"You gonna stand in my way too?" Gray was watching Lyon carefully, his head tilted. "I'm not above fighting you, if you really think you can take me on. But I'm also not gonna stop until I've finished getting these idiots out of my way so I can get to work on my real mission."
"Gray." Erza slowly rose to her feet, steading herself with her weapon. "This isn't like you. We can—" She broke off as Gray held out a hand, freezing the lacrima behind him with the same unusual ice that he'd used on Midnight. Lyon didn't want to even look and see the state of the wizard who'd been frozen.
"I'll take care of this stupid mission for you." Gray glared at her. "Don't let it get to your head, though. I'm not doing this for you - they're just pissing me off by standing in my way."
He didn't give them a chance to object. Gray walked out the door, leaving them alone in the room with the lacrima now frozen and beyond their reach if they couldn't first break Gray's spell. "Are you alright?" Lyon could deal with Gray another time. Likely, Invel was already working on it, if his earlier message was any indicator of what he was focused on.
Nodding, Erza let herself sit for a moment. "I'm fine. My injuries were not as severe as they could have been." She closed her eyes. "What is Gray even thinking? We're supposed to be launching a coordinated attack."
"I can't even reach the others myself," Lyon said. Erza frowned, her brow furrowing for a moment. "Mystogan and I were able to handle one of their wizards in front of another lacrima. I realized once we defeated him that no one was responding to my updates."
"Then we've lost our ability to coordinate at all." Erza inhaled slowly. "Gray intends to shatter them at once, doesn't he?"
"Likely." Lyon frowned. "And I suppose he's returning to his mission without us once he's finished."
Erza was quiet for a moment. Her eyes flickered towards Millianna, the girl that was still recovering from Midnight's initial attack. "We cannot let him go down this path. I don't know what has triggered this, but this is not the Gray I've come to know."
"Right now, we have other problems to deal with." Lyon sighed. "We need to find our way out of this place and regroup with the others. I don't know what any of the other teams encountered on their way here, or even if they are waiting at the other lacrimas."
"I suppose you are right." Erza slowly rose to her feet. "For now, we should regroup. Once our team is assembled, we can make a plan for what to do regarding the final stage of our attack." Erza knelt down by Millianna, slowly rousing her to a point where the other girl could walk when supported by the requip wizard.
Together, they exited towards the pathway that Gray had just wandered towards. Lyon started along the path, returning to the lacrima he'd freed to find it frozen over just like the previous one. Mystogan had been knocked unconscious and was not moving. "I'll carry him for now," Lyon said. With a grunt, he worked at getting the other wizard on his back. Their progress was slowed with the extra weight, but he wasn't going to leave the man behind.
Their team eventually arrived at a third lacrima, also frozen over. At its base, Juvia was glaring at it and launching attacks in the form of her water slicer to try and shatter the ice. "Juvia!" Lyon grabbed her arm, halting her next attempt. The water mage turned towards him, exhaling and dropping her gaze towards her feet.
"Juvia didn't want to fight Gray. He is Lyon's friend and her own." Juvia's hands shook. "But Juvia cannot target the lacrima. Gray's spell is blocking her from getting near it with her magic."
"It is alright." Erza spoke quietly. "We encountered the same situation just moments ago."
Gray was moving fast then. Lyon kept moving too, growing their group with each room they entered. They'd managed to retrieve Natsu and Ur before the ground shook violently beneath their feet. Turning towards the others, Lyon raised his eyebrows. "Do any of you know what that's supposed to mean?" Then, the shaking worsened. Lyon stumbled into the wall, not expecting the entire place to begin reacting so violently. Rocks and dirt began to fall from above them, making his eyes widen.
"Nirvana is collapsing," Erza said.
With a new sense of urgency, their group began rushing towards the nearest exit. Turning to the first door that led to the exterior of the spell, Lyon hurried along. Natsu began to slow, holding his stomach as the structure's motion started triggering his sensitive stomach. By his side, Ur began helping him up to drag him along with the rest of the group.
Emerging from the collapsing spell, they began to search for the fastest path down. Wandering around the ledge on the side of the spell, Lyon blinked in surprise at the site of an icy set of stairs leading from the platform to the ground. "Gray's path out, it seems." Ur was quiet. "No time to think about it. Let's get going and find him later. I'm going to kick his ass when I see him next."
