Despite her sudden overturn in the situation, Lucy soon found herself in a very tough situation. She and Virgo were able to defeat some of Bora's men, but the fire wizard was able to dodge the celestial spirit and go for Lucy, all while the others dealt with the celestial spirit. Even if Lucy was able to hold on for a few moments against him, she soon was subdued by him, who used his fire to create more restrains on Lucy, this time securing both his hands together and elevating her a few inches from the ground.

"Princess…" Virgo said, as she prepared to go help Lucy after taking down some of Bora's goons.

However, Bora summoned a fire ball and said to the celestial spirit:

"If I were you, I wouldn't do any other move. Unless you want me to burn your master."

To make his point, he shot some embers of his fire towards Lucy, with them burning through her top and skirt (causing her body to get more reveled), while also causing some slight burns on her. That caused Virgo to stop on her place.

As he saw his men starting to get back on their feet, Bora told them:

"Okay, boys, let's get back to business. We already lost precious time. People won't ignore this barrier forever. Recover the goods and make sure they are tightly secure. I'll handle this two myself."

"Okay, boss" they all said, as one of them went to get the box.

Turning to Lucy, Bora approached her with his taunting smile and told her:

"I hope you're ready, sweetie. We're going to have so much fun."

But before he could do anything, lightning came out from the magic mist that served as a barrier and hit Bora, pushing him back. That caused the fire that was holding Lucy to disappear, and she fell. But she didn't fall on the ground, but was caught by someone. When she looked up, Lucy saw…

"Laxus?" she asked, seeing the former S-class wizard of her guild who was looking forward towards Bora (who was getting up after being hit).

He put her down carefully and then got up and moved forwards, while removing his cloak and placing it over Lucy to cover her.

"Stay with her" Laxus said to Virgo, who nodded to him and went to the owner of her key.

"Are you okay, princess?" Virgo asked.

"Yes, Virgo, don't worry" Lucy replied, while wrapping herself with Laxus' cloak. "Can you please get me some clothes?"

"Sure thing, princess…" Virgo replied.

Facing Bora and his men, Laxus just said with calmness and a bit of notorious authority on his voice:

"Let the box here and leave… now. If you do that, things don't have to get messy."

But Bora just made a scornful chuckle and replied:

"Do you think you scare us just because you just come in shooting lightning and…"

Before he could even finish the sentence, one of his men just got electrocuted. Bora couldn't believe how fast that just happened, but then he noticed some electricity coming from Laxus.

"This was my second warning" Laxus told, with more seriousness on his voice. "You won't have a third one. Leave… now."

That sudden attack from Laxus scared Bora's men. Even him felt himself intimidated. Obviously that man was no ordinary wizard. But he just couldn't afford to lose all the girls he had just got, after all the work and time he dedicated to them.

"Don't back down!" he told his men. "He is just one. We are many. We can take him down!"

"Yeah!" they replied.

And so they all started going towards Laxus. Sighing, he went to take them all out. One by one, Bora's men started to fall, with most being taken down with just one blow from Laxus. Noticing then Lucy, who had just traded her burned clothes for the ones Virgo brought her, he saw his chance.

Summoning his fire whip, he went to attack Lucy. She saw that coming, but she wouldn't be able to dodge in time. Virgo was about to shield her owner, when Laxus suddently appeared in front of them, taking the hit from the fire whip. However, it would appeared that the attack didn't do much, besides burning his jacket over his left side, something that left Bora completely astonished, even more when he realized he was the only one standing of his team.

"You call that fire magic?" Laxus asked. "I've already seen a child cast a much more impressive attack… for real. You should really have listened to my warnings."

Feeling completely overwhelmed and not wanting to get caught again, Bora tried to run away, but then, as Laxus released more electricity of his body, a tremendous lightning fell from the sky on Bora, causing him to scream in pain, before falling unconscious on the ground after the lightning disappeared. Once that happened, the barrier around them disappeared.

Lucy had finished putting on the new clothes when she turned to Virgo and said:

"Thank you, Virgo, you can go now. Thank you for everything."

"My pleasure, Princess" Virgo replied, making a bow before disappearing.

Holding Laxus' cloak, she approached him, as he turned to her, saying:

"Laxus… thank you so much… If it weren't for you…"

"What is wrong with you?!" Laxus asked, causing Lucy to get silenced. "Have you been too much around Natsu?! I hope that is the reason, otherwise I don't get why someone as smart as you would try to beat an entire gang of slave traders."

