Chapter 08: Arise, Nirvana!

"Hey, undo this stuff!" Bell demanded of the limp Jellal, holding the man up by his collar. "Killing yourself off doesn't mean shit for atonement!"

"How good is your knowledge of this type of magic?" Erza asked from the other side of the bluehead.

"Not even nearly enough." Bell grimaced as he began utilizing his Sea Magic to begin healing him. "So far, I can at least determine that it's causing extremely potent cellular damage directly onto his vital organs. The only reason he's lasting so long is because most of his magical energy's going into the destruction glyph for Nirvana, leaving just a sliver to work on him. I can stave it off, but it'll be really tough to deal with once Nirvana's gone."

"I won't allow that! Enough of this, Jellal!" Erza grabbed Jellal's collar for herself, her tears now flowing more freely. "Bell is right in saying that death doesn't count for repentance, not with your sins! Do you really think you'll be at peace knowing nothing?"

Jellal's eyes weakly opened up, barely focusing on Erza as Bell kept healing.

"Live and struggle, Jellal!"

Jellal smiled weakly. "Why... are you crying... for me...?"

Erza flinched back before checking her cheeks, staring in confusion at the droplets upon her gauntleted hand.

"Erza, now's not the time to lose composure." Bell pointed at Cobra, who startled on finally being remembered. "There's an Oración Seis mage right there that shouldn't be ignored any longer."

"Tch! Screw you guys." Cobra went into a combat stance with Cubellios, toxic miasma wafting off his fingers. "You think she can take me on?"

"No. I will take you on." Erza wiped her cheeks clean and summoned a pair of swords into her hands. "Frankly, this will be simpler for me to deal with."

However, a sudden wooden clang rang out through the cavern before they could clash, heralding the arrival of Brain. "What is the meaning of this?"

"Of course their leader showed up." Bell cursed. "What a shitty turn of events."

"A self-destruction glyph?" Brain muttered as he looked up to the glyph working over Nirvana.

"Jellal constructed it, that bastard!" Cobra raged. "At this rate, we'll have finally found Nirvana only to see it destroyed!"

"Worry not, Cobra." Brain smirked as he began to approach Nirvana. "I'm sure you know why I have the codename 'Brain'. I was once a member of the Ministry of Magical Development, during which I had used my knowledge to create and master hundreds of new spells. Naturally, those include the self-destruction glyph."

Brain briefly paused to directly regard Jellal, his gaze going confused at the sight of the self-destruction glyph on the bluehead's chest. "Did you forget that I was even the one to teach that to you?"

"Now here's the hilarious bit. Jellal apparently did forget that." Cobra scoffed. "It's most likely from the Ethernano, but his memories are screwed up bad. He doesn't even realize that he's a bad guy."

"What? That is hilarious!" Brain laughed before sending Jellal, Bell and Erza a mocking glance before approaching Nirvana himself. "Even without the cancellation code, I can just invalidate the glyph itself, you see."

Brain raised his and swiped it up, causing the self-destruction glyph to switch it's purple coloration for teal and begin breaking down, much to the light mages' shock and Cobra's delight.

"How pitiful, Jellal!" Brain chortled. "Nirvana will be mine!"

"Never!" Erza charged forward at Brain, steel blades flashing.

But it was too late.

"Arise, Nirvana!" Brain declared, causing a shockwave to spread as something from below ruptured, tearing the ground apart. "Reveal yourself!"

""Erza!"" Both Bell and Jellal shouted in worry when Erza was inadvertently forced upwards from the increasing quakes.

"I can hear it! Our future!" Cobra cheered as the pillar of energy grew even more turbulent as the shockwave spread out far into and across the woodsea. "The sound of the extinction of the light!"

And within the light, Erza, Bell and Jellal found themselves forcibly separated.

All across the Worth Woodsea, many others like Jura and Hoteye stared towards Nirvana as they both saw and felt the shockwave, the former actually sweating from the skyrocketing rise of magical energy he could sense. "Hoteye-dono, what is that?!"