Not having any objections, Lyon began to rush down the stairs as Nirvana collapsed to the ground completely. On the ground, the wizards involved in fighting slowly began to blink and take in their surroundings as its effects wore off. Battling slowed as Meredy's wizards held back, gauging the state of the wizards they had been facing. Regardless of how they'd come to this point, their mission was a success. Nirvana was destroyed and these people were freed. A chill still lingered in the air as Lyon turned back, seeing no sign of his former peer in sight.
Meredy could feel her heart pounding in her chest as she saw Nirvana collapse. After all of this time, it was finally gone. Her failure was corrected and the friends she'd only barely started to make were free. Yet, she didn't know if they'd even want to see her. Her hands shook by her sides as she looked out across the battlefield. Wendy had been on the front lines, using the sort of magic she'd insisted she would never be able to use. The snow magic had confirmed Eve was here somewhere too, though it was more common so Meredy supposed it might've been someone else.
She began running across the crowds, pushing her way through to try and find a familiar face out of those she had lost. Meredy wanted to see them, to apologize properly for how poorly she'd handled things before. She had been young and had failed to realize that overconfidence was bound to result in suffering for those around her. Leading a guild and working towards creating a system to rescue refugees had given her the chance to realize that there was far more to strategy than just the analysis of spells and magical power.
Her future was still uncertain, given the state of the rune knights now. Per her agreement, she was still technically meant to join their ranks. Yet, Lahar had refused to take leadership of the temporary guild she'd formed. He'd insisted that it would be akin to abandoning his true position, so the role had fallen to her instead. Either way, it wasn't as if they had a reason to return to Alvarez if the opportunity to rebuild Fiore was about to come.
"Meredy?" The pink haired wizard turned, seeing Mystogan lying on the ground behind her. Wasn't he inside Nirvana though? She'd left him behind with Gray.
Blinking, she realized her mistake quickly after taking in the state of his clothes. "Jellal?" The man frowned, but Meredy slowly found a smile growing on her face. "How are you feeling?"
"A bit disoriented, to be honest." The other wizard rubbed his head. "This feels not all that different from waking up from the curse you and Ultear maintained on me. I can recall my actions from the past few years, yet it just feels like they were all from some sort of dream."
"You aren't the only one feeling that way." Meredy looked out at the area. She could see her guild was already relaxing and working with the people waking up from Nirvana's influence. "Now that the source of the spell is destroyed, its effects are fading away."
"Then you managed to destroy Nirvana." Jellal smiled weakly. "I'm glad. I'm sorry I was unable to assist with the matter." Looking away, Jellal rested his hand on his leg. "If anything, I fear Ultear and I only made matters worse, giving them more targets to add to their numbers."
"Well, we figured it out anyway." Giving him a smile, Meredy placed a hand on her hip. "I figured out a way to get some pretty powerful allies that even you can't stand a chance against."
"That's an understatement." Jellal gave her a half-smile. "I can't even say how I was stopped. Whoever managed to intervene did so without even being spotted or detected during that fight."
Letting out a chuckle, Meredy offered him a hand. "Either way, seems like the fight is coming to an end. I think we should probably try to find some of the others and figure out what we're doing next."
"Please tell me you're not planning on another wild adventure already."
"Actually, I'm not certain." Meredy shrugged. "I may be working with the rune knights on reforming their ranks when this is finished. Despite winning now…" Meredy trailed off, shaking her head. "This entire event caused a lot of damage. Fiore's government is in shambles and I doubt we'll be looking at an easy path to fixing it."
"Government?" Jellal raised his eyebrows. "You intend to work on reforming such a thing?"
"Maybe not quite that high up." Meredy looked around, beginning to walk again. "I'm not exactly a politician and I haven't done anything to even start understanding how to lead a country."
"I suppose I'm just surprised to hear any of this coming from you." Jellal was smiling softly. "You've grown. It is good to hear that you're learning how to step away from the darkness you were raised in."
Nodding, Meredy nearly commented before she saw the face she'd been looking for. "Wendy!" On the ground, the girl was clutching Charle to her chest with tears in her eyes. Immediately crouching in front of her, Meredy met her eyes and nearly forgot that Jellal was following her. "Hey, it's alright. You couldn't do anything to stop it - that's just how Nirvana works."
