AN: Thank you Goku275 and Wadeparker.

"Meteor!"

"Power Perfume: Max Men!"

Empowered by their respective magics, Jellal and Ichiya slammed into Acnologia's arm. The force of their attacks loosened the Black Dragon's grip on Christina.

"Activating our backup Magic Booster!" announced Jenny from aboard the airship, pulling the chord to trigger the booster.

While it was weaker than the main booster (which was still cooling down after its earlier use), the backup booster was still strong enough to get them away from Acnologia. As Ren and Eve had used all of their remaining Magic Power into the main booster earlier, Jenny and Hibiki funneled everything they could into the backup booster and hoped that it would be enough.

Thanks to the combined efforts of Blue Pegasus and Jellal, Christina was able to break free of Acnologia. Ichiya and Jellal were able to re-board the airship when it escaped, allowing Christina to rocket away from the Black Dragon without anybody being left behind.

"How impertinent," bellowed Acnologia, scowling as the distance between him and the airship rapidly increased. "As long as a Dragon exists there, I will slay it!"

The Black Dragon opened his mouth, unleashing an intense Dragon Slayer's Roar. The beam chased after Christina, closing the distance within seconds and blowing the airship's left wing to pieces. Christina shook heavily, and its speed was greatly diminished.

"I will slay all Dragons! This world has no need for such creatures!"

Acnologia flew toward the airship, determined to tear it apart and kill the Sky Dragon inside. However, despite the impending threat he posed, the passengers' attention was drawn elsewhere.

"The Space Between Time has reopened!" exclaimed Anna. But her words were not joyful, as a new obstacle to their plan of trapping Acnologia had emerged.

"The opening is visible!" shouted Ichiya, pointing at the rift to the Space Between Time. As the Pegasus said, the rift was now very noticeable, resembling a miniature black hole. It would now be impossible to trick Acnologia into the rift.

"It's all right!" declared Jellal, activating Meteor again and jumping through the air toward the Black Dragon. "Deception may no longer be an option but force still is! I'll push him into the rift!"

As the Independent Mage approached Acnologia, the Black Dragon stopped chasing after the airship and focused on Jellal. Acnologia didn't know what the Space Between Time was, but he recognized it as the reason why he had been lured here. The enemy believed that it could stop him, and he wasn't going to just stand by and let them test that theory.

Natsu could not see anything but inky blackness. He couldn't smell anything either, and the only thing he felt was a deep pain in his torso and lighter but still noteworthy pains across the rest of his body. The Dragon could hear something, though.

Millianna. Blaze. Iggy. Happy. Gray. Erza. Wendy. Lucy. Carla.

Voices, faint at first but growing louder and more numerous with every passing second.

Igneel. Makarov. Gildarts. Mavis. Gajeel. Levy. Panther Lily. Sting. Lector. Rogue. Frosch. Laxus. Romeo. Minerva. Juvia. Lisanna. Elfman. Mirajane. Cana.

They were urging him to get up, to keep fighting, and to never stop until he wins.

Yukino. Sorano. Rufus. Orga. Freed. Bickslow. Evergreen. Mest. Jet. Droy. Alzack. Biska. Asuka. Macao. Wakaba. Max. Warren. Reedus. Nab. Vijeeter. Laki. Kinana. Porlyusica.

Strength welled up within the Fairy's body as the voices continued to grow in both quantity and volume.

Crime Sorcière. Lamia Scale. Blue Pegasus. Mermaid Heel. Quattro Cerberus. The Garou Knights. And so, so many more.

After a certain point, it left like every single person he had ever helped out or befriended was shouting words of encouragement at him. Natsu was brimming with strength, like when he had supercharged Fire Dragon King Mode with Igneel's flames. The Dragon let this power erupt from his body, producing flames that burned away the darkness.

Natsu woke up.

"Raaah!" yelled Jellal as he slammed his Meteor-enhanced body into Acnologia's chest. He pushed against the Black Dragon, slowly moving them toward the rift. Acnologia responded by feeding on his Magic Power.

