stare as Brain (?) threw away his coat and summoned a green jacket to cover his torso. With a hand placed outward like a hand trying to hold a globe and the other folded neatly behind his back, he smiled and continued with his story.
"They didn't realize that they had killed the only thing keeping a far worse abomination from waking up! There were two monsters in that cave, the waking one was doing all it could to keep a second monster, more powerful, more dangerous abomination from waking, and the fools killed the only thing keeping it asleep! The second monster awoke, and not a single one of them survive its onslaught!"
He slammed his outward hand into a fist. "I am Zero, the True Master of Oracion Seis, and much like the story I just spoke, allow me to just say you all just royally fucked up!"
It is the way of mortals to inflate facts when telling stories. They tend to downplay mistakes and overstate accomplishments. With this in mind, it would stand to reason that the story of the Machina King would be exaggerated like any other story.
This is a false assumption.
It is exaggerated in the opposite direction. The accomplishments and powers of the Machina King described by historians and recorders were downplayed to prevent the nightmares of those who teach and learn of his legend from returning night after night. The mistakes and flaws were over blown in some desperate hopes that if you were to face this being of unstoppable force, you would not die like a screaming, pitiful child and at least die trying to fight that what only a legend of equal power could face and win.
But there it was, it's body puppeteered by an ex-member of the Magic Council and a force to be reckoned with to any that oppose the Oracion Seis.
Yet hope remained. The Griever's new opponents where that from the famed guild, Fairy Tail. A guild known for including some of the most skilled, powerful of mages as well as people capable of laughing in death's face.
If anyone could bravely say they would fight the Griever, head on, with confidence and competency, it would be none other than— "AAAAIIIIIIIIEEEEEE! Why is it always meeeeeee!?"
Anyone else from Fairy Tail that wasn't Kain Reynolds.
The young coward was fleeing from the black machine like a character from a horror-slasher film that everyone knew would die from first appearance. Though the reason why he was surviving much longer than those people was because of his special magical armor which could increase his ability to run away.
Kain was able to zip around when several icicle spears fell from above, all with the intent to turn him into a kabob.
If there was one silver lining to this it was that Erza Scarlet was also chasing after The Griever as he was chasing after Kain. Another fact was that Erza had sent Wendy, Carla, and The Exemplar automaton down towards the path they were meant to go which was made easier for Kain leading their opponent in the opposite direction.
However, these facts were very easy to forget mostly due to the fact The Griever used both his ice and stone blade to create a maw of stone stalactites and frozen stalagmites. Kain avoided the attack easily, but the problem was that it cut off his escape.
The lawyer turned around, wishing more than his childhood version of himself that he was a posh-accented Jedi/Sass Master.
The Griever jumped with all of his limbs and blades stretched out, forcing Kain to use the Omni Tool to turn it into a bubble. The landing of the onyx machina caused a shockwave that caused the bubble to bounce off the wall and make Kain fall out like a skipped stone.
With every movement unleashing the roar of a powerful machine, the Machina King raced for the fallen red knight. The blades flew, yet something moved fast and parried all incoming blades from the initial attack. Erza in her speed armor with a blade that had an enchantment rune of power had saved her ally... for a few precious seconds. The Griever adapted fast, stepping forward and used his six blades to attack this new intercepter. While Erza was indeed a skilled blade user, even someone like her had trouble handling something with a very unconventional but still masterful style of fighting with six blades, there were even times the machina flipped to a hand stand and used four blades in his hind legs to attack her, throwing off the scarlet haired woman with this bizarre fighting style.
Erza, seeing her disadvantage in balance and raw power, backed, off picking up Kain as she flew back to rest the distance between her and her opponent. But the Machina King stabbed his flame and gravity blade in to the ground. Something shot into the ground and caused a crack to speed past Erza and erupt a massive wall of flames. This cut off her attempt to escape and allowed the Griever to catch up with all blades primed and ready once more. With little time left, Erza threw away Kain before was locked once more into a blade fight with the Griever.
That second throw snapped Kain out of his senses. The first sight he witnessed waking back up was Erza slowly being overwhelmed by the Griever.
Erza started to change her strategy and transformed into different armors whenever one of the different elemental blades came her way. However, the Machina King also changed his strategy, and started using feints, baiting Erza into one armor then slamming a limb into her from an unexpected angle.
The red haired S-class mage grunted in pain before toppling over. The Griever didn't hesitate to lift and empower the six elemental blades with the intent to bring it down on his opponent, yet in an instant, a golden lasso snaked around it's neck and tightened with a powerful pull. The Machina King's head was turned 180 degrees to see Kain using the Omni Tool to save his friend.