"But-but I—" Wendy broke off, shaking her head. "I helped them do so many bad things. I kept fighting, and I—" She choked, shaking her head.
Reaching out, Meredy grabbed Wendy's hand slowly. "Okay, maybe I was being too optimistic." She met Wendy's eyes calmly. "You can't change the past and I understand that it is hard. But you aren't the only one who has to live with regrets." Inhaling slowly, Meredy met her eyes. "I'm sorry I failed you, Wendy. I should have been able to stop Nirvana the first time around."
The other girl sniffled, slowly blinking as she focused on her. "M-Mer?" The sky wizard only now seemed to realize who was speaking with her. "Did you really come back?"
Nodding, Meredy smiled. "Of course. I promised you that I'd protect you on this job, didn't I?"
Wendy didn't stop crying, but she did manage a brief flicker of a smile. "Thank you." After a moment, the girl leaned forward and wrapped her arms around Meredy's waist. "Can you just…let me think things over for a bit? I'm not…" She trailed off. Meredy began to return her hug quietly. "I don't think I'm ready to talk about it, not yet."
"That's alright." Meredy patted the back of her head. "It isn't easy, talking about things like this."
"Indeed it is not." Jellal nodded at them. "I can't say it will ever be something you're ready to do."
Having gone through the same experience, Jellal likely related far better than Meredy ever would. Still, Wendy just remained where she was in silence. Around them, the rune knights were starting to regroup, combining from both sides. She thought she recognized Princess Hisui amongst their group, potentially discussing the politics Meredy had been unable to really understand how to handle.
Eventually, Wendy stirred and started to pull away from Meredy. "Sorry about that." Wendy slowly began to wipe at her eyes, inhaling deeply. "I bet that was sorta weird. I mean, you haven't really seen me in seven years and even back then, we'd only just started to really get to know each other."
"It's fine." Meredy looked away, brushing aside her hair out of her face. "Honestly, you were probably one of my first real friends, Wendy. You were the first to really be willing to take the time to get to know me and encourage me to be myself, rather than what you needed me to be." Turning towards her, Meredy gave the dragon slayer a small smile. "Really, I still consider you a good friend of mine, even if it is just because of how fondly I remember that brief time with you."
"I'm glad." Wendy smiled at her. "Because I really just want to pretend these last seven years didn't happen. None of it feels like it was me, Mer. And…it was so long too. I just don't know what to do or think anymore."
Snorting, Meredy shook her head. "Well, I suppose you've got a good friend to help you with that then." Nudging her shoulder, Meredy grinned. "I just went through a similar realization and have been looking for the same answer myself. I've actually been spending my time as a guild master in another country while I planned all of this out. Plus, I've made some promises to join the rune knights once they reform."
"You're a guild master?" Wendy's eyes were wide. "What guild? Are they here helping too?"
Nodding, Meredy looked over at Jellal who was watching them in silence. "Yeah, they are. Why don't we try to find the rest of our alliance before I explain everything? I imagine they'll have the same questions too."
Nodding, Wendy slowly rose to her feet. Charle remained in her arms, having been rather quiet during their reunion. Now, the cat turned towards Meredy and met her eyes calmly with a nod. "Thank you for your efforts to save Wendy." She paused, looking away. "And I'm sorry for all of the times I misjudged you."
"My past doesn't exactly make me an easy person to trust." Meredy nodded. "You were justified to treat me as you did - I don't blame you for any of it." The cat looked relieved, though even she remained quiet as she dealt with the struggle of realizing exactly what she'd done while influenced by the reversal magic of Nirvana. These people would be dealing with plenty of issues for quite some time, but at least they'd taken the first step forward to starting to heal.
Gray was determined to find Zeref. It was the one thought on his mind, an urge he'd given up on even attempting to resist who knows how long ago. When he'd first started to act, the idiots in that airship thought they could keep him contained. He'd easily dealt with them both, freezing the entire thing and creating a slide of ice to guide him down to the ground. There, however, he found a far more tedious issue to deal with.
He'd gone on quests in this area in the past, so he knew they weren't far from Magnolia. Yet, an ongoing battle was in between him and the path he needed to take. A very distant part of him decided that perhaps it would be best to take out the massive spell in his way first. He could recall it being the reason behind a lot of the fighting in this place anyway. So, dealing with the detour first, he'd followed the strategy that came to mind on instinct - destroy the lacrimas and the spell would be gone.