"Get away from him, Jellal!" cried Erza from aboard Christina. Unfortunately, neither she nor anybody else aboard the airship could intervene, as Erza and Wendy were still too injured to fight and everybody else lacked the ability to fly (with Christina itself being too damaged to travel there safely).

Jellal shoved Acnologia with all of his might, but his Magic Power ran out before they reached the Space Between Time. The Black Dragon grabbed the drained Independent Mage and tightened his grip. Jellal screamed as he started getting slowly crushed to death, helpless to resist.

Luckily for the Independent Mage, he was saved when Christina rammed into Acnologia. The Black Dragon, caught off guard by the assault, lost his grip on Jellal as he was knocked into the rift.

"Eat it, Acnologia!" shouted Ichiya, the sole person still aboard the airship. "You're finished! The age of the Dragon King is over!"

"What is this…?" went Acnologia as he was absorbed by the rift. "My body… Gah! Aaaaaaaa…!"

The Space Between Time started to shine, quickly growing as blindingly bright as the sun. Then, that light disappeared, along with the rift and everything that had been in contact with it.

"There's something that Gramps always says…"

Zeref froze. He was only a few steps away from Neo Eclipse, but the Black Mage knew that if he tried to pass through the doorway, an attack would strike him before he made it. He turned toward the speaker, Natsu.

"When you go through those doors, you make a vow," continued the Dragon. In spite of the hole in his chest, the Fairy had risen again. "A vow that you'll always come back! If you won't make that vow, then I won't let you pass through those doors!"

Intense flames wreathed Natsu, his Fire Dragon King Mode stronger than before. Though neither Dragneel noticed, a few dying embers even clung to the Fairy's white scarf, fading away now that there was no longer a Curse to burn.

"Of course…" murmured Zeref, coming to a conclusion about how his brother had lived. The Black Mage raised his voice to address Natsu. "I can't believe I forgot that you're a Dragon now. It's obvious that you would be resilient enough to survive what a human could not."

"You're wrong," refuted the Fairy. "The strength to get back up didn't come from being a Dragon, but from my bonds. Everyone is relying on me to stop you, and there's no way I'm gonna let them down! Fire Dragon King's Claw!"

In an instant, Natsu closed the distance between him and Zeref. He delivered a roundhouse kick to the Black Mage's left side. Zeref blocked, buy was still sent flying away from Neo Eclipse. The Fairy then leapt after his brother and delivered a Fire Dragon King's Destruction Fist to the Black Mage's face.

"Just shut up already!" shouted Zeref, aggravated that Natsu was still talking about friends and family. The Black Mage retaliated against the Fairy, coating his hand in Magic Power as he raked it upward across Natsu's chest, forming a diagonal slash mark. "In the world I'll create, none of them will have suffered in the first place!"

"They'll have also lost their happiness!" retorted Natsu, throwing another blazing punch at Zeref. The Black Mage used his arms to defend against the strike, though they ended up battered and blackened as a result.

"Do you really think that joy compares to the suffering endured?" asked Zeref derisively. He gathered as much power as he could from Fairy Heart, the Space Between Time, and the Curse of Ankhseram into his right fist. "Taste my misery! My hatred! My darkness!"

"Then the power of my friends and family will fuel my flame!" roared Natsu, meeting Zeref's darkness-filled punch with a fist of burning emotions. The Fairy gritted his teeth as he pushed against the Black Mage's attack, neither pushing him back nor being pushed back himself.

"I understand… that all lives… have suffering…" forced out Natsu, struggling with all his might to break the deadlock. "But that's why… these bonds… are so important…! They're what makes… the happiness… outweigh the suffering…! Our bonds are… what makes life… WORTH LIVING!"

As the Dragon made this declaration, his flames burned hotter and hotter. By the end of it Natsu's fire burned as hotly as Igneel's did.

"…"

On the other hand, Zeref's power faltered. 'If I hadn't distanced myself from others out of fear of what my Curse would do to them, would the happiness they brought me have surpassed the pain that I felt?' This thought only occupied his mind for a moment, but that instant was all it took.