Lucy was caught off-guard by what Laxus just said. Maybe that could have been him just calling her "weakling", but she could notice the worry in his voice, for more he tried to hide it. That caused her to blush a bit, but she turned her face away to hide it, while saying:

"Well, in my defense, my job was to find missing girls. I didn't know it would lead me to face an entire gang. Much less they would target me… again."

There was a pause and then Lucy's face was invaded by a sudden sadness, as she realized that, once again, she got into trouble that she couldn't solve all by herself. Once again, she was the damsel in distress, needing to be saved. The one moment she tried to prove she could handle herself she ended up proving the opposite, what made Lucy feel herself stupid about her argument with Natsu. Some tears started to appear on her eyes and, despite her best efforts, she couldn't help but letting one or two come down, all while saying with a forced smile:

"That was… really stupid of me to assume I could handle a job like this… Of course it would be dangerous. Mira warned about it… But… I just wanted to prove that I could do things without needing to rely on Natsu… or on Erza… or on Gray… or on anyone. I guess I will always be the dead weight, the one constant worry for everyone…"

Laxus didn't exactly know what was all that about. He never cared to learn how to handle people that were overly emotional… but he could see Lucy was feeling herself not much of a worthy wizard of Fairy Tail… and that was a feeling he himself came to feel in the worst possible way. He advanced towards her and took back his cloak, putting it back on his shoulders and then said:

"I find it funny that the one wizard that was able to beat Brixlow, a member of the Thunder Legion, and was able to unite the entire guild during the Battle of Fairy Tail would think that about herself. If you want my opinion… I think no one has proved to be more capable than you."

Having said that, he started to move away, with Lucy observing him. She soon found herself feeling warmer, as she blushed immensely and felt her heartbeat racing. As she observed Laxus, she could feel that she had gain even more appreciation for him… more than just the conflicted feelings she had.

Noticing then the box with the girls turned into dolls kidnapped by Bora and his men who now lied on the ground, she said to Laxus:

"Laxus, wait! What about this? Don't you want to get the reward…?"

He stopped and then said, without looking back:

"Your job was to find the missing girls, right? Congratulations, you just did that."

Having said that, he moved away. Despite Lucy got a little angry for that response, she just couldn't stay mad at him after what he did for her.

After he was far away, Laxus stopped, as he sighed and took his right hand towards under his jacket, right under the place where Bora's attack hit him, and took Lucy's music lacrima that had been pierced by it, losing all of its music. He was planning to give it back to her, but now that it was damaged, there was no point. After using his electricity to destroy the lacrima completely, Laxus continued his way.

After rounding up Bora and his gang to Amaryll's authorities and delivering the box with the girls they had kidnapped, they forced the bandits to turn them back to normal. Then, Lucy got payed for the job, but she couldn't help but feeling she didn't deserve it. After all, even if she, in a way, managed to find and recover the missing girls, the truth was that Laxus was the one to actually save them all.

As she walked on the streets of the town, she couldn't help but thinking about Laxus and how much he had really changed. Who would think that the Laxus she had first met would even do something like this? All that made her see him in a brand new perspective and that made her express a big smile.

"Lucy!" she heard a voice calling.

Turning around, she saw that it was Happy that called her and he was coming, flying with his Aera magic. Not far away, he was followed by Erza, Gray and Natsu (with the latter coming a bit behind and with a frown face).

"What are you guys doing here?" Lucy asked.

"Well, we are a team, aren't we?" Erza asked. "Teammates must remain together."

"That and the fact Erza got worried about the job you took" Gray replied.

"And fortunately there was no foundation for that worry" Erza told, with her arms crossed and her smile. "We've heard already how you managed to save those girls."

"Well… it wasn't exactly how it really happened…" Lucy started, nervously, unable to find words to tell her friends what really happened.

Lucy was interrupted when Erza pulled her into one of her hugs, where she basically hit the former's head against her armor, saying:

"Amazing work, Lucy. You made Fairy Tail proud."

"Yeah, what is rather surprising, having in consideration you tend to mess things up, Lucy" Happy replied.

"Shut it, cat!" Lucy exclaimed, as she freed herself from Erza's hug.

It was then that her gaze crossed Natsu's, creating an awkward silence between them, with neither of them looking at each other directly. Getting enough of that, Erza grabbed the back of Natsu's neck, causing him to moan in pain, as she said:

"Do it now…"

"Okay, okay…" Natsu replied.