It was too easy to deal with. No one expected anything from him, thanks to the gifts from that idiot ice general. All he had to do was feign weakness and show off his cuffs to get someone to lower their guard. Then, a blast of cold energy would freeze everything solid allowing him to destroy anything he needed to on his path to success. Each room was the same, with a few variations when he encountered the people that stirred up memories that were only getting in his way. Friends did not assist in the goal of finding Zeref. They did nothing but trigger distractions and delays so once he'd realized they weren't standing in his way, he'd moved on.
Honestly, he wondered why he hadn't started thinking like this sooner. It was efficient and there was something oddly pleasing in the sight of so much chaos left behind him. With just a snap of his fingers, he could freeze over an entire room and shatter everything contained in the ice. Destruction would be left behind, forming an odd art on its own that people always sought to decipher and find meaning behind.
Laughing, Gray grinned as he ran well beyond the destroyed spell. An instinct was telling him exactly where he needed to go, something that hadn't been there moments ago. It was as if Zeref wanted to be found, was begging for him to do so. Gray was only happy to listen to the call and this time, he had no one to bother him as he ran. There were no pesky reminders of the vague recollections in his head. No one was around to tell him that this 'wasn't him', despite feeling better than ever as he followed the instincts driving him forward.
It didn't take long for that chord driving him along to finally reach its end. He smirked as he stared up at the ice encasing the black wizard and Acnologia. Those dark eyes looked down at him at his approach. Just like with the others, there were vague flashes of images in his mind. Yet, they were meaningless just like everything else. All that mattered was the next step - destroying him once and for all.
Placing his hand on the sculpture, Gray smiled at the man. "I'm here. I will fulfill your wish, Master." The words left him almost without thought. Ice began to spread from his palm, coating the spell containing them both. Taking a step back, Gray smiled widely as he shattered it just like he'd done with everything else. Yet, he blinked as he realized all he'd managed to do was break the outer shell he'd created.
"Huh. So, it looks like this is actually a bit tougher than the rest." With a grin, Gray approached. "I'm never one to back down from a challenge."
He began to attempt further variations on what he'd learned. He made the shell thicker, hoping that it would have more force. When that failed, he attempted making it thinner, questioning if he'd just made the wrong assumption on how it worked - he couldn't say he'd really mastered this art before jumping into all of this, after all. Still, it wasn't the answer. Scowling, Gray began pacing around the base of the creation, trying to come up with some other solution. Perhaps he could simply target Zeref directly and ignore the outer spell?
Focusing, Gray attempted to do just that. There was a space he could see inside of the icy statue that he tried to target. Yet, despite the drain in his energy, Gray saw no visible change in the ice. With a shout, he punched the thing in anger. "Damn this thing! I need more power, more strength. Then, I'll be able to—" He broke off, blinking at a vague memory. Absorption, amplification and application. His hand drifted to a necklace at the case of his throat, a grin forming at the thought.
Rather than targeting the spell around the black wizard, Gray focused on pouring his energy into the necklace he wore. He could practically feel its growing energy, the pendant becoming cold in his hand. Once he was confident it had sufficient energy, Gray focused on the ice spell that was insistent on standing in his way. "Alright, let's get this over with."
It was more so instinct than anything else, guiding him on unleashing the spell from within the pendant. First, the layer of freezing was just as rapid as before - Gray wasn't certain what the amplification did in regards to it. Yet, the true beauty came with its destruction. Once he demanded it finish the shattering of the ice, the pendant obeyed. The result was loud, almost as if someone had dropped an actual explosive on the spell rather than just more magic.
Gray chuckled as he took a few steps back from the blast, watching as ice flew into the air and scattered around the area. The remains of the spell lingered, a base of jagged and sharp ice lingering in the town. Shards of ice had broken nearby windows and created holes in walls all around them. They lingered on the streets, all of them in varying sizes due to the destructive nature of his means of attack. Now, he faced Zeref but an annoyance was still here.
By the dark wizard was a familiar dragon, now freed from the ice. Acnologia's eyes remained shut, however. One of his legs was still trapped in the ice that Zeref was freed from. When Gray realized that the beast wouldn't be moving, his grin widened and he turned his focus onto the black mage. "Glad to see he won't be interfering. I won't let anyone take credit for my efforts to grant you your eternal rest."