"It has begun! The final stage... The resurrection of Nirvana!" Hoteye explained in an uncertain mix of joy and panic, no doubt remembering that he'd wanted this. All of a sudden, Hoteye directed his gaze downwards, his panic now completely rising to the surface.

"Hoteye-dono..." Jura did not like the implication of Hoteye's reaction to whatever he was looking at. "Can you see something?"

"Something... Something huge is coming, indeed...!" Hoteye explained.

"Something huge?" Jura questioned. A second later, he almost wished he hadn't.

The very earth itself shook as they were suddenly rocketed up into the air atop a gargantuan tendril composed of unnaturally flexible stone. It wasn't just the singular one, as around the turbulent pillar of energy, five more titanic stone limbs quaked free from the earth, some mages being unfortunate to be above the limbs at the moment.

Then the pillar of energy finally tapered off as all six limbs raised up what was connected to them, uprooting loose what appeared to be a long abandoned stone city that now stood several hundred meters off the ground.

And right at the very top, Brain and Cobra stood at the center.

"Finally! Finally, it is mine!" Brain declared. "The ultimate weapon that will destroy the light! The ultra magic of reversal, Nirvana! The greatest weapons of the official guilds, their unity and trust... will now become powerless before me!"

"Erza..."

Erza grimaced as she held onto Jellal while they both hung off what now looked like pathway ringing part of the currently uprooted city. To make matters worse, she didn't know Bell's status at the moment due to their separation, because now there was nothing to subvert Jellal's foolishness. "Undo the self-destruction glyph you cast on your own body! You have a duty to survive!"

"I... wasn't able to stop Nirvana..." Jellal despaired.

"Don't say that..." Bell's voice spoke up from above, causing Erza sigh in relief when a massive reptilian arm composed entirely of water reached down and caught them in its hand, cradling them up to Bell's side. Letting the water disperse, Bell immediately returned to clutching his stomach for some reason. "It was... literally our job today..."

"Bell is right." Erza agreed while she looked over at him in a little worry, wondering if he'd gotten injured during their separation. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, just... trying to keep it in..." A sudden lurch of the structure had Bell's cheeks suddenly bulging in a manner Erza found disturbingly familiar before he forcibly swallowed. "Urgh... I wish I had my own flying cat..."

'Ah. Of course, he's a Dragon Slayer just like Natsu.' Erza turned to observe Nirvana in it's massive entirety as it began moving towards a destination. 'And this massive walking city clearly qualifies as transportation.'

"Jellal... I won't be able to heal as well as I could in this state." Bell spoke quietly, no doubt trying to ensure that words were the only substances to escape his mouth. "You need to stop feeling sorry for yourself and get rid of that thing."

"Exactly. If you wish to repent for your sins, you must be alive to do so." Erza agreed, helping Jellal so that he now sitting beside Bell, before then standing up again to regard the other mages she could now see rushing upwards into Nirvana as well. "Besides, my comrades are also here to deal with Nirvana as well. You're not alone in this."

"Also, you owe my sister an apology." Bell grunted as he slapped a hand over Jellal's chest, Erza sighing in relief when the self-destruction glyph finally broke apart as he began healing him once more. "She overdid it in healing you, and you want to make her efforts for nothing?"

Jellal sighed between the two of them, before smiling a little as he made to get up. "Let's go... Together..."

"Yeah..." Erza agreed as she took his hand and pulled him up, the two holding their gazes.

"...Oh, god, am I the Third Wheel of this group?" Bell suddenly groaned, causing the two to separate. Then Nirvana shook again. "Hurgk! Stupid walking city!"

"Finally, Brain! We've gotten Nirvana!" Erik was elated at their current change of events, with Cubellios joining him checking out the ancient stone pillars. "So this is a relic of the ancients? Cubellios, this is pretty awesome!"

"Look, Cobra. Come and look at the world spread out below me." Brain called out to him, prompting Erik to walk over and regard the desolate city below. "The city of the ancients... That itself is the true identity of Nirvana."

Brain spread out his arms, as if fancying himself to be a king. "While I stand here on the King's Summit, this city moves exactly as I will it!"

