"Mira-nee...Elfnee-chan..." Lisanna looked up at sky, wondering how Mirajane and Elfman were doing in the tower.
"Don't worry, Lisanna," Makarov replied with a reassuring smile. "Those brats will be fine..."
"Hey..." Macao looked around, scratching the back of his head. "As anyone seen Kinana...?"
.
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Team White Eclipse, minus Waiston, blasted their way through the back of the tower, jumping from Christina onto the solid ground. Luke turned around, waving to the Blue Pegasus mages. "Thanks for the lift!"
"Men! Now, do your best!" Ichiya nodded as Christina flew off into the distance and out of sight, not wanting to get shot again.
"Oh thank GOD we're off that ship..." Selene placed her hands on the ground, feeling much better now that she was on solid ground.
"This place gives me the creeps..." Aira said, looking around.
"Don't let that discourage you," Luke said with a nod. "We're here to save Fiore after all, because god knows Fairy Tail can only do but so much...Anyway!" Luke grinned, slamming his fist into an open palm. "What's the plan!?"
"Split up into groups," Reve said. "Unless you would prefer going solo. Either way, I suggest that everyone be careful, I know these mages are nothing to sneeze at."
"Selene and I will be a team!" Aira nodded with a cheerful smile on her face.
"Wait I didn't exactly agree to-" Before Selene could finish her sentence; Aira grabbed Selene's wrist and dragged her off into a random direction.
"Hm..." Heather sniffed around before a faint, familiar scent entered her nose. "I'll be going this way," Heather said, walking off to the east path.
"Heh..." Arc eventually made his way where Team White Eclipse was, looking around at the group. "I see we're all here..."
"Thanks to Zalen, otherwise we would've crashed quite a ways back..." Jack replied, holding onto his six pack of beer.
"So, we're splitting up it seems..." Jaxon said, looking around before deciding to take a path on his own.
"So...that leaves me, Zalen Jack...Reve...Arc...and Tak..." Luke thought to himself. By the time Luke looked up, the remaining four were gone. "WHA...But...they were just...ugh...always leaving me alone..."
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"Ice Dragon's Roar!" Waiston opened his mouth, sending a powerful cold blast in Maggie's direction.
"Tch," Maggie jumped to the side, avoiding the incoming roar, but she wasn't prepared for Gray's attack.
"Ice Make: Ice Hammer!" A magic circle appeared over Maggie, and a giant ice hammer slammed down into her, creating a minor crater from the impact. "Got her!"
The hammer melted from Maggie's growing body temperature and anger, annoyed that two legal mages had the nerve to team up on her. "I'm starting to get annoyed with you two..." Maggie puffed her cheeks out, starting to inhale as a cloud of ash started to surround her mouth.
"Watch out!" Gray shouted.
"Ashfall..." Maggie threw her head forward, unleashing multiple balls of ash towards the two ice wizards.
"What the...?" Waiston crossed his arms as the balls of ash struck the area, filling the area with a thick smoke screen. A few balls of ash struck the two wizards as well, causing them to slide back into the center of the smoke screen. "Damn...! First off, that burns...second off, I can't smell her...this smoke screen is too thick..."
"I got it!" Gray placed his fist into his palm, but before he could say the words for an Ice Make spell, a heated fist slammed into his side, causing a large burn mark and Gray to stumble back into Waiston.
"Hey, watch it!" Waiston sneered at Gray.
"She hit me...!" Gray replied, glaring over at Waiston.
"This is exactly why I decided to give you a hand, it doesn't seem like you can do much on your own!" Waiston shouted.
"I didn't need your help in the first place!" Gray shouted back, obviously very annoyed. "Why are you even here? We didn't ask and we don't want your help!"
"You blokes really picked an interesting time to start fighting..." Maggie's voice had a slight giggle to it.
Gray slammed his fist into his palm; even though the ash was clouding his vision and starting to burn his flesh, he wasn't about to let Maggie have a victory here, there were too many things at stake for such a thing to happen. "Ice Make: Freeze Lancer!" Gray threw his arms forward, unleashing a barrage of large ice lances all around into the ash.
As Gray fired off his lances, Waiston stepped on the ground, causing a glacier to appear under his feet and launch him into the air, now above the smoke screen. He saw Maggie a few feet away from the smoke screen, laughing as Gray's lances were way off target. "Got you..." Waiston tucked his arms in and dove down towards Maggie, rigid ice covering his legs as he went for an axe kick to the girl's head.