Zeref frowned, lying on the ground now that he was freed. The man slowly sat up, recovering more quickly than most expected. His eyes studied Gray with his expression unchanging. "Gray." The man's eyes flickered towards Gray's wrists. "Your magic was suppressed. That explains…" He trailed off, closing his eyes.
"Who cares about that?" Gray walked forward, focusing intensely on his magic. Really, just this power alone wasn't enough - too many others had been foolish enough to think that was the case. However, they didn't have the gift of this pendant in their possession. Gray had the exact weapon he needed to make his power stronger, strong enough to overcome any barrier in his way.
Pressing a hand to the pendant, Gray began to charge it again with his magic. Seeing his action, Zeref narrowed his eyes. "No. I will fix this." The wizard lifted his hand and before Gray could react, a sudden exhaustion filled his body. What energy he had been pouring into the pendant halted and he stumbled forward. He began to blink rapidly before finally falling onto the ground, sinking into darkness with his mind going blank.
Magical exhaustion was not a sensation Zeref usually experienced. Centuries of life with the majority of that time spent meditating had expanded his natural stores of magical energy to a point far beyond a typical wizard. As such, it was usually only his rare expeditions into living magic that depleted him so much. Today was unusual, however. Zeref still wasn't certain if it should be blamed on the curse that had never stopped expelling energy while he was frozen or the variant of iced shell that had been cast on him.
That exhaustion, however, was not enough to prevent Zeref from enacting a weak sleep spell on Gray as needed. The ice mage, or ice demon now he supposed, was gradually falling into a state Zeref had no experience in. When he'd warned Gray about slayer magics, it had been from years spent researching the theoretical constructs of such branches of magic with Irene. Assisting her with her attempts to fully reverse her own transformation had resulted in him realizing that dragon slaying magic could theoretically be applied to any magical creature; from a technical standpoint, one could create a 'Vulcan Slayer' or a 'Wyvern Slayer', if one altered the enchantment appropriately. From there, it had been simple to theorize that the same transformation happened in any case where competing energies were involved.
Demons were not a natural race, however. Anything else would offer Zeref some sort of insight on what to expect - the instincts of non-human creatures could be analyzed and applied to their influence on human thought and emotion once merged. Yet, demons already possessed both thought and emotion. Their very existence required a tether to another's magic - Zeref had silently hoped that would hinder Gray's transformation, yet this had surpassed his expectations and followed them at the same time. Like all slayers, the transformation came yet it contradicted a demon's very nature and he didn't have the time to work out the details.
As interesting as it would be to study the spell he'd been freed from, Zeref's priority would remain determining exactly what devil slayer magic was doing to Gray. Inhaling slowly, Zeref did what he did best, focusing on the analysis of magic while he lifted the ice mage into his arms. Only the sight of that dangerous pendant kept Zeref calm as he held another living being quite so close. Even if things were to go wrong, Gray's demon half was awakening. It was quite likely that there was a means of bringing him back just like the others, an endless existence through recreation rather than immortality.
The question as to why Gray had used devil slayer magic so extensively also lingered. Then, he recognized the cuffs on the wizard's wrists. Narrowing his eyes, Zeref glared at them as a familiar fire began burning in him at the sight. Slayer magic resulted in a transformation once the opposing source of energy was able to overpower a wizard's natural source to draw from. Suppressing that natural source would typically not matter, as most living beings utilized ethernano to empower their magic. The suppression would block all energy, both foreign and natural, in such a situation. Yet, for a devil slayer, suppression would be akin to surrendering over to the foreign energy. By suppressing Gray's magic and not his curse power, Zeref could already theorize how his condition had advanced so quickly.
Uncertain of how far it had progressed, Zeref immediately unlocked the cuffs. He sent them into his requip space for now as he walked, seeing no change in the discoloration of the boy's skin. Really, it may be too late to restart an internal war against the demonic energy overtaking the boy. All Zeref knew was that the result thus far was turning him into something more like Deliora or Lullaby than he'd like to admit. Perhaps it stemmed from the nature of the demon who's core was taken for the slayer magic? Zeref wasn't certain which demon it was that Silver had stolen his power from, but it also hadn't mattered at the time when he was just a pawn of his other demons that were barely on his mind these days.