'So that's Nirvana's been moving forward for a while now.' Erik realized. "Are we making it go somewhere?"

"I'm aiming for a certain guild, you see..." Brain answered. "Especially since I know for sure it's S-Class mage isn't currently there."

Erik's eyes widened as he immediately got what Brain was implying. "Our first target is that guild?"

"And it shall become the first of many to have their light extinguished." Brain waved his staff, creating an array of Archive glyphs that finished in the form a steering wheel simile. "Go forth, ancient city! Change our darkness for light!"

Something sparked from above, prompting both Erik and Brain to notice Salamander dropping down upon them with a flaming fist.

"I'm gonna stop ya!" Salamander declared as he blazed right past between them, powerful flames flaring in his wake as he incinerated a majority of the Archive glyphs. Twisting about with what Erik could now see was one of those flying cats carrying him, Salamander launched another attack immediately. " Fire Dragon's Roar!"

Flames gushed out from his maw on command, scorching across the entire area with Brain shielding himself within a magical shield while Erik and Cubellios retreated to behind one of the pillars.

"Cobra! Don't let him interfere!" Brain ordered.

'Looks like I'll be finishing that match of ours right here and now!' Erik grinned. "Right! Cubellios!"

Cubellios shot upwards at his shout, his serpentine partner almost knocking Salamander out of the sky before the cat caught them from falling.

Salamander readied himself to unleash another Roar, but Erik had already tasked Cubellios into launching him right at him to deliver a vicious suckerpunch. While Salamander took the time to recover, Erik enjoyed their expressions when Cubellios took to the skies with him. "What's that?! The snake's flying?!"

"Hey, I heard that you couldn't handle transportation..." Erik questioned the guy Brain had declared along with the other Dragon Slayers to be motion sick.

As if in utter defiance of that designation, Salamander rebutted it furiously. "Happy isn't transportation!"

"That's right!" The flying cat protested along.

"I see... So that's why you were already flying. Because you aren't able to even stand on Nirvana." Erik surmised. That would mean that the Sky Dragon Slayer might show up as well, if she hadn't gotten crushed by falling boulders from Nirvana's awakening. As for Leviathan, there was no damned way he wouldn't be on his way, if not already on Nirvana, motion sickness be damned.

'But back at that initial encounter, I only counted two flying cats... That means, we'll only be dealing with a maximum of two combat ready Dragon Slayers.' "What a riot you guys are turning out to be."

"Screw that, you're in the way!" Salamander yelled. "I've gotta stop this big pile of junk!"

"Go ahead and try." Erik crossed his arms defiantly. "I won't let you get near Brain. You shouldn't have come alone on a two-man job when you're clearly not capable enough for it."

"Brain?" Salamander queried before looking down to regard his Guildmaster. So the idiot hadn't even known his name? "So he's the one that's moving it?"

"Come, Fire Dragon Slayer." Erik beckoned, wafts of poison beginning to escape his nails. "It's time to settle up where our fight left off."

"Comin' right at ya!" Salamander rocketed straight for him. *Pretend to go for him, but aim for that guy! The sooner we stop this massive thing, the better!*

Erik's eyes narrowed. "Cubellios."

Cubellios reacted immediately, her tail smacking into Salamander's chest with bone-breaking force when he tried to fly past them. As expected of his durability, Salamander still lived despite that blow, not even looking like he was having much trouble breathing.

"A-Again and again..." Salamander muttered, at least having taken some damage.

"He totally predicted your moves!" The cat muttered, staring at him suspiciously while Salamander clearly became confused.

"I can hear your movements!" Erik shouted down at them, causing Salamander to growl at him. "Yeah, that's better. Let's play... You'll be a fine appetizer before Leviathan shows up!"

"Screw you!" Salamander shouted back, his fists setting ablaze. "I'll kick your ass before Bell-nii even shows up!"

Erik fought not to smile in amusement at that thought. Below them, Nirvana continued it's rumbling march towards their first target for reversal.

Towards Cait Shelter.

KingVessel: Done! Please gimme reviews!