Chapter 60

Raising the Stakes

"Speech"

'Thoughts'

"Magic"

Flashback

Location / Date / Time Skip

Natsu and Jackal stared each other down before Michello finally snapped. "What did you do to my house!?"

"He's from Tartaros!" Happy shouted.

"Probably the one who killed the current council too." Carla added.

"He's not gonna get me!" The elderly man replied, starting to run away.

"Let's go!" Natsu declared. Jackal smirked and waved his hands in a circular motion. The wind suddenly exploded throughout the town, scaring the people. Clenching his fist in anger, Natsu launched himself forward into a blast from Jackal.

"He's a goner!" Michello said, giving NO HOPE to Natsu at all.

"He'll be fine." Happy chuckled as Natsu started eating the flames.

"He's eating my explosion!?" Jackal was stunned, letting Natsu punch him in the face. Jackal dodged another attack before Natsu managed to get hit by a flaming knee to the chin. Jumping after the blonde, Natsu unleashed blow after blow on the murder.

Michello was shaking in fear. 'I've heard stories about Fairy Tail wizards, but this is my first time seeing one up close. I didn't know this was strong!'

Jackal slid along the ground with a smile on his face. "You're better than I even thought! But you should know-" Another punch cut him off before more and more fists pummeled his face.

"Natsu… you can stop…" Wendy mumbled.

"Did you forget that we needed him conscious to answer some questions?" Lucy asked, finally making Natsu stop.

'What if… these monsters really are after Face?' Michello asked himself in a panic. 'All of Fiore would be in danger. The White Legacy is a secret. Most of the other Council members don't even know about it. How could Tartaros even know about it? I need to find shelter and hold out.'

"Well, you kids have this under control, so I'll be leaving now."

"If you know something, now's the time to spill it!" Lucy declared.

"I don't know anything! Just leave me alone!" He shouted back.

"Now, now, no need to lie." Natsu jumped back as Jackal pushed himself up. "Unless you don't want your granddaughter to walk away." Michello flinched as Jackal turned to Natsu. "Pinky, you got skill, but you need to learn to listen to other people." Pointing down, Natsu saw his hands and knees were glowing.

"My Curse can turn anyone stupid enough to touch me into a living bomn. Hope you didn't lose count of how many times you touched me."

"Get back!" Natsu shouted before the curse detonated, blowing him up.

Jackal laughed as Natsu fell over, scaring the others. "Crazy! I can't believe he's still in one piece after all that!" Michello was shaking in fear as Jackal walked over to him. "I'm serious: spill what you know or else your granddaughter is toast. Don't ever call me unreasonable."

In less than a second, Michello turned tail and ran for his life. "Not gonna happen." Jackal sprinted forward as Wendy pulled her head back.

"Sky Dragon Roar!" A tornado shot out of her mouth, only for Jackal to reach down, touch the ground and detonate the wood. "He canceled it out with another blast?"

"Wendy, move!" Lucy shouted as she pulled out a key. Scorpio appeared and released a sandstorm out of his tail.

"Oh, there's one more thing I forgot to mention." Jackal chuckled, holding out his hand. "We don't use magic in Tartaros, we have a darker poison." He waved his arms and smirked as the air itself started glowing. "Have a little taste of my explosion curse! Explosion Spiral!"

The girls and cats were blasted away as Jackal ran into the city. Pushing herself up, Lucy groaned in pain before she looked over. "Wendy, help Natsu! I'm going after the freak show!"

"Be careful!" The young girl warned as she started healing the older slayer.

Michello panted as he raced through the city, confusing everyone else around him. 'If Face is really what they're after, we're all done for! The whole world would be doomed! Need to find a place to hide. Maybe one of these peons could-"

"Wow, you didn't get far at all." He froze in fear as Jackal appeared, crouched on a building.

"Stop this!" He begged before jumping into the river. "I don't want anything to do with this! I just live a peaceful life with my grandchild, that's all!"

"The same grandchild you straight up left alone at my mercy?" Jackal reminded, causing Michello to freeze. He glanced to the side and chuckled. "Wouldn't do that unless you wanna go boom." A seal appeared on the ground beneath her, causing her freeze in fear. "My landmine curse. One wrong move and boom."

A crowd formed her and Jackal smiled. "Let's have some fun with the crowd, shall we?" He stood up and snapped his fingers, causing an orb of energy to surround the former councilman. He snapped again, and this time a woman in the crowd was captured. "Say hello to my newest bombs."

The entire crowd ran for their lived as Jackal jumped down from his perch. "Alright, time to choose who lives and dies. But I won't be making that choice; you will." Lucy froze in fear as the woman held her stomach.

Michello flaunted his position of power and authority over her, angering both Lucy and the future mother. "Times almost up, ten seconds left." Jackal warned. "Oh, and if you try to move, you'll set off the mine. Which means you'll forfeit your choice and all three of you will die. So who leaves in a body bag?"

"Yours, punk!" Jackal turned to the side and was meet with a fist to the face, sending him skipping into the river and through a brick wall.

The curses faded around the three as the Exceeds carried the woman away. Michello popped out of the river and was punched in the head by Natsu, knocking him out. "He totally deserved that." Lucy said.

"You either have a death wish, or the worst memory ever." Jackal declared, pushing himself up in the water. "You just touched me, remember?"

"Oh, I remember." Natsu said back before his fist detonated. The flames from the blast were sucked into his open maw, scaring Jackal. "Not a bad trick, right?"

"This shouldn't be possible…" Jackal mumbled. "What did you do!? Who are you!?"