"What the...?" Maggie noticed Waiston coming down towards him, so she brought her arm up, blocking Waitson's attack just in time. Waiston then jumped back, just in time as Gray used Ice Make Fan once again to disperse the ash, revealing his lightly charred body.
"Damn...that's hot..." Gray replied, shaking his head as he stood up straight, allowing his ice fan to vanish.
"She's stronger than she looks..." Waiston said, wiping his mouth.
"Play with fire, you get burn, loves," Maggie replied to the two ice mages with a devious smirk. "In fact, I think I'm just about down toying with you two…"
"She's toying with us…!?" Gray asked, taking a cautious step back.
"No way, she's bluffing!" Waiston replied, keeping a deep glare on Maggie.
"Am I?" Maggie's smirk widened as she spread her arms out, causing a grey magic circle to appear under her. "Lava Wave," Lava spiraled around Maggie's feet, and then launched up into a large wave of lava which Maggie rode forward.
"Shit!" Gray stuck his hands out, a blue magic circle appearing. "Ice Make: Rampart!" Gray spread his arms apart, creating a large wall of ice to block the incoming lava. Waiston gave support by stepping on the ground, causing a blue magic circle to appear just in front of the rampart. The magic circle unleashed large glaciers that shot up in front of the rampart for defense. The wave of lava crashed into the wall of ice, slowly eating away at it like acid.
"Shit, we need to think of a plan," Waiston said, looking over at Gray, panting slightly.
"No dice, loves!" Maggie wasn't going to allow them time to think. She thrust her arm forward, a beam of lava shooting through the ice wall cleanly. Gray and Waiston were just narrowly able to avoid, but then, Maggie herself appeared in front of them. She whipped her arm forward, turning it into a superheated whip that cracked against the two wizards multiple times. Gray and Waiston cried out as they were both tossed backwards from her sheer strength.
"D-Damn..." Gray winced while holding his sides. "I-Is that all you got...Natsu's flames are...hotter..." He taunted, despite his situation.
Maggie spat in Gray's direction. His taunts got under her skin, but not for the reason he expected. "You humans, always acting like this when backed into a bloody corner. It makes me sick."
"Humans...?" Waiston caught onto that. "Why are you speaking like that...?"
"Oh, that's right...you blokes don't grasp the truth behind Tartaros yet." Maggie shook her head with a knowing smile. "Well, that's a proper amusing thing, innit? You'll die before you ever have the chance to know." Maggie was preparing to finish the two wizards off, but then...she sensed something. She turned her head, spotting an elongated dragon composed of ice shooting in her direction. She held her hand out and snarled, the ice dragon colliding with her, but melting due to the sheer heat that Maggie was giving off. "Which one of you did that!?"
"Not me..." Gray admitted and Waiston shook his head.
"Honestly, how many times do I have to end up bailing you out?" That voice came from Lyon Vastia. He was a fair distance away, but his Dynamic Ice Make allowed him to close the distance with his attacks easily.
"Who...?" Maggie quirked a brow, having no interest in Lyon whatsoever.
"Lyon!?" Gray's eyes widened. "What the hell are you doing here?"
"Who's this?" Waiston also stared at Lyon like some kind of stranger.
"I'm Lyon Vastia...the strongest pupil to come from Ur." Lyon stated boldly while making his way over to Gray and Waiston. "Chelia informed me what happened, and that message across the country was difficult to ignore. So...I wondered what kind of mess Gray found himself in this time, and I come in to see this shameful display."
"Do you really gotta talk like that right now?" Gray groaned while standing up.
"So this is the stronger one, or what?" Waiston was still confused, but he wasn't going to say no to extra help.
Lyon gripped his shirt and tossed it aside. "So I knew that Gray needed my help, and as the star pupil, how could I refuse? You're about to enter a completely different domain of cold!"
Maggie just rolled her eyes. "What is it with you strippers? I'm not interested." But after her groan of annoyance, a grin crept up on her face. "Fine by me, though. This just means more meat to burn."
.
.
Cana and Warren were sitting at the entrance inside the tower, eying the door carefully. Cana was shuffling her deck of cards, making sure they would be ready in case anyone tried to attack them. Warren had to fingers to his temple, using this time to establish a telepathic connection with the Fairy Tail members inside. "Hello, can anyone here me?" Warren asked aloud.
"I can hear you, loud and clear," Laxus replied.
"I hear you, Warren," Erza replied. The other Fairy Tail members, aside from Gray, responded positively, signifying that the group was all connected via Warren.
"Excellent," Warren smiled slightly before looking around. "The only one that I don't have a link with is Gray, and he's still outside…"
"Gray'll be fine!" Happy commented gleefully.