When Zeref saw the collapsed form of Nirvana, he realized that Gray must have been here to stop the spell. At least he'd learned that it was too dangerous to free Zeref with the threat of that reversal magic around. Either way, it was not his focus. The cuffs in his requip space only continued to remind him that someone had been quite reckless and overstepped their authority in his absence. He was not going to let this stand so easily, not when the result was so disastrous.
There were small groups of wizards scattered in the area as he walked around Nirvana. Many seemed dazed, though some were slowly walking away and scattering from the area. Scanning the crowd, Zeref frowned as he realized he hardly recognized anyone amongst them. His generals had either left already, or they were elsewhere. Yet, his eyes did eventually settle on Lyon and Gray's friends.
Approaching them, Zeref looked to Natsu first. The dragon slayer had grinned when seeing Zeref, only to drop that smile when he saw Gray. Without giving him the chance to speak, Zeref held Gray out. "Take him." He had already taken far too much of a risk bringing him this far. If anyone could contain Gray when he awoke, Zeref had to hope it would be the dragon slayer who was most familiar with Gray.
Natsu reacted on instinct, taking Gray moments before Zeref took a few steps back to keep his distance. "He managed to free you?" Lyon's eyes were wide. "I suppose he figured out the reversal spell then."
"No." Zeref looked away, closing his hands into fists. "He did not reverse the spell." That had been pure destruction at a level of power greater than he'd anticipated. Zeref had acted on instinct when Gray began preparing to use it again, this time on himself. He supposed he didn't know what the result would be, but much like when Gray had suggested using iced shell as they raced through the R-System, Zeref had felt a fear in him that he'd been confident was gone. The fear that Gray's attack would actually succeed still lingered, his eyes looking at the boy's pendant and debating if he should remove it for safekeeping. Yet, if Zeref lost control, it might even be worse.
Looking around at their group, Zeref inhaled slowly and made a decision. "Ur." The older ice mage frowned at him. "Take Gray's necklace. Whatever you do, do not allow him to learn that you have it."
"You think I'm going to just listen to you when you haven't even started to explain what's going on with Gray?"
"Perhaps not." The dark wizard smiled at her. "However, if you do not, I can guarantee you that when Gray wakes up, he will use it in an attempt to kill me and anyone who interferes." It was enough of a warning to at least push Ur to take the necklace, even if she stood tensely and continued to observe him after grabbing it from Gray.
"Kill you?" Lyon raised his eyebrows. "I find that hard to believe. You're talking about the one of us that was pushing the hardest to find a way to save your sorry self from that curse of yours."
Talking was only wasting time, though. He needed to find Irene and strengthen his weak enchantment on Gray soon. If the boy was too demonic, Gray would only be out for fifteen minutes at most. Their bodies burned off enchantments faster than wizards. "Zeref." Erza spoke, noticing his silence. "Is everything okay? Gray wasn't supposed to leave the airship. I may not understand how he arrived, but you—"
"I don't have time to explain." Zeref looked over at them. "You contacted Invel, correct?"
"Yeah." Lucy hesitated. "Though, Gray did most of the work there. We got an alliance, but they weren't all that happy with us."
Zeref supposed that was possible, depending on how strong Fairy Sphere had been at its activation. He'd sensed its power, but waking up gave him no indication of exactly how much time had passed. "Where is he?" Zeref narrowed his eyes at them. "Anyone from Alvarez will work, really."
"We came on one of your empire's airships." Lyon frowned. "I'm assuming Invel is searching for Gray - they were treating him as a prisoner of sorts until they determined your safety."
The familiar flare of rage burned in him again with the reminder. Zeref took another deep breath, attempting to stay calm. Gray's team had not been in a position to argue, not if they were looking for an alliance. None of them realized the damage that such an imprisonment had caused. "And the rest? Brandish? Irene?" Zeref narrowed his eyes. "Invel couldn't have been the only general they sent."
"Irene should still be on the airship." Happy spoke up. "She was gonna prepare a protection spell for us in case they fired Nirvana again."
That was all he needed to hear. Focusing outwards for the magical energy of the lacrima powering Alvarez's airships, he began to sense for its location. Once he detected it, Zeref opened his eyes and turned towards Natsu. "Stand still. I need someone to bring Gray with me." The dragon slayer looked ready to object, but Zeref's teleportation spell was already forming, focusing on the two of them. In just a few moments, he was with the dragon slayer on the deck of the airship.