Natsu smirked before charging forward, his fist burning with his magic. "Natsu of Fairy Tail!" He shouted before punching Jackal in the face. His fist started glowing again, before he performed the same trick as before.

'Is he… EATING my explosions?' Jackal questioned in horror as Natsu walked over. 'He might be even stronger than when this fight started. This guy… he's a monster!'

His face twisted as his body suddenly started growing larger and ripping out of his shirt. Gaining a muzzle, yellow fur overtook his body as his hands turned to claws. "At least now we know where he got his name…" Natsu mumbled before blocking a punch, pushing him back into the city.

In a wild fury, Jackal swung his arms and detonated bombs around the before slamming a fist down on Natsu. "You humans are but cockroaches to demons like me. Only suitable for killing."

"So that's what you demons fight for?" Natsu asked as he pushed up against the large fist. "Let me show you how we humans fight!" Pushing the slam away, Natsu delivered a flaming kick to the jaw before pulling his fist back. "Here's a present from the ones you failed to kill!"

Flames gathered in his hand before electricity started rippling out from the center. "Lightning Flame Dragon Firing Hammer!" He slammed his fist forward and the attack crashed into Jackal, sending him flying into a large castle before falling to the ground. Four explosions went off on Natsu's body before he looked up, giving Happy and Carla a thumbs up.

A laugh caught everyone off guard as they looked up. "I'll be damned if I said I saw this coming." Jackal chuckled, back in his original look. "Haven't taken a beating like that in a long time." His body began glowing as he chuckled. "I don't like losing, so I'm just gonna blow us all to hell!"

Thinking quickly, Happy flew forward and grabbed the blonde by the scarf. With a cry, he lifted Jackal into the air as high as he could. "You can tell your friends to stay in hell, cause they're never gonna win!"

"I'LL BE BACK!" Jackal roared before his body detonated.

The four stared in shock as Carla started tearing up. As the dust settled from the detonation, Happy flew down from the blast and smiled before passing out, forcing Natsu to catch him.

Fairy Tail Guildhall

Makarov stared at the communication lacrima as Gray and Juvia came into view. "We're too late. He's already dead." Gray begrudgingly reported. "Whoever did this destroyed half the town on the way out. Just for fun, it seems."

The image changed to show a bitter looking Gajeel. "They murdered Belno too." He reported.

"The city is fine, though." Levy added. "Must have been two different people."

"So that leaves us with Michello and Yuri." Brianna mumbled. "Let's hope we can save them."

The transmission suddenly turned to static as Lucy came into view."Master, can you hear me?" The blonde asked, much to his surprise. "We'd have gotten to you sooner, but we ran into a problem. Someone from Tartaros tried to kill Michello, but Natsu took him out."

"I rule." Natsu groaned in the background.

"We need to know everything you learned from Michello." Makarov ordered.

"Yeah, that's kind of a problem." Lucy mumbled as she glanced at the mumbling grandfather.

"Face? What is this 'Face'?" Makarov questioned, only to get more mumbling. "Secrecy be damned, lives are on the line! Tell us!"

"Face is an Anti-Magic Pulse Bomb." Michello confessed. "This device can clear our continent of any trace of magic."

Instantly, everyone understood the implications of what that meant: death to all wizards. "Where is this Face!? How do we stop it!?" Makarov shouted.

"I don't know…" The grandfather confessed. "Only three former council members have the seals needed to unlock it with Body Link Magic. The former chairman is the only one who knows who they are."

"Start looking for the former chairman!" Makarov ordered. "We need to send a protection squad at once!"

With Elfman and Lisanna

Elfman held the old man and hung his head in shame. "We didn't make it." He reported. "Get the communication lacrima ready. We need to report this to the guild."

"Right." His sister nodded as she reached into her bag.

"He's completely uninjured…" Elfman mumbled as he set the body down. "As if he died naturally." Yuri suddenly snapped opened his eyes, scaring the siblings. "You're alive!? I checked your pulse and-" The old man ignored him and pointed at Lisanna, firing off a blast of magic that destroyed the lacrima. "The hell is wrong with you!?"

Yuri didn't answer before he collapsed to the ground, confusing them even more. "For the record, he did die naturally." The siblings turned around and found a horn-headed girl sitting in the library, reading a book. "I'm not as cruel as many of my brethren."

"So you're from Tartaros?" Elfman asked. "What do you want with the council members!?"

"These human books are quite boring." Sayla ignored his question, closing the book instead. "They all end so happily. About as unrealistic as you can get, if you ask me. Maybe your kind need a demon tale."

"Stay behind me, no matter what." Elfman told Lisanna, only for both to be surprised when he wrapped his hand around his neck. "What's going on? I can't control my body." He turned back to the demon as his grip tightened. "Stop it right now!"

"In case you forgot, we're in a war." Sayla said. "And demons like me have no need for mercy."

Fairy Tail Guildhall

"Master, we found him!" Laki shouted as she came up with a book. "In the sixteen address of former council members we found, one of them was his."

"Send a group there now!" Makarov shouted.

"Way ahead of ya." Cana chuckled. "The three of them are already heading there now. The best trio we have available."

A large stag raced through the woods, the Fairy Tail crest on its antler. Erza and Mirajane rode on their mighty steed as Nicholas breached out of the earth next to them.

Talk about an explosive start to the war… sorry for the bad pun. Seriously, Jackal was an insane first round match up for FT, and it's only going to get more insane from here on out. I do not envy then one bit in this. And then we talk about the psychological bit from Elfman's angle. Sick stuff. Next time is going to be… interesting. See ya then.

Beta read by General Feng Xiang