"I hope so," Mirajane replied. "If I remember right, that girl took Natsu's flames like they were nothing…" Mirajane frowned slightly, but the only one who could see her do so was Elfman.
"That perverted iceberg better win!" Natsu shouted.
"Right…just be careful, everyone, and let me know when something comes up," Warren said before the link went silent, just meaning everyone to do what they were doing.
"Those bastards have a lot of nerve, don't you think?" Cana asked; feeling satisfied with the current arrangement of her deck and took a seat on a conveniently placed chair, crossing one leg over the other as she looked up at Warren.
"Mhm…taking one of our nakama…destroying our guild…" Warren replied.
"Not only that…" Cana frowned slightly as she swung her legs. "They did it on Wendy's birthday too…Imagine how the poor girl must feel right now?" Cana took her flask, thankful she remembered to bring it and took a sip. "She's not herself right now, I can say that much…I just hope we can all get out of this mess okay…"
.
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Aiden turned his head, looking to the lacrima screen with the video of what was going on outside. His lips curled into a scowl as she saw Waiston, immediately looking at the other screens to confirm his suspicions. He was right; other members of White Eclipse snuck around the front and made their own entrance in his beloved tower, and were now roaming around as if they owned the place. "Blasted little..!" Aiden took a deep breath, and exhaled slowly. "Actually…this is a good thing…I'll show Fiore what happens when you ignore my specific instructions. I think I'll amp the power up to 50% this time…Plus this will take out those meddling Pegasus' for a while…" Aiden walked over to the cannon controls and started to press a few buttons, tilting the cannon's aim from somewhere random to a specific location…White Eclipse.
"N-NO! DON'T DO IT!" Cynthia screamed out, the dark red flames appearing around her body once again, flaring out of her control. She used to have control, but during this entire incident, she was too lost in herself to control her emotions, so every little thing set her off; just how Aiden wanted.
"You don't have a say in this, tool," Aiden replied, starting to power up the cannon. The cylinder above Cynthia started to harness her wild red flames, feeding up into the cannon. The cannon gave off a low hum as the tower began to shake lightly. Aiden also put up feed of the cannon about to fire in the areas where White Eclipse mages were.
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"What's this shaking!?" Natsu wobbled around for a little bit before his cheeks puff up, his face turning pale as a result as he hunched over.
"YOU'RE GETTING MOTION SICKNESS NOW!?" Happy asked in shock before picking up Natsu, floating above the air. However, Wendy didn't stop, and Carla didn't stop as a result. Wendy made a hard left at the next split path, Natsu and Happy just barely managing to follow her.
"W-Wendy, slow down!" Carla shouted, even flying at her fastest she found that she was barely able to keep up with the worried Sky dragon.
"I-I can't! Cynthia needs our help! I need to get to her!" Wendy shouted, not even sure where she was going, she just went in the direction that seemed right.
.
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Arc felt the shaking of the tower, he felt the large buildup of magic energy rising into the area, so he did the only thing he could. He sprouted wings, and crashed through the wall back outside, flying to the top of the tower. About halfway through, he noticed the cannon was pointed in a particular direction, his mouth dropping as soon as he noticed through the bandages over his eyes where the cannon was pointed. "No…!" He increased his speed, but he knew one thing…he wasn't going to make it.
"That BASTARD!" Reve clenched his teeth, tightening his fist.
"He wouldn't…!" Zalen's jaw dropped as the cannon's humming got louder, telling that it was close to firing.
"Don't you do it!" Luke shouted, even though no one could hear him.
"Master and the others…!" Aira's eyes began to tear up; realizing that nothing they could possibly do could stop the Omega Fire Cannon from destroying their home.
"How could he even think to do this…?" Selene scowled at the image of the cannon nearly ready to fire.
"Omega Fire Cannon…FIRE!" Aiden pressed the button, telling the cannon to let loose 50% of the power it can get from Cynthia.
"AAAAAAHHHH!" Cynthia let out a loud shriek of pain as the cylinder above her body extracted her flames forcibly. "S-STOP IT! PLEASE STOP! IT HURTS! IT HUUURTS!"
"DAMN IT!" Arc shouted, flying at top speed, he was close, but he just needed a little more time! Just when all seemed hopeless several blue oval shaped magical blast struck the cannon, not destroying it, but damaging it enough to the point where a sufficient delay would happen. "What?!"
"WHAT!?" Aiden looked at the screen, spotting the Blue Pegasus ship, Christina not too far from the cannon itself.