Erza released him and Natsu, trying to avoid look directly at Lucy, said:

"I'm sorry, Lucy…"

Hearing Natsu apologizing made Lucy to feel a little guilty. If there was one thing that experience taught her was that, no matter the skills, one is only stronger with their friends around. What Natsu did was to protect her because she was his friend and he cared for her, so Lucy getting mad at him was totally an overreaction of her part, her feelings of insecurity getting the best of her.

"I should also apologize to you too, Natsu" she said, much to the Dragon Slayer's confusion. "I know you didn't mean to undervalue my worth, but… It's just that all of you are so strong and with amazing magic! Meanwhile… I am just a common celestial wizard who is always afraid of a direct confrontation."

"Lucy…" Erza started.

"Come on, that is not true" Gray replied.

"Well… the last part kind is…" Happy replied. "But you are everything, but common, Lucy."

There was a pause, where Lucy waited for a response from Natsu. It was then that he replied:

"That's so lame…"

That response really caught both Erza, Gray and Happy off-guard.

"Natsu!" Gray protested.

"That's Natsu for you…" Happy said, while shrugging his shoulders.

It was then that Natsu approached Lucy and continued saying:

"Why would you even think that? You are strong. You already saved us many times. So why would I even bother to make a team with you, if that wasn't true?"

"Uh, because we needed a blond girl for…" Happy started, before being silenced by Erza.

"Natsu… do you really think that?" Lucy asked, with some tears on her eyes.

"Of course!" he exclaimed, while making his big smile.

Just that made Lucy feel better. She didn't know why, but Natsu really could take away her worries. She cleared her eyes from his tears, before saying:

"Thank you…"

After that, Lucy treated her team into a night at the best inn of Amaryll, using the money she got from finishing the job.

At the next morning, they started heading towards the train station to go back to Magnolia, with Natsu walking not very pleased with his arms behind his head:

"Why can't we just walk back home? Do we really have to take the train?"

"Don't you get tired of asking the same thing over and over again?" Gray asked in the usual provocative way he and Natsu talked to one another. "Uh… so annoying…"

"What?!" Natsu asked, getting angry, while approaching Gray. "Say that again to my face, Droopy Eyes!"

"I can say it a million times, Flamefreak!" Gray replied, as he hit is forehead against Natsu's and both started to measure their strength.

But before they could continue their heated argument, Erza approached them and hit them hard on the head, knocking them out and saying, while placing them on top of her suitcases:

"Honestly, can't you guys spend a day without embarrassing us?"

"Well, it's not like you're doing any better…" Lucy commented, seeing how Erza punching Natsu and Gray and put them on top of her cart was catching more attention than the boys' argument.

"That's Erza for you…" Happy said, as he flew to get to Erza.

Before Lucy could catch up with them, she heard a voice calling:

"Excuse me, miss!"

She turned around and saw the owner of the music shop approaching, holding a cubical box.

"Oh, hey…" Lucy said. "Is everything okay?"

"Oh, everything is alright" he replied. "I just came by to give you this."

Lucy received the box and asked:

"What is it?"

"Well, that nice young man that was with you yesterday bought it and asked me to give it to you" he said.

The young celestial wizard quickly realized that he was talking about Laxus, what made her blush slightly. Curious about what was in the box, she opened it and saw it was the same music lacrima she had bought. Lucy got astonished by that. After what happened, she had almost forgotten she had lost the one she had bought.

"Did he… really buy it… for me?" Lucy asked.

"Yes, he did" the music shop owner confirmed. "And it was a strike of luck. After all, that was the last one… If he had appeared a few moments later, it would be sold out. He even gave me a message to give you."

He took out an envelope that Lucy received.

"Thank you…" Lucy replied, with the shop owner saluting her before moving away.

Opening the envelope, Lucy took out a piece of paper that simply said: Try to be more careful with your things. See ya, blondie. Despite the message appearing to be rude, Lucy could see that was just Laxus' way to be considerate, causing her to give a smile, while making a slight blush.

"Lucy, is everything okay?" Lucy could hear Erza ask from the distance.

"Yes, I'm coming!" she replied, as she put the music lacrima and Laxus' letter in the box and headed towards them.

From afar on a higher ground, Laxus could see Lucy going after her friends. He didn't know why he did what he did. After all, if Lucy had lost her music lacrima, it was because she let her guard down. However, something inside him told him it was the right thing to do. As he saw Lucy getting to her team, a smile appeared on Laxus, before he turned his back and continued his way.