In the brief second where Natsu's power was greater than Zeref's, the Black Mage's arm — still damaged from blocking the Fairy's previous punch — broke under the pressure placed upon it. As a result, Natsu's fire was able to overwhelm and devour Zeref's darkness.

"Aaaaaaaah!" screamed the Black Mage as the inferno swallowed him whole.

Wendy, Erza, Anna, and the mages of Blue Pegasus (excluding Ichiya) stared in shock as Ichiya forced Acnologia into the Space Between Time.

Wendy had turned into her Dragon form and let everyone else onto her back so that she could fly them over to Acnologia; that was their plan to save Jellal. But, as soon as the last person got onto her, Ichiya beat them to the with his sacrificial attack.

They gazed in at the space where the Black Dragon, the airship, and the rift had all been only moments prior until Erza snapped them out of it.

"Jellal!" exclaimed the Fairy. "We have to get him out of the sea!"

Wendy reacted after a moment, flying over to the Independent Mage. She hovered next to him, allowing Jellal to leap out of the water and onto her back with a burst of Meteor.

"They're… gone…" said the Independent Mage somberly, shaken by Ichiya's sacrifice.

Those words caused the dam to burst. The Blue Pegasus Mages, Erza, Wendy, Anna, and even Jellal started to cry. They sobbed at the loss of an odd yet noble man.

Their mourning did not last long, though. Less than five minutes later, the location where the rift had been exploded. Chunks of flaming debris, fragments of Christina, were sent flying in all directions.

Worse, Acnologia was also ejected from that spot, blasted in the opposite direction. The Black Dragon fell into the ocean, bellowing profanities as he twisted around to remove the bits of wreckage that were stuck in his body like splinters. He had a number of gashes, burns, and broken scales, but he was still alive.

The Fiore mages looked at Acnologia in horror until their attention was drawn away when one of the pieces of 'debris' close to them made a noise.

"Maaaaan…" groaned Ichiya as he floated on the ocean belly-up. His injuries were similar to Acnologia's, but more severe.

"Ichiya!" exclaimed everyone joyfully. Wendy immediately flew over to the Pegasus, scooped him up, healed him as much as she could, and gently placed him on her back with the others.

"Master!"

"You're alive!"

"It's a miracle!"

"Ich– *sniff* –Ichiya!"

The Blue Pegasus Mages gathered around their comrade, overjoyed to see that he was still alive. Anna, Jellal, Erza, and Wendy let them rejoice, talking amongst themselves about what to do now.

"I don't understand how it happened, but the Space Between Time was destroyed," said Anna.

"We should head back before Acnologia recovers," stated Jellal. "Our plan has failed, and we're in no shape to fight."

"I agree," said Erza, shifting to address Wendy. "It looks like we're going back to the original plan… you and the other Dragons and dragon slayers fighting Acnologia yourselves."

"We'll definitely beat him!" declared the Sky Dragon. Her resolve affirmed, she turned toward the mainland and began flying.

Omake

Acnologia's lip curled into a draconian smile as he watched the Sky Dragon flee with those foolish humans. Although he was unhappy about the damage that he had taken from being at ground zero for the Space Between Time's destruction, the pain had ultimately benefitted the Black Dragon by snapped out of his fixation on killing the Dragon.

Now that his head was clearer, Acnologia realized that it would be best to let her go for a little. After all, she would doubtlessly gather the other Dragons and dragon slayers together in a futile attempt to vanquish him.

"Once they've gathered together, I'll be able to purge this world of Dragons for good!"

AN: I feel like expanding a bit on the suffering vs happiness argument. Sadness and pain are an inevitable part of any relationship, be it from arguments, toxic elements, or the end of said relationship (potentially from the other person's death). But, in spite of this, we as people continue to form relationships because the happiness brought by a good relationship greatly outweighs that suffering.

Or, at least, that is what I believe. Anyway, that is all. Goodbye for now!