"MEN!" Ichiya grinned. "GO!"
"Heh…crazy parfum smelling bastard…" Arc smirked before ramming his body into the cannon, putting every ounce of strength he could muster, slowly tilting the cannon to the side and up, off point from White Eclipse. However, he was only able to do this for a few seconds until the cannon suddenly fired, the sheer power of the cannon blowing Arc back a great distance, burning the entire left side of his body. The large funnel of fire raced towards White Eclipse…luckily, thanks to Blue Peagus' and Arc's intervention, the cannon was off target, and missed the mountains completely, hitting the area way behind the guild, but the explosion caused an earth quake, and reached out to an 40 mile radius. Arc was on the ground, severely burned, but still grinning. "...That's gonna hurt in the morning."
.
.
"Holy shit!" Taya and the other members of White Eclipse watched as the large funnel of dark red fire flew over the guild and off into the distance. The earthquake still reached them, but it was nowhere near as bad as the funnel of fire.
"What the hell was that!?" Michio asked, looking around.
"Whatever that was it was aimed at us…" Nami frowned.
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Reve let out a loud sigh of relief as he saw the cannon miss. "Damn, Arc…Thank you…"
"What are we going to do without Arc now…?" Zalen asked, looking towards Reve.
"Arc will be fine…he's Arc, after all, Reve replied, smirking slightly. "He'll be back on his feet soon enough…"
.
.
Erza walked into a large corridor, the walls plated with steel. She looked around, feeling odd around this place. "This place looks just like..." She cut herself off, realizing that it was only true for the outside of the tower.
"Brings back memories, doesn't it?" Heather asked, walking up to Erza from the other side of the corridor.
"You're…Heather…" Erza squinted slightly as Heather came closer, trying to analyze and remember where she's seen the female before. Not just in the little face off between the guilds, no. It ran deeper than that. "White Eclipse mage…What are you doing here? Are there other with you?"
"Of course," Heather replied with a nod. "But, I have a more serious question."
"And what's that?" Erza asked, raising an eyebrow to Heather.
"Don't you remember…?" Heather looked up at Erza with a certain look.
"Remember wh…" Erza stopped herself in mid-sentence, her eyes widening as images of the Tower of Heaven flashed into her mind, even more importantly, images of a young Heather, one of her friends during that dreadful experience. "H-Heather…!"
"You remembered…" Heather gave a faint smile.
"Y-You're safe…!" Erza immediately wrapped her arms around her old friend, hugging the female tightly. ""Independence can teach you a few things"" Erza said with a soft voice. "I'm glad you're safe…"
"I'm glad to see you're okay too," Heather grinned, wrapping her arms around Erza just as tight as the two embraced each other.
"You too, Scarlet…" Heather embraced Erza tighter, the two staying silent for a few minutes. "So, you're here to rescue your friend, right?" All seemed peaceful until Heather's hands slowly started to leak out a toxic missed that filled the air around the two, causing Erza to start coughing.
"H-Heather…What are you doing?" Erza began to cough violently, feeling the poison entering her respiratory system, and she quickly pulled herself away from Heather's grip, bringing a hand to her mouth as she began to coughing. "W-What…?"
A devious smirk appeared on Heather's face as she looked right into Scarlet's eyes. "Independence…what do you think that means?" Erza was unable to respond, she was only able to wheeze and cough uncontrollably as the poison invaded her lungs.
"You're just like those things I call parents, Scarlet. You left me…to fend for myself…you were absolutely right, independence can teach you a few things…" After Heather spoke, she pointed her hands forward, a purple magic circle appearing as she sent multiple poison scales towards Erza.
"H-HEATHER!" Erza's eyes widened in horror as the poison scales came forward. She wasn't scared of the attack itself, but she just remembered that her Adamantine armor shattered after protecting the people of Fairy Tail from Tobias' Meteor Storm attack, and that it wouldn't be fixed for a while. The only thing Erza could do was roll out of the way. "H-How dare you blame me…?! I did everything I could…to allow us freedom…I fought for our independence…" Erza started to cough even harder as she spoke, coughing up small traces of blood from her mouth. "And you think I would purposely abandon you!? I would never…!"
Heather shook her head rapidly from denial. "I don't want to hear it! I think it's time you took a little nap to think about what you did." With that, Heather began to puff her cheeks out, inhaling the poison floating around in the air. "Poison Dragon's Roar…" Heather threw her head forward, unleashing a deadly stream of poisonous gas towards Erza.