Without saying a word to Natsu, Zeref began walking for the door that would lead to the control room. "Hey! Don't just act without warning, alright? We're supposed to be working as a team and making decisions together."
"Are we?" Zeref looked over at the dragon slayer with narrowed eyes. "As of right now, I find that I care little about whatever plans you are making. I will do whatever it takes to fix this, regardless of what path that takes me down."
"Fix what?" Natsu frowned, tilting his head. "You mean Gray's weird attitude? He was acting kinda odd before, but it looks like his restraints are gone. That's gotta help, right? Lyon made it sound like something weird was going on because of them."
Lyon had figured it out? Zeref frowned, staring at Gray. Then, he slowly shook his head. The other ice mage may have determined some of the details, but it was highly unlikely he would have all the knowledge he'd need to come to this conclusion. It would have taken a larger explanation on the side-effects of slayer magics to the entire group, something he'd refused to provide all because he thought it was pointless to explain.
Inside the control room, Zeref quickly saw Irene tending to a wizard that was fully encased in an icy prison. Made from curse power, Zeref could already sense its differences from the one that had trapped him. "Leave it." Irene turned, her eyes widening as she saw him. "I need you to enchant Gray into a perpetual sleep for the time being. It will be released at a time I decide, after I've had time to research is condition."
"Wait, you're doing what?" Natsu glared at him. "You're not gonna just knock him out forever. He's not always that bad - Gray promised he was fine and that he'd be able to fight through this."
There was no precedence for predicting what would happen though. Zeref closed his hands into fists, seeing Irene raise her eyebrows at him. Giving her a nod, the enchantress approached Natsu and the ice magic user calmly. "Please, stand aside, Natsu. I'd hate to start a fight with one of our temporary allies," she said.
"You wouldn't. Gray—"
"Is nearly fully transformed into a demonic state." Zeref met Natsu's eyes. "We do not have time to debate this, Natsu. I will explain once I have any information, but for now, there are no other options if we don't want to risk him worsening his own condition."
There were questions in Irene's eyes at his comment, but she did not voice them like Natsu. "What do you mean by that? Sure, he looks a bit weird, but he—hey!" Irene had taken advantage of Natsu's distraction, swiftly casting an enchantment on the boy in his arms. "I'm trying to talk this out first, alright? Gray wouldn't want me to fight you, but that doesn't mean I won't if I have to."
"Irene's enchantment can be lifted, if you are able to convince me that it is the best course of action." Zeref turned towards Natsu, giving the boy a dark smile. "Of course, that would also mean you'd have to be well-versed in the mechanics behind the final stage of the transformation triggered for slayer magics. While you may be a dragon slayer yourself, I find it highly unlikely that you managed to find any education on the topic beyond what I've told you and your group about it."
"He's undergoing a transformation?" Irene couldn't hold back anymore, though at least her surprise was reasonable.
Nodding at her, Zeref rubbed at his forehead. "An unpredictable one, to say the least. I wasn't certain which side would win and took a gamble on the transformation never occurring when I advised on this." Letting out a sigh, he turned towards Irene. "Demons require an innate connection to a wizard's natural energy flow - they draw from that as something akin to their life force, for lack of a better term. That fundamental concept had me believing that even if he possessed the energy of a demon, Gray lacked that connection. I'd need to research to see if one somehow formed on its own, or if he is some new form of a demon that is more natural in design - sustained on his own energy as unlike the others, Gray has always been alive."
"You made a slayer from one of your own creations?" Irene glared at him, her hands dropping to her sides as she took a step closer to her emperor. "Out of all of the—you know what this magic does, Zeref! We've researched it together and both arrived at the same conclusion. What gave you the impression that it was something to toy around with further by throwing in a non-magic-based variant to that power?"
The warm feeling of being welcomed, he supposed. Zeref had not felt like he belonged anywhere for so long. With Gray and his team…Zeref couldn't help but cling to that chance, that feeling of at least being tolerated for who he was rather than the master playing with his pawns in Alvarez. He knew it was illogical and knew that none of them should offer him any form of acceptance, but that longing was still there, just as it had been with Mavis.
Closing his eyes, Zeref inhaled slowly. "I don't know." Really, logic had told him to refuse their demand. "If it helps, I was not the first to create it. I simply opened the path to create the second, at least the second devil slayer I'm aware of."
