Ben and Gildarts decide to spar after their arm wrestling match. They went to an empty area far away from Magnolia to avoid damaging anything in the town. A battle between 2 high-level mages like them is extremely destructive.
Coincidentally, when they went to the empty area, mages from Blue Pegasus and Lamia Scale arrived. The news of the Tenrou Team's return had spread so the 2 allied guilds decided to visit Fairy Tail. They came on Blue Pegasus' airship, Christina.
The ones who came were the usual people, Master Bob, Ooba Babasama, Jura, Team Lyon and Team Ichiya. But there were some new faces. A little girl around Wendy's age named Sherria Blendy who is Sherry's cousin and a blonde-haired woman named Jenny Realight in Blue Pegasus.
When they heard that Ben and Gildarts are going to spar, the 2 guild's mages decided to watch. They all want to see Fairy Tail's Wizard Saint take on Fairy Tail's ace. Gildarts was famous for being incredibly strong, so they all are curious.
They arrive at the empty area after walking for a few minutes. Gildarts and Ben assume their positions while the 3 guild masters, Jura and Fairy Tail's S-Class mages stand in front of the others to protect them from stray spells and other things.
"Who do you think will win?" Gray asked.
"I don't know. They're both ridiculously strong." Gajeel admitted.
"What do you mean you don't know? Gildarts will win obviously." Natsu said confidently.
"But he lost in the arm wrestling match." Elfman pointed out.
"Th-that's...a real battle is different from a contest of strength." Natsu said stubbornly.
"Gildarts hasn't had the chance to improve over the last 3 years due to Fairy Sphere, so Ben will end up winning this battle because he's more powerful right now." Kenshin wisely noted.
"Heh, we'll see. That old man has more experience, so the result hasn't been decided yet." Cana said, defending her father.
Everyone watched Ben and Gildarts intensely because the result of their sparring match will decide who their guild's ace will be. The boys are also focused on it. They always wanted to chase after Gildarts and surpass him one day.
If Ben wins this match, he will be their new goal. Chasing after Gildarts is difficult enough so it will be even more difficult to chase after Ben if he can defeat Gildarts. But they were also excited with this battle because they want to see Gildarts and Ben use their full power.
Both of them start the match after everyone else was a good distance away. They rush at each other and coat their fists with their magic. Gildarts' fist glowed brightly while Ben's fist glowed bright gold as he used the solar power of his Sun Dragon Slayer Magic.
They meet in the middle and throw punches at each other. A boom and strong shock wave were created by the clash. The shock wave is really strong and it will push the audience back if not for the high-ranked mages in front blocking the shock wave.
They were already amazed with the first clash and even more so with the other ones. Ben and Gildarts engage in a close quarters fight with their bodies coated by their magic. Strong shock waves kept appearing as they exchange blows.
With his current power level, Ben doesn't need to be wary of Gildarts' magic. He has enough power to prevent Gildarts' magic from crushing him or his magic. Over the last 3 years, Ben had learned many new types of magic including Crush Magic, although he only knew the theories and never used them.
By learning them, Ben now knew the method to counter them. Close combat using concentrated magic power is the best way to face Crush Magic. Concentrating magic power will make the attack power increase a lot.
In the end, all clashes of magic will be decided by their power. The one with more power will surely win. It applies to all kinds of magic and spells.
By concentrating his magic power in his attacks, Ben can increase his attack power without wasting too much magic power. He will need to get a lot more magic power if he used long ranged spells because his magic power will spread.
Their battle continues as they move around to attack their opponent from other angles. The clashes from their battle destroy the surrounding area. The ground cracked, the trees broke, the grass was uprooted and the air became turbulent because of the shock waves.
Their match seemed to be even but slowly, Gildarts' original hand started to get burned and his prosthetic hand started to melt. Even the audience sweated buckets because the air became very hot.
Ben's magic is so hot that it raised the temperature around him significantly. The vegetation around them also started to die and be burned up by the heat. If not for the magical protection of the S-Class mages, their clothes would be burned or melted.
Gildarts felt a lot worse than the audience. He came in contact with the source of the heat directly. His clothes even started to burn so he threw some of them off and only kept his pants.
Slowly, Gildarts was pushed back by Ben and took more attacks. Then he destroyed the ground to break Ben's footing. However, he quickly reacted to it by melting the ground, turning it into lava.
Now Gildarts is the one in trouble because he can't stand on lava. So he jumped away to get out of the lava zone that kept spreading. Ben seized the opportunity to attack him while he was too focused on getting away.
Ben suddenly turned into a streak of light and appeared before Gildarts in an instant. It's not even teleportation, but his speed has matched the teleportation spell. Light is the fastest thing in the world, and he can use it to it's full potential.
When he got in front of Gildarts, Ben immediately punched the half-naked man's body. Gildarts can't even defend himself because he was too fast for Gildarts to react. So Gildarts crashed into the ground and the impact broke it, leaving a large crater behind.
Gildarts coughed up some blood after the impact with a pained expression on his face. Ben descended and crouched next to the fallen Gildarts with his flaming right hand held a few centimeters in front of Gildarts' face.
"So?" Ben asked with a smirk.
Gildarts smiled bitterly as he said, "You win."
Ben grinned and dispelled his magic before calling for Wendy to heal Gildarts. She rushed over and immediately healed Gildarts' injuries. Ben supplied her with his magic power to speed the healing process up.
Soon, all of Gildarts' injuries were healed, including the internal injuries and burns. Wendy wasn't exhausted even though she used a lot of her magic power because Ben supplied her with a lot of magic power.
Gildarts was talking happily with Ben about their match. He wanted to discuss a few things with Ben because he wanted to improve himself. Losing to Ben isn't shameful and it didn't destroy his confidence.
It made him more passionate to improve himself instead. Gildarts actually found a lot of room for improvement in their battle. He found his shortcomings and weaknesses that he didn't know about before so he can improve himself by taking care of those problems.
Meanwhile, the ones who have known Gildarts for a long time are still in disbelief. They never thought Gildarts would lose to a 20 year old mage. But it also burned the passion in their hearts to improve themselves and chase after Ben.
Ben smiled after seeing their expressions, 'Be strong so that the same tragedy that fell upon us won't be repeated.'