Inside his armor, Kain blinked. "Okay, not the intended result I was hoping for." As the Machina King started to move, the red rider dug his feet in and used all of his enhanced strength to pull the lasso harder.
The result was The Machina king, despite being heavy and resisting in his own way, being pulled closer to Kain. One instant later, the onyx machine stopped resisting and went with the pull with a jump, allowing it to launch itself closer to Kain.
"Didn't think that one all the way through!" Kain cried out slid under the jump and tried to pull hard on the lasso. This caused the large machine to flip mid jump, but even then it wasn't even bothered by the sudden switch and used the flip to stab two of it's blades towards Kain, throw it's stone and ice blade into the air to be caught by it's feet, and use it's two new free hands to stand in place of it's feet.
With that, it started to unleash a storm of slashes that Kain only avoided thanks to his enhanced speed. "I really didn't think this through!" Instincts kicked in and Kain reached a hand to his back and threw gum bombs right towards the hands of the Griever, causing sticky pink taffy to catch into the momentary legs of the black eight limbed monstrosity and allow Kain to back off to Erza.
"So umm, how are we going to beat this thing?" The young lawyer in armor asked while carefully eying the Griever struggling to move.
"Everything has a weakness Kain, even this powerful creature. In order for us to win, we need to work together." Erza said this before changing into an armor he hadn't seen yet. Her armor was bulkier than the usual style of armors she wore, with larger shoulder shields and styled almost like a Celtic viking, with a cylindrical helm with three horns, and there was this massive, bronze great sword with many grooves on one side—making Kain realize it was similarly designed like a sword breaker back in his world.
"I don't usually use this armor, the Forger Breaker. This armor is designed to destroy magical tools, but even for someone like me, it slows my movements greatly." Erza began as she wielded the large bronze blade with the grooves facing their opponent. However, at that moment, the Machina King stabbed his ice blade into the gum bombs, freezing them solid and making them no longer able to hold him for much longer. "But in exchange, this armor's power is perfect for destroying those elemental blades. I need your help to be my shield and give me opportunities to break them."
Kain nodded, looking back as the Machina King freed itself and looked back towards the two. The young man felt a shiver up his spine.
"Remember what I taught you!" Erza's voice cause Kain to stop shivering and stand straight up. "Your blade in front of you, a shield to cover where your body is facing, your feet firm, but ready to move!"
With each of her cries, Kain's stance shifted into one far more primed to fight. This was a good thing seeing as The Griever was now upon them. Kain made a move forward, allowing himself to turn the Omni Tool back into a shield as he blocked the green wind blade that was coming towards them. The green blade started to glow, but Erza sidestepped and swung the great sword not towards the Griever, but towards his wind sword with the groove side of the blade. It was caught and then the light of the blade was snuffed and the rising humming was abruptly cut.
The Griever, to his credit, attempted to move, but Kain moved first and turned the Omni Tool into cuffs and connected both his hand and the limb wielding the wind blade.
With the two of them working together, the bronze great sword seemed to be 'eating' the elemental blade and then Erza yanked the great sword, which made that green blade shatter like glass hit by a baseball while losing all of it's vibrant colors.
Both Erza and Kain backed off while the Griever stared at his now useless wind blade.
Realization hit Kain as he recalled each time anyone has attempted to adapt to the Griever's fighting style, only for him to counter back with greater success… "He's not going to let us destroy the other blades as easily, isn't he?"
Erza returned to a stance, "We must prevent him from preventing us."
Kain sighed as the griever's empty face turned to them. Even if he was dead, why did it feel like he was still being glared at harder than before?
"I really hope Wendy is doing much better than us."
When Wendy Marvel reached the end of the path, she admittedly was a little out of breath. She had to admit, an elaborate, circular, and giant doorway was something she could see with the general aesthetics of the place, but witnessing it still made her in awe that Nirvana really was an artistically advance culture.
"Well?" Carla's voice snapped the blue haired girl momentarily. Yet, when she looked back, she noticed Carla glaring at the mossy robot. "Hurry up and open the door! I doubt that coward can last even a minute against that monstrosity!"
"C-Carla," Wendy tried to say before looking up at the old Automaton. What was it called again? Exem..pl..pla? "Um, Pla?" Wendy shook her head when her mouth sputtered out that. However, the machine seemed more attentive towards her. "Can you please open the door?"
The Machine did so, stepping forward and having it's eyes glow a green color like that of the grass of a bright and windy day. The door made many clicking noises before it split in half, opening up by the sides.
Both Wendy and Carla were filled with anticipation when the doors opened. However, whatever they were expecting, they didn't expect to see a sleek, almost futuristic room that had several gravity rings around a giant magical orb that was both black and white. Furthermore, the giant black and white orb wasn't some kind of Lacrima, it looked more like a ball of energy. The strange thing about it was that it started to have pieces of it suddenly jerk out erratically, like something was trying to break out the orb, or it was doing it's best to twist and contort in any way that wasn't a perfect circle.