"Then where did the first come from?"
Giving Irene a weak smile, Zeref shook his head. "I don't know." A second question he failed to answer. "Once I learned that they held no real benefit to me, I stopped monitoring most of my demons. The few occasions on which they ran into me were the only times I heard updates. All I know is that at some point between encounters, Tartaros gained an ally in a wizard with such a power."
"You're an idiot." Zeref narrowed his eyes at her but Irene was already holding her hands up in surrender. "Sorry, your majesty, but there are a few times when someone needs to be as blunt as Dimaria with these things." She had calmed down, enough to remember her place at least. It still didn't change the situation either way. "What are you even planning to do anyway?"
"The same as before, I suppose." Zeref stared down at Gray with a frown. "We learned quite a bit together, regarding the dragon slayers. It should give me a starting point for this - I just need to determine exactly how that process translates over…"
"We never found the answer." Irene's voice was quiet, her tone unforgiving. "You lost interest and abandoned the project, claiming it was impossible."
Zeref opened his mouth, then closed it again. He looked over at Irene's eyes, feeling his chest ache at hearing his own words returned back towards him. Then, he turned towards Natsu, the only true reminder that his research had at least resulted in one benefit for future slayers, even if he had failed Irene. The dragon slayer had grown quiet while they spoke and Zeref realized he'd nearly forgotten the boy was there.
"It's not gonna be impossible." Natsu looked between them with determined eyes. "This'll be just like Zeref's curse, right? We start small and figure things out as we go. So long as we don't give up, we'll find an answer." Taking a deep breath, Natsu slowly lowered Gray to the ground. "I do admit, I still don't like leaving him like this. But if I'm understanding you two correctly, you're saying that Gray's becoming a demon, right?" Zeref nodded. "And not the friendly kind either."
"Considering he freed me only to proceed with an attempt to kill me, I'd say no."
Natsu frowned, but accepted this unlike Lyon had earlier. "Alright then. Gray would hate himself if he actually went through with something like that, so I'll let this go for now." The dragon slayer looked over at Zeref. "You don't mind putting our curse-breaking mission on hold for this, right?"
His curse was the last thing on his mind right now. "Of course." He looked over at his brother, finding himself slowly realizing that this was likely going to be one of the most difficult debates he was going to have with their team. "Gray's recovery takes higher priority." Zeref paused, tilting his head. "In fact, depending on what is required…I actually might not be able to succeed without the curse protecting me."
"Huh? Why is that?"
Chuckling, Zeref slowly shook his head. "Living magic often provides its own warnings against use, Natsu." Turning to the dragon slayer, he offered the boy a sad smile. "If I have to…there may be a means of binding him to a book, just as I've done with the others. In that form, I could manipulate things to seal away his demonic nature, similar to your condition. However…that sort of manipulation…" Sighing, Zeref shook his head. "It is deadly for a normal wizard to manipulate that sort of spell. My books don't often fall into the hands of wizards who live to tell the tale."
"I think you're being overly optimistic." Irene shook her head. "Admittedly, I am far from an expert in your particular area of expertise, I suppose, but it would just be odd if it functioned on a principle that simple. If he became a demon without a book in the first place, I just can't see you being able to manipulate him like the others."
Staring down at Gray, Zeref felt a numbness start to fill him. It was a sensation he felt on rare occasions and he'd often associated it with forgetting the value of life. Yet, he could clearly remember just three times in the past when he'd felt it while knowing well what he valued: the day his family died, the day he'd gained his curse, and the day he'd been forced to bring Mavis back to Fairy Tail. Feeling it again now, he swallowed and closed his eyes.
"Then I will have to make him like the others." Inhaling, he turned towards Natsu. "I told you, I will fix this, no matter what path I have to take. This is why I did not ask your team to assist me." He knew what they'd say, if they knew that this was one of the first options that had come to mind as a solution. Without even performing any research, he'd jumped to the same conclusion Irene had likely reached on her own. "If research will not provide us with an answer, I will kill him to grant me the opportunity to do what I must to seal away that power." It didn't matter if he hadn't made a new demon in centuries. Zeref would go back to that path again if it would save the first person he'd encountered in nearly a century that was able to forgive him for his past and find a way to still consider him a friend.