Erza knew she didn't have many options left, especially without use of her defensive armor. She coughed violently, feeling her lungs beginning to collapse from the deadly poison as she leaned against the wall for support, bringing a hand up to her chest. The poisonous roar made contact with Erza, and when it faded, Erza was in her Heaven's Wheel armor, feeling her body quickly succumb to the paralysis. So she lifted her to blades up, causing multiple swords to appear over Erza's head, sending them all forward towards Heather. "Heather…I didn't leave you…!"
Heather spread her arms apart, creating a Poison Dragon's Guard to protect her from the incoming swords. The guard proved to be effective, but the last two swords broke through the guard and hit Heather's side, causing two gashes in them. Heather ignored the pain and rushed towards Erza, pulling her hand back as a poisonous claw appeared. "Not only did you leave me…you left all of those people… ALL OF THEM!" Heather swung her poisonous claw, after she screamed out, creating a gash in Erza's exposed stomach, causing Erza to fall to the ground.
"I…I tried to save everyone…I really did…" Erza looked up at Heather, coughing horribly as the poison in her system took over her body completely, leaving her in a state where she was unable to move.
"Failure shouldn't be an option! All those people left there for the rest of their lives, not once getting to know what it meant to be free…" Heather frowned deeply as she spoke, eying the downed Erza. "It's not fair, now is it! You're putting in all this effort to save your friend, but where was that effort so many years ago when we were all left to rot!? And to make it worse, I saw you...fraternizing with the one who did this to us! You're friendly with Jellal!"
Erza slowly looked up at Heather, tears beginning to form in her normal eye as she bit her lip. The past always came back to haunt her. That dreadful tower... "I-I didn't know how many people had not come with me after we broke through the tower and fled…I wanted everyone to escape…but it turned out I'm not even bringing people out to the freedom…I'm sorry, Heather…" Erza hung her head forward, the tears in her eyes falling like a river as she looked down.
There she was...in front of Heather, the mighty Titania broke down. Heather knew Erza was truly heartbroken, and she wasn't sure how to feel about it. She felt a tear forming in her eye, but she quickly wiped it away. "I…I just don't want to be alone anymore…" Heather said, pointing her hand forward at Erza. Was she really going to do the deed? She didn't know if she had the strength...but she just wanted the pain to stop somehow. Looking at Erza reminded her of that painful past...
"Oh, how touching is that…" Tobias appeared from the shadows, clapping slowly at Heather and Erza. "If I knew Fairy Tail and White Eclipse were gonna kill each other like this, I wouldn't have bothered showing up!"
"W-Who are you!?" Heather turned her attention from Erza to Tobias, pointing her hand at him as a purple magic circle appeared.
"Oh, I'm a Tartaros mage, Tobias," Tobias said proudly. "I was the one who destroyed the Fairy Tail building, and nearly killed all of its members without even lifting a finger."
"A Tartaros mage?!" Heather immediately fired off the Poison Dragon's scales over at Tobias. Erza could wait. Tobias was a threat and one she needed to get rid of.
"Heh…you defeated Titania, eh? Let's see how strong you really are…Magic Guard…" A blue light surrounded Tobias as Heather's poisonous scales hit, creating a small smoke cloud. When the smoke cleared, Tobias was basically unharmed, not even the poison affected him.
Heather and Erza's eyes widened at Tobias's uninjured body. "B-But how…!?" Heather stuttered, immediately wincing as she felt the pain from the two gashes in her sides. "Tch…"
"That's what you call an attack?" Tobias sighed, tugging his scarf as a red magic circle appeared in front of him. "Flame Dragon," From the magic circle, a large flaming dragon head shot out towards the two girls.
"E-Erza, look out!" Heather dove forward to protect the weakened Erza from the attack…but it was useless, the Flame Dragon exploded on contact, creating a large explosion that shook the first and third floors of tower.
.
.
"W-What the hell was that…!?" Natsu stopped as an uneasy feeling came in the pit of his stomach. "What was that…?"
Even Wendy, who was currently out of her mind, stopped, freezing in place as she looked to Natsu, Carla, and Happy. "S-Something really bad just happened…"
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Warren jumped up, his eyes widening as he attempted to establish a connection with Erza. "Erza…? Erza! ERZA!"
Cana's eyes widened at Warren's failed attempts to call Erza. "Warren, what's wrong!? What happened to Erza!?"
.
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Tobias turned and walked away, smirking at his work; behind him, Heather and Erza on top of one another on the ground, fatally wounded by the Flame Dragon. In fact...the pair of mages were motionless. "That was disappointingly easy." Tobias sighed, not even glancing behind him in the process.