"Is this the core of Nirvana?" Carla asked while the three all walked in. Then the small white cat turned to the large machine. "Well go on, hurry up and shut if off!"
"Um, Carla? I think it only listens to me?" Wendy began before looking up to the Exemplar Automaton. "Umm, Pla—I mean." She shook her head at the wrong pronunciation again and fighting a blush, she tried again. "Can you put it off?"
The Automaton seemed to process Wendy's words before slowly pointing a finger towards her.
"Huh?"
"She ordered you to put this thing off, already you hunk of metal! Why aren't you doing it!?" Carla asked sharply but the Automaton seemed to still point at Wendy.
Or at least… Wendy realized that he wasn't exactly pointing at her, but her guild mark. It was then that the Cat Roubaul words came back to her, that it needed to be her to stop Nirvana. That's why Pla—why did she keep calling it that!?—That's why Mr. Robot was pointing at her. He couldn't stop it, it had to be her.
"H-How do I stop it?" Wendy croaked out, trying to gather courage even though the magical orb that was behaving out of control freaked her out.
Mr. Robot had it's arm transform and walked forward, closer to the magical core, which promted Wendy and Carla to do the same. When the long arm stopped transforming, the Exemplar's hand looked almost like a… a harp?
The robot started to pull on the strings, and a melodious tune echoed through the room. The erratic moving of the orb started to slow down but still seemed and looked unstable. Soon after, the Exemplar started to play a beautiful but lovely melody with the strings etched outwards from his hands. Wendy recognized the tune of this melody and recalled the cat Roubaul's last, desperate word before he was cut off being music.
It all clicked. The very song that Brain used to find Nirvana, it was the same tune as the melody the automaton was playing. That's why Cait Shelter wanted her to learn this song and dance so much, it wasn't just a fun culture tradition, they were preparing her to save them from Nirvana!
Wendy stepped forward. "Carla, to stop Nirvana, I need to sing again."
This was going to be it, all she needed to do to stop Nirvana was just to do what caused this madness in the first place. All she had to do was open her mouth, inhale deeply and—
Yelp as the ground shook violently.
There was a scream followed by an explosion. Wendy and Carla looked back to see Kain flying towards them, only to land near the entrance of the room. The crimson rider attempted to stand back up, only for the Griever to jump out of the darkness and with all his weight, slam one of his legs right into the chest plate of the young man, cuasing the place to shake and creating a miniature crater. Wendy and Carla noticed something different from the Griever: four of his blades were now shattered, leaving only the gravity and fire blades left on the onyx corpse. On the other half of it's arms, Erza was being lifted by her neck with two other limbs clamping hard on her left hand and right leg.
It looked bad then, but it was about to get worse. A powerful quake, this time coming from above the room, caused the roof to be torn open, and what fell through and crashed into the opposite side of the core room was Ignis, looking battered and weakened while holding his wings across his chest. As he let his wings fall, on his chest were even more battered and weakened members of the Alliance such as Lucy, Jason, Lahar, Raina, and Lyon.
This surprised and horrified both Wendy and Carla until something else came and fell from the sky, unlike Ignis though, it landed on both of his feet.
Brain (?) had returned, no longer wearing the same get up he appeared before and with eyes like pools of blood. In his hands, he was clutching on to the skulls of a weakened Gray and Alexandra, both seemingly too injured to do anything at their situation.
Then, the leader of Oracion Seis slowly turned towards Wendy.
"I apologize, Prodigal Daughter," Wendy tried to be brave, but just those words alone froze her into an almost catatonic state. "But your story ends here."
{Author Notes}
And so does this chapter.
I apologize for the lateness in this chapter. Things have been very busy for me this month and some amount of Writer's Block didn't help at all.
My Oracion Seis arc is one of my longest arcs so far, which is rather distressing considering I didn't expect it to be this long. Though that's what I get for trying to add more things to an arc that went on for a while even to usual Fairy Tail standards. Then there are the arcs that are even longer than this one…
Well. Hopefully, they aren't bad because either the next chapter or the one after will finally and the Oracion Seis arc. And I'm looking forward because a new original Arc is coming soon! Those are always super fun to write.
Hopefully, you guys don't mind me trying to give Erza a new Armor. Granted she has a lot of them, but I wanted to see if I could take my own spin into adding a new armor for Erza. Forge Breaker came to mind, and I had to give a reason as to why she never needed it until then.
Anyway, hopefully the next chapter will come sooner, but then again, there are a lot of things I need